Remembering When

Remembering when... the Troopship HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury

By Ken Hayes - Honorary Membership Secretary

The Troopship HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury on 22nd June 1948 with 1,027 passengers from the Caribbean of which 539 were Jamaican.

They had come to England to find work at the invitation of the UK Government and had paid a fare of £28.10 shillings, (£1,0029 in value today). Among those Caribbean natives, there were Polish nationals, (mainly women and children), displaced by WWII, members of the RAF and British natives. Caribbean migration between 1948 and 1971 became known as the Windrush Generation. Britain was recovering from the WWII bombings and rebuilding was beginning. Many young Caribbean men and women who had served in the British armed forces decided to come to Britain to help as unemployment was high at home. These new arrivals were not welcomed as they thought they would be. Oswald ‘Columbus’ Denniston said, “the atmosphere on board the Windrush was jolly, we had two or three bands and calypso singers. Jamaican people are happy-go-lucky, when you have more than six you have a party”. He was 35 when he arrived in England and he began working the same day at the shelter in Clapham where the passengers were staying, handing out rations. Oswald settled in Brixton where he worked as a street trader. He died in 2000 aged 86. He said. “Many of us thought we would come here for a better education and stay for about five years, but then some of us have stayed 50”.

Many of the native British population resented the migrants arrival in the post war period, when rationing was still in place, housing was in short supply and they had a different skin colour. They also resented them taking their jobs, even those that they did not want to do themselves. Signs were posted outside Public Houses and Lodging Houses which read. No Blacks, No Irish, No Dogs. In spite of this resistance the immigrants knuckled down, worked hard and integrated into the communities where they settled. As British subjects the people who disembarked from the Empire Windrush in1948 were entitled to come to, stay and go from the UK as they wished. They shared the same nationality as the resident population as well as the many other British subjects of the British Commonwealth. Successive Acts of Parliament in 1962, 1968 and 1971 were passed to restrict the rights of Black and Asian people from countries such as Jamaica and India. The 1971 Immigration Act preserved certain immigration rights of Commonwealth citizens who had already settled, but firmly established a distinction among British subjects

“In 1995 two of the passengers on the Empire Windrush, Sam King and Arthur Torrington set up the Windrush Foundation, a charitable organisation dedicated to keeping alive the memories of the young men and women who came to Britain to build a new life for themselves after WWII.”

concerning rights to enter and stay in the UK. A decade later in 1981 the British Nationality Act established what is now British citizenship. The result of that was that many Commonwealth citizens ceased to be British subjects, but did not become British citizens. In 1995 two of the passengers on the Empire Windrush, Sam King and Arthur Torrington set up the Windrush Foundation, a charitable organisation dedicated to keeping alive the memories of the young men and women who came to Britain to build a new life for themselves after WWII. Sam had served in the RAF in the last years of the War as a skilled aircraft fitter. Sam returned to Jamaica after the War but could not get a job due to the high unemployment rate in Jamaica. He saw an advertisement in the Gleaner newspaper and bought a ticket on the Empire Windrush to come to Britain to help the country rebuild. Sam settled in Camberwell south London and he applied to the Royal Mail and got a job as a Postman and was subsequently promoted to a manager. He worked for the Royal Mail for 34 years. He recalled being greeted at work with a heckle by a white worker who yelled, “Send ‘em back”. Sam’s quickwitted riposte was, “I am all in favour of sending them back as long as you start with the Mayflower.” Sam got involved with two Brixton based newspapers, founded By Claudia Jones in 1958, the West Indian Gazette and the Afro-Asian- Caribbean News. He was among those who helped Claudia to organise an indoor Caribbeanstyle Carnival at St. Pancras Town Hall, which eventually became the annual Notting Hill Carnival. Sam also became involved in community activism on migrant welfare issues. He joined the labour Party and in 1963 he was elected as a Southwark Councillor for Bellenden Ward in Peckham and a year later was elected the first black Mayor of Southwark. The National Front were very active in the area and let it be known that if Sam became the Mayor they said they were going to slit his throat and burn his house down. Sam’s reaction was, “I am not against them slitting my throat, but they must not burn down my house, because it is not a council house. In 1998 Sam King was awarded an MBE for his community and political service. He was granted the Freedom of the Borough of Southwark in 2016. Sam died aged 90 in June the same year and there is a Blue plaque in his memory on his former home.

There is no doubt that the Windrush Generation migration from the Caribbean, helped Britain rebuild in the post WWII era and contributed greatly to the life and culture of our country.

“As British subjects the people who disembarked from the Empire Windrush in1948 were entitled to come to, stay and go from the UK as they wished. They shared the same nationality as the resident population as well as the many other British subjects of the British Commonwealth.”