When the residents of Nottingham woke up on Tuesday morning to find police cordons scattered across the city, no one could have anticipated what had happened in the early hours.
Then the horror gradually emerged – three people had been stabbed to death in the street and three others injured when a van mounted the pavement and mowed them down.
As the front page of the Nottingham Post proclaimed on Wednesday, it would be remembered as one of the city’s “darkest days”.
But the thousands of residents who packed Old Market Square on Thursday evening showed the true spirit of the city, with people from all walks of life coming to lay flowers and support the grieving families.
“This is quite an extraordinary sight, but this is what this city does, it comes together,” Bishop Paul Williams, from the diocese of Southwell and Nottingham, told the crowd.
Turning to the victims’ families, he said: “Nottingham is not about to simply move on, and in one sense, we never will. We will not forget you, this city will not forget you.”
Two of the three killed, university students Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley-Kumar, had only lived in the city for a few months, but their parents attested to how much they had adored their new home.
“Nottingham, he really loved you. He really, really loved you. We couldn’t bloody get him home half the time,” Emma Webber, Barnaby’s mother, told the crowd. “When he was accepted on his place to study here in only August of last year, he was so bloody chuffed.”
Webber, a history student and cricketer, was stabbed to death alongside medical student and star hockey player O’Malley-Kumar as they were walking home from a night out, just minutes away from their university accommodation.
“She did love Nottingham. When I asked her to come home last week she said she needed a few more ‘sessions’. This is one brilliant university town,” said Grace’s father, Dr Sanjoy Kumar. “She would have gone on to be a junior doctor serving you and your lovely city at the hospital, and that’s been taken away from us.”
The message from all the speakers, at the vigil in the town centre and another at the University of Nottingham the day before, was clear – the actions of an individual would not be allowed to overshadow the city.
Shujahat Aslam, chair of the Nottingham council of mosques, said: “It hurts as a parent whose kids go to university as well that we weren’t able to look after their kids as our kids are looked after. That hurts so much.
“But we have shown the world that Nottingham is truly one Nottingham, we come together as one community, caring, compassionate, hurt, but together.”
There were plenty of red Nottingham Forest football shirts in the vigil crowd, paying homage to school caretaker Ian Coates, who was killed on his way to work. A chorus of “You Reds” erupted after his children paid tribute to their father.
Ross Middleton, the head teacher at Huntingdon academy, where Coates worked as site manager, described how he “always put the children first”, whether it was through creating his “showstopping” Christmas displays or helping year 3 with their sewing.
On Friday, the sea of flowers, balloons, football shirts and cricket balls on the council house steps was growing, with many wiping away tears as they paid respects.
Nadia Whittome, the Labour MP for Nottingham East, said the week had shown “the very best of Nottingham coming together”.
She said: “We’ve seen a huge outpouring of love over the past few days across the whole city, and I think that’s what exemplifies Nottingham. That’s who we are.”
