Abbreviation | GUSNA |
---|---|
Formation | 1927 |
President | Euan Bell |
Secretary | Sam Parker |
Past President | Nico Matrecano |
Affiliations | SNP Students |
Website | gusna.org |
The Glasgow University Scottish Nationalist Association (GUSNA) is a student organisation formed in 1927 at the University of Glasgow which supports Scottish independence.
GUSNA is important historically as it predated many pro-independence organisations including the Scottish National Party itself. It is the forerunner of the National Party of Scotland (NPS) which is itself a forerunner of the modern Scottish National Party. [1] One of the three founding members of GUSNA was John MacCormick who had previously been involved in the Glasgow University Labour Club. [2]
GUSNA was thrown into prominence in the early 1950s when a group of its members (including Ian Hamilton who would later become a well known Queen's Counsel) took the Stone of Destiny from Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day 1950. This caused a huge scandal among the British establishment and it was not until April 1951 that the stone was found by the authorities. [3] [4] [5]
GUSNA has, almost since its inception, tried to play an active part in the life of Glasgow University with its members regularly being involved in the Students' Representative Council as well as regularly nominating candidates for the election of the Rectorship of the university. Notable GUSNA Rectorial candidates of the past have included Robert Cunninghame-Graham and John MacCormick (who with Ian Hamilton as his campaign manager was successful in being elected). More recent candidates have been Ian Hamilton, Alasdair Gray and Alan Bissett; with the most recent being Aamer Anwar, who was elected in 2017. GUSNA is affiliated to SNP Students, the student wing of the Scottish National Party, and played a leading role in its formation in the 1960s.
Prominent former members of GUSNA have included Winnie Ewing, Neil MacCormick (son of John MacCormick), Mhairi Black, and former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. [6] The current president is Euan Bell.
The members of the 2023-24 executive committee are: [7]
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The Stone of Scone, also known as the Stone of Destiny, is an oblong block of red sandstone that was used originally in the coronation of the monarchs of Scotland and, after the 13th century, the coronation of the monarchs of England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom. It is also known as Jacob's Pillow Stone and the Tanist Stone, and as clach-na-cinneamhain in Scottish Gaelic.
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John MacDonald MacCormick was a Scottish lawyer, Scottish nationalist politician and advocate of Home Rule in Scotland.
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Gavin Harold Russell Vernon was a Scottish engineer who along with his accomplices, removed the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey in London on Christmas Day 1950 and took the Stone to Scotland.
On 25 December 1950, four Scottish students from the University of Glasgow removed the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey in London and took it back to Scotland. The students were members of the Scottish Covenant Association, a group that supported home rule for Scotland. In 2008, the incident was made into a film called Stone of Destiny. It seems likely that the escapade was based on the fictional account of a plot by Scottish Nationalists to liberate the Stone of Destiny from Westminster Cathedral and to return it to Scotland, as told in Compton Mackenzie's novel The North Wind of Love Bk.1, published six years earlier in 1944.
Kay Matheson was a Scottish teacher, political activist, and Gaelic scholar. She was one of the four University of Glasgow students involved in the 1950 removal of the Stone of Scone.
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