This Week in The United States - Juneteenth

 This Week’s Historical Theme: The United States 

19 June 1865 

A significant event throughout the history of the United States that occurred in June is Juneteenth. This marked the day that Union soldiers arrived in Texas with the news that the American Civil War was over, and slavery was abolished. As a mixture of the words “June” and “nineteenth”, Juneteenth was coined as the day of commemoration for the end of slavery in America. Despite Abraham Lincoln issuing the Emancipation Proclamation two years prior in 1863, a lack of Union troops in the rebel states made it difficult to enforce. While some historians argue this delay was caused by poor communication in the time period, other historians believe the Texan slave owners purposely continued their practices.

On this day, 250,000 enslaved people were freed, many of whom left the state immediately in search of family members they had been separated from. For many African Americans, Juneteenth is considered an Independence Day. In 1979 Texas became the first state to make Juneteenth an official holiday, followed by many others. On 17 June 2021, President Joe Biden signed legislation officially declaring it a federal holiday.  

Want to find out more about Juneteenth? Click here for more information, or here for more about Biden's new legislation.

 

Nonsuch HP is 12!

 

Today is Nonsuch HP's 12th birthday. To celebrate this, the blog has been tidied up a bit and the the internet safety policy updated to reflect the substantial changes in the internet and social media that have taken place recently.

This also seemed a good opportunity to look back over the hundreds of articles that have been published over the years. Many still remain relevant and of interest, and can be found easily using the "tags" which you can find on the right hand side. Over time we will re-tag or highlight those articles that are particularly worth reading. Here are some tags that we recommend:

• Black History
• Cold War
• Middle East
• Tudors

We also recommend our "pages" on special subjects which you can see on the right hand side, in particular:

• Nonsuch Palace
• Historical Fiction (although this needs some serious updating)

Please let us know if there are any topics you think the blog should be covering in the next 12 years!

Black History Month - Paul Yaw Boateng

Black History Month: 30 October 2020

 

Paul Yaw Boateng is a Labour Party politician, who was the MP for Brent South from 1987 to 2005, becoming the UK's first black Cabinet Minister in May 2002, when he was appointed as Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Boateng was elected to the Greater London Council for Walthamstow in 1981, which was then under the leadership of Ken Livingstone. Boateng was only the second person of Afro-Caribbean descent to be elected to the GLC. As chair of the GLC's police committee and vice-chair of its ethnic minorities committee, he advocated greater accountability in the Metropolitan Police and spoke out against racism in relation to their dealings with the black and Asian communities. In 1992, he became shadow minister for the Lord Chancellor's Department, a post he held until the 1997 general election, where he was a strong advocate for increasing pro bono legal services among UK law firms.

 

Boateng became the UK's first black government minister as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Health, where he was responsible for social services and mental health. In that position, he published guidelines to end the denial of adoptions purely on the basis of race. Boateng is credited with building a close relationship to South Africa's ANC government, and it was reported that he privately worked to bring together bitter rivals in the crisis in Zimbabwe, although he publicly condemned the Zimbabwean government's illegal occupation of land from white farmers and the resulting turmoil, which Boateng labelled a "human rights crisis." On 28 May 2010, it was announced in the 2010 Dissolution Honours that Boateng would become a member of the House of Lords.

 

Want to find out more about Paul Boateng? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Joe Clough

Black History Month: 29 October 2020

 

Born in 1887, Joe Clough became the first Black London bus driver in history. He was born in Kingston, Jamaica, and having been orphaned at an early age, became employed by a Scottish doctor to look after his ponies. When he was just 18, in 1905, this doctor offered to take him to England, an opportunity Joe quickly accepted. They arrived in 1906. As the doctor's servant, Joe learnt not only how to drive the horse drawn coach, but also the motor car, which was a very recent invention.

 

It was not until 1910 that he applied to work at the London General Omnibus Company. Initially employed for a while as a spare driver, once he had passed his test, he began driving number 11 B-type buses around London. He made huge contributions during World War One, as he drove a field ambulance for four years on the Western Front at Ypres. Once the war was over, he lived in Bedford with his wife and two daughters and was able to buy his own taxi in 1949. Sadly, he died in 1976 at the age of 91.

 

Want to find out more about Joe Clough? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Sara Forbes Bonetta

Black History Month: 31 October 2020

 

Sara Forbes Bonetta was the goddaughter to Queen Victoria and was an Egbado princess of the Yoruba people in West Africa. During a war with the nearby Kingdom of Dahomey, she was orphaned, and became the slave of King Ghezo of Dahomey. In a turn of events, two years later, she was liberated by Captain Frederick E. Forbes of the British Royal Navy on a diplomatic mission. From her birth name of Omoba Aina, she was renamed after Forbes and his ship HMS Bonetta. In 1850, she met Queen Victoria, who was impressed with the princess' intelligence. She had Sara, whom she called Sally, raised as her goddaughter in the British middle class.

 

In 1862, she was given permission by the Queen to marry Captain James Pinson Labulo Davies. He was a Yoruba businessman of considerable wealth, and after their wedding, the two moved back to Africa, where they had three children: Victoria, Arthur, and Stella. Sara kept such a close relationship with Queen Victoria that she and Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther were the only Lagos residents the Royal Navy had orders to evacuate in the event of an uprising. Many of Sara's descendants now live in either England or Sierra Leone, where she was educated. She died of tuberculosis in 1880. An obelisk-shaped monument was raised by her husband in her memory in Western Lagos.

 

Want to find out more about Sara Forbes Bonetta? Click here for more information, or watch the 2017 ITV series 'Victoria', where Sara is portrayed by Zaris-Angel Hator.

Black History Month - Ottobah Cugoano

Black History Month: 28 October 2020

 

Ottobah Cugoano was an African abolitionist who was active in England in the latter half of the eighteenth century. Captured and sold into slavery at the age of 13 in present-day Ghana, he was shipped to Grenada. In 1772 he was purchased by an English merchant who took him to England, where he was freed. Later working for the Cosways, he became acquainted with British political and cultural figures, and joined the Sons of Africa, abolitionists who were Africans.

 

In England, Cugoano became very prominent in the abolitionist movement. In 1786, he joined the African-British William Green in successfully appealing to Granville Sharp to save Harry Demane from being forced into slavery. With Olaudah Equiano and other "Sons of Africa" he continued to write against slavery, contributing public letters to London newspapers. His most important published text was "Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic of the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species" (1787), later published in a shorter version, "Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil of Slavery" (1791). The book excoriated slavery, calling for immediate abolition of the trade and emancipation of the enslaved. It was the most radical abolitionist text of its time.

 

Want to learn more about Cugoano's story? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Sislin Fay Allen

Black History Month: 27 October 2020

 

Sislin Fay Allen, known as Fay Allen, was the black woman police constable in the United Kingdom, serving in the Metropolitan Police in London from 1968 to 1972. Allen was born in Jamaica before moving to the UK. Here she went on to work as a nurse at Croydon's Queens Hospital before deciding to switch careers after seeing a recruitment advert for male and female police officers. After training at Peel House, she was posted to Fell Road police station in Croydon. After a year in Croydon, she was posted to the Missing Persons Bureau at Scotland Yard for a while before being transferred back to the beat at Norbury police station.

 

In 1972, she resigned from the Metropolitan Police to return to Jamaica with her family. In Jamaica, she continued her policing career and joined the Jamaica Constabulary. She later returned to the UK with her family and moved to South London. Sislin has since returned to Jamaica again where she now lives.

 

Want to find out more about Sislin Fay Allen? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Don Barden

Black History Month: 25 October 2020

 

Don Barden was born December 20, 1943, in Detroit, Michigan. Instead of continuing with university, he decided to start a business and with just $500 started a record store which did well enough that he put on concerts and founded his own public relations business. A lucrative army contract and subsequent property sale made him rich, which led to him cofounding the Lorain County Times newspaper. In 1993, when Indiana legalised riverboat casinos, he teamed up with President Riverboat Casinos and sold his share of Barden Cablevision to raise $300 million; he used this to open the Majestic Star in 1996. In 2002, after Fitzgerald's casinos filed for bankruptcy, Barden took ownership of them, securing $135 million to his stake. Crucially, one of those was in Las Vegas, making Barden the first black casino owner in Las Vegas. Beyond the worlds of gambling and television Barden was also involved in the development of new technologies, including digital voting machines and video jukeboxes that played music videos. He died on May 19, 2001 of lung cancer.

 

Want to find out more about Don Barden? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Ira Aldridge

Black History Month: 26 October 2020

 

Ira Aldridge was the first black Shakespearean actor, who made his career on the London stage. His father had initially intended him for the church, and sent him to New York's African Free School, where many future leaders of the American abolition movement were educated. However, Ira was attracted to the theatre, at a time when British actors were playing in New York, and the city's free black community had launched its own African Theatre. He made his debut as Rolla in 'Pizarro', but the only way for Ira to succeed was to emigrate. Therefore, when he was around 17, he worked his passage to Liverpool as a ship's steward.

 

His first known British performance in 1825 had a mixed reception. The Times commented on his apparent difficulty to pronounce English due to the shape of his lips, but The Globe found his enunciation interesting and distinct. Due to Ira's race, he received a hostile response, preventing him from establishing himself in London. Outside of London, he won respect, and was able to perform as Othello. His contemporaries praised his work, but was boycotted by the West End stage, and so sailed for Europe. While on a lengthy tour, visiting many places no foreign actor had been to, he died aged 59. The whole town of Lodz turned out to mourn his passing.

 

Want to find out more about Ira Aldridge? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Frank Bailey

Black History Month: 24 October 2020

 

Frank Bailey is remembered as the first Black firefighter in Britain, described by the London Fire Commissioner as a "pioneer". Born in Guyana, Bailey came to England in 1953. He was a political activist, and upon hearing allegations of racism against the Britain fire department, and that black people were not being hired, decided to apply for a job there in 1955 to see if this was true. He was accepted, however, and joined the West Ham fire brigade in East London. In a collection of memoirs from Black and Asian staff of the fire brigade, Bailey described how he saved the life of another firefighter who had fainted, by bringing him down to the ground in a fireman's lift.

 

Though he was talented as a firefighter, and making positive contributions to the community, he still faced discrimination in the position, and he left the job in 1965 due to have being passed over for promotion several times. Today, though there are still areas that require change, 32% of employees of the fire department are from black or ethnic minority backgrounds, thanks to the work of Bailey and others like him. Bailey also made positive change by being one of London's first black mental welfare officers and psychiatric social workers, although he is most well remembered in his role as a firefighter. He continued to follow African and Caribbean politics and campaigned for the rights of the black working class, until his death in 2015.

 

Want to find out more about Frank Bailey? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Wilfred Wood

Black History Month: 23 October 2020

 

Wilfred Denniston Wood, born in Barbados in 1936, became the Bishop of Croydon in 1985 and the first black bishop in the Church of England. Being struck by the harsh conditions that black immigrants had to undergo and by the problems of the inner city, Wood maintained an active interest in race relations and social justice in London. He noticed black youths being treated poorly and at times criminally by law enforcement. He condemned how young black people were systematically prevented from mounting the first rung of the career ladder due to severe racial bias. He witnessed the multiple barriers to housing for black families as they put up with abysmal living conditions and had little support from officials to fight their corner.

 

Thus, he used his authority to set up a fund to support black families in need, established a credit union to create sustainable ongoing income, opened Saturday schools to supplement education, formed a successful job club, and established a housing agency. He was a founder member of the Paddington Churches Housing Association and was appointed the Bishop of London's race relations office in 1966. He dedicated his life to not only faith but improving the lives within unfairly neglected black communities.

 

Want to learn more about Bishop Wilfred Wood? Click here for more information.

Black History Month - Charlie Williams

Black History Month: 22 October 2020

 

Charlie Williams was one of Britain's first post-war professional black footballers who later found even greater fame as a popular comedian and entertainer. His father, also Charles, had come to Britain in 1914 from Barbados, and enlisted in the Royal Engineers. Charlie was brought up in Yorkshire and after the Second World War, he turned professional, and signed for Doncaster Rovers in 1948.

 

Following his retirement from football in 1959, Williams tried his hand as a singer in local working men's clubs but decided to move into comedy full-time. He eventually became Britain's first well-known black television comedian. He reached the pinnacle of his comedy career in the early 1970s. In 1972, he spent a six-month season at the London Palladium. Williams was appointed an MBE in 1999 for his charity work. He was also given a lifetime achievement award at the Black Comedy Awards in 2000.

 

Want to find out more about Charlie Williams? Click here for more information, or here for a video of some of Charlie's comedic work.

Black History Month - John Kent

Black History Month: 20 October 2020

 

John Kent was a British police constable at Maryport and is reported to be the first black police officer in Britain. He served seven years in the office of constable at Carlisle but was eventually dismissed for drunkenness in December 1844, following an earlier suspension.  This was common as clean drinking water was a rarity due to diseases like cholera. Kent was credited with several arrests. He provided several accounts in his later years, one of arresting two "coiners". After arresting one suspect, he handcuffed him to the fire grate in his own house. He left an unloaded pistol with his wife, telling her to shoot the prisoner if he tried to escape. Kent then apprehended the second outstanding suspect. Later, he became a court bailiff, then a Parish Constable at Longtown. Until 2006, when a former officer of Cumbria Constabulary discovered Kent's employment records, it was thought that Britain's first black police officer was Norwell Roberts.

 

Want to find out more about John Kent? Click here for more information, or here for more about Norwell Roberts.

Black History Month - Clive Sullivan

Black History Month: 21 October 2020

 

Clive Sullivan, a Welsh rugby league player, was the first black captain for Great Britain in any sport. Born in Cardiff, his rugby journey began in 1961 while he was serving in the army. He was chosen to play in an inter-corps match, and showed great potential, despite having injury doubts. Sullivan was eventually picked up by Hull FC. Although his first seasons were hampered by his army commitments and some injury concerns, he featured more prominently in 1964 after becoming free from his military duties. Whilst at Hull, he made 352 appearances and scored 250 tries.

 

During the 1960s and 70s, there were very few black athletes in key positions in British sport, but Sullivan was the person who would change that. Throughout his career, several black sporting role models, such as Tessa Sanderson and Neville Meade, began to feature prominently as well. However, after he led Great Britain to the World Cup, his return was not met with much positivity, due to social and racial issues. Nevertheless, he still broke down racial barriers and undoubtedly impacted Britain sport. After his death in 1985, the city of Hull held him in such high regard that the city centre was renamed Clive Sullivan Way in his honour.

 

Want to find out more about Clive Sullivan? Click here for more information, or here for more about black people in British sport.

Black History Month - Zadie Smith

Black History Month: 19 October 2020

 

Zadie Smith, most well known for her debut novel White Teeth, was born in 1975 in London to an English father and Jamaican mother. During her teen years she enjoyed musical theatre and tap dancing and earned money as a jazz singer at university. Despite her initial interest in journalism, she studied English at Cambridge, and published White Teeth in 2000. It details three ethnically diverse families in London, and won several awards for its portrayal, including the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Guardian First Book Award, the Whitbread First Novel Award and the Commonwealth Writer's Prize. The novel was adapted for television in 2002. Her second novel, The Autograph Man, was published in 2002, and while gaining the same critical reception as White Teeth, was a commercial success. She also became Writer in Residence at the Institute of Contemporary Arts and became a professor of fiction at New York University in 2010. 

 

Want to find out more about Zadie Smith? Click here for more information, or here for more about her work.

Black History Month - Malorie Blackman

Black History Month: 18 October 2020

 

Malorie Blackman OBE was born in 1962 and is a British writer who held the position of Children's Laureate from 2013 to 2015. She primarily writes literature and television drama for children and young adults. She has used science fiction to explore social, ethical and racial issues. Though most of Blackman's characters, like herself, are black, Blackman chose not to foreground the issue of race and ethnic identity (until the publication of 'Noughts and Crosses'), but rather to depict black characters simply living their lives, whether in ordinary or unusual circumstances, without an overt focus on their race. This was because Blackman felt that her publishers were trying to pigeon-hole her as a 'black writer' who would 'write about race and nothing else'.

 

Her critically and popularly acclaimed 'Noughts and Crosses' series uses the setting of a fictional dystopia to explore racism. With 'Noughts and Crosses', Blackman addresses racial issues more overtly, depicting a world in which black people, or 'crosses', are the ruling elite and white people, or 'noughts', are confined to minority status, denied legal rights and work in menial jobs. Through the acutely satirical depiction of racism, Malorie stresses the importance of putting oneself in someone else's shoes. She is acknowledged as one of today's most imaginative and convincing writers for young readers.

 

Want to find out more about Blackman's incredible work? Click here for more information, or here for more about her life.

Black History Month - Margaret Busby

Black History Month: 17 October 2020

 

Margaret Busby was born in Ghana and educated in the UK. She was Britain's youngest and first black female book publisher when she co-founded Allison and Busby in 1967. An independent editor, writer, broadcaster and critic since the 1990s, Margaret has contributed to many publications – including The Guardian, The Observer, New Statesman and TLS – and judged numerous literary prizes. She has worked continuously for diversity within the publishing industry and in the 1980s was a founding member of the organization Greater Access to Publishing (GAP), which engaged in campaigns for increased Black representation in British publishing.

 

In 1992, Margaret compiled the pioneering anthology Daughters of Africa, which brought together writing by more than 200 women of African descent. Her follow-up, New Daughters of Africa, added another 200 writers and was published to great acclaim last year. She has been awarded the Royal Society of Literature's prestigious Benson Medal, and the Royal African Society's inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award. She was appointed OBE for services to literature and publishing in 2006.

 

Want to find out more about Margaret Busby? Click here for more information, or here for a video with more about how she got into publishing.

Black History Month - Olive Morris

Black History Month: 16 October 2020

 

Olive Morris was a community activist in South London during the 1970s. She led protests and demonstrations, while also helping to create the Brixton Black Women's Group in 1973, one of Britain's first official networks for black women. When she was only 16, she became involved in an incident where police tried to arrest a Nigerian diplomat, who had parked his Mercedes in Brixton to purchase some records. Olive came forward and physically tried to stop the police from attacking the diplomat, causing the police to instead arrest her and assault her. This was only an early incident of Olive's commitment to challenging oppression.

 

In the late 1960s, Olive became involved in the British Black Panther Movement, whose mission was to promote self-determination and challenge the British state. During her years studying at Manchester University, she also became involved in the community struggles in Moss Side, contributing to the formation of the Black Women's Mutual Aid and the Manchester Black Women's Co-op. At the age of 27, she died, and was buried in Streatham Vale Cemetery. However, her legacy still lives on as in 2011, the Olive Morris Memorial Award was launched to give bursaries to young black women.

 

Want to find out more about Olive Morris? Click here for more information, or here for more about the Memorial Award.

Black History Month - Lilian Bader

Black History Month: 15 October 2020 

 

Lilian Bader was one of the first ever Black women to join the British army. When World War II began in 1939, she enlisted in the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes, NAAFI, in Yorkshire. She was dismissed after seven weeks, however, when she found out that her father was not born in the United Kingdom. She instead enlisted in the Women's Auxiliary Air Forces in March 1941, after she heard that the Royal Airforce were accepting citizens of West Indian descent.  

 

Bader trained in instrument repair, which was a trade newly opened to women. Afterwards, she became a Leading Aircraft Woman and was promoted eventually to the rank of corporal. After World War II had ended, Lilian began to study for a degree at London University and became a teacher once she graduated. In 2018, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of women's right to vote, 'The Voice' newspaper listed Bader, along with Kathleen Wrasama, Olive Morris, Connie Mark, Fanny Eaton, Diane Abbott, Margaret Busby, and Mary Seacole, among eight Black women who have contributed significantly Britain's development and progression. 

 

Want to find out more about Lilian Bader? Click here for more information, or here for more about the African community in the army in World War II.  

Black History Month - Evelyn Dove

Black History Month: 14 October 2020

 

Evelyn Dove made history by being the first black singer on BBC Radio, participating in the series 'Serenade in Sepia'. Born in 1902, she showed a talent for performing arts from a young age, but despite her incredible voice, faced discrimination from the classical music scene because she was mixed race. This did not stop her, however, from practicing jazz and cabaret, and her career grew as she gained a reputation for her talent. The public and press were thrilled by her incredible stage presence, as she quickly became known as one of the most glamorous women of her time.

 

She joined BBC Radio in 1939, a series which became so popular that, after it ran for a decade, became a TV show. The BBC employed her all throughout the war, and sometimes these appearances were broadcast to the forces. Having suffered from depression in the 1960s, she was admitted to a nursing home in 1970 and died in 1987. Though there were African American women who had had success in music, Evelyn was ahead of her time in Britain and Europe, paving the way for more black women in classical music.

 

Want to find out more about Evelyn Dove? Click here for more information, or here to hear her singing voice.