Category: World War One and Beyond

Bill Hern of Historycal Roots attended The Walter Tull Memorial service held at the Assemblies of the First Born Church in Lozells, Birmingham on 25 March 2018.

The event commemorated the 100th anniversary of Walter’s death in World War 1. Walter played football for Clapton, Tottenham Hotspur and Northampton and was one of the first black officers in the British Army.

The service was led by Reverend Dr Desmond Jaddoo with a major contribution from the ‘Why Are West Indians In this Country?’ project (WAWI). Cyrille Regis, one of the most recognisable faces of Black football from the 1970s and 80s, who died in January, was represented by his daughter Michelle who made a moving speech about her father and his faith.

The congregation was reminded that Walter Tull had been recommended for the Military Cross. The recommendation arose from his time serving in Italy and was made by his Commanding Officer, Major General Lawford, who wrote this: “I wish to place on record my appreciation of your gallantry and coolness. You were one of the first to cross the river [the Piave in Northern Italy] prior to the raid on 1st & 2nd Jan.1918 and during the raid you took the covering party of the main body across and brought them back without a casualty in spite of heavy fire.”  But, in spite of Lawford’s recommendation and praise, the medal was never awarded.

A letter, signed by over 120 MPs, has been sent to the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Defence asking that this situation be rectified. David Lammy, MP for Tottenham, has led on this and is on record as saying; “His [Walter’s] service on behalf of this country was immense. The records suggest great gallantry, great bravery and a kind of coolness. He saved people’s lives, he fought incredibly hard, died young. I think he should be remembered, and the only reason he’s not remembered is because at that time there was extraordinary prejudice towards even having a black man in our armed forces, and certainly towards that black man being a second lieutenant and leading other men.”

Let’s hope the letter has a positive response and Walter’s family can be awarded the medal he earned by sacrificing his life 100 years ago.

    

The subject of Black brothers who served together in the First World War is one that particularly interests us at Historycal Roots. Our book about the Walker Brothers documents the only example that has yet come to light of three brothers who served. We are sure there must be other examples but, for now, they remain hidden.

Today we have added a page to the ‘Forgotten History’ section of this site. It is about the Tull brothers: Walter (whose story is quite well documented); William; and Edward. The stories of William and Edward are less well known.

   (William Tull, aged about 10)

William served in the Royal Engineers as a sapper. He died after the war but his final resting place in Folkestone is marked by a Commonwealth War Graves Commission headstone. He and Walter therefore both served. The new page sets out the known facts about William’s life. It is possible to piece together a reasonable picture of his time in the Folkestone area up to the 1911 census but, unfortunately, very little is known about his army service or how he came to die.

Edward did not undertake military service so far as we know and so, although there were three Tull brothers, only two of them enlisted.

There are other examples of two Black brothers: the Manleys (Norman, who lived to become Prime Minister of Jamaica and Roy who was killed in action); the Bemands (George Edward Kingsly and Harold Leslie, who were both killed in action); and the Vignales (Otho Rudolph and Ralph Ernest who have their own page in the ‘Forgotten History’ section of this site).

The Bemands are commemorated on the war memorial at Dulwich College in South London where they were schooled:

   

It is only in recent years that these stories have started to come to light thanks to the research of authors like Stephen Bourne and Ray Costello (whose ‘Black Tommies’ is a book we can highly recommend if you have an interest in this subject).

We don’t doubt that there are many more stories waiting to be uncovered and would love to hear from anyone with a story to tell.

In recent years historians have become increasingly interested in documenting the part that Black people played in the 1st World War. For almost a century their contribution has been ignored. As David Olusoga commented recently, there comes a point where ‘the omission of Black people from history begins to look less like an accident and more like a deliberate strategy.’

Historians like Stephen Bourne (in his book ‘Black Poppies’) and Ray Costello (in ‘Black Tommies’) have, along with Olusoga and others, been attempting to redress the balance.

One problem historians face is how you identify whether a historical figure actually was Black. Generally the available records do not include any reference to ethnicity and so other means must be used.

Family history can play a part, as it did with our recently published book ‘The Walker Brothers and their Legacy’. That book came about because a lady, Maria Downer, recalled that her father and his two brothers had all served in the so called ‘Great War’. Research online and at the National Archives at Kew was able to put flesh on the bones of Maria’s story.

Another avenue is to look at Black people who achieved a degree of fame and trace their stories back through time. There are many examples, for instance  Randolph Turpin, who was briefly a Black boxing world champion, had a Black father, Lionel, who is known to have served in the British Army in France (both Bourne and Costello have written about Turpin).  We are proud to be able to add another ‘discovery’ to the list -John Edward (‘Eddie’) Parris.

Eddie Parris (junior) is believed to have been the first Black player to represent Wales at football. But, as far as we know at Historycal Roots, no one had thought to trace the story of Eddie’s parents. Bill Hern has now done so and, as a result, we have successfully identified another Black man who served in the 1st World War. Eddie Parris (senior) now has his own page in the ‘Forgotten History’ section of the Historycal Roots site and you can read his story there.

Well done to Bill Hern for bringing Eddie’s contribution to light.

Bill Hern’s review of Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) graves from the First World War on Barbados is now complete – there are articles on the Historycal Roots site covering the twelve soldiers who are commemorated on the island by a CWGC  headstone. The articles are arranged in alphabetical order from Archer to Yard.

The first to enlist was Martin Luther Taitt (September 1915), the last was Fitz Grandison (in May 1917). Taitt also has the distinction of having served the longest – he died in a military hospital in Trinidad on 31st August 1919 having served almost exactly four years.

Bill has no further excuse to visit Barbados which makes his decision to go again early in 2018 all the more strange, perhaps it isn’t just the opportunity to do research on behalf of Historycal Roots that attracts him?!

Congratulations to Bill on completing his project and do please contact us if you are a descendent of any of these brave men..

Clapham library in South London may not sound the grandest of places to launch ‘The Walker Brothers and Their Legacy’ but it was a particularly appropriate venue – this is where Maria Downer’s journey of discovery started three years ago.

Almost three years ago to the day she did a presentation to a group of children, Somali refugees, as part of Lambeth’s Black History Month celebrations. Then, she told them about her father and two uncles, three Black brothers who fought and served in World War One.  Since that day, with the help of the Historycal Roots team, she has discovered so much more about the brothers’ story. Enough to fill a book!

At the event she was able to share her personal journey of discovery alongside details of the fascinating (and unique?) story of how the brothers served their country.

The event attracted a wide age range and it was good to see the younger generation represented:

During her talk, Maria discussed the brothers’ ‘legacy’  but, of course, she is part of that legacy herself. One of her sons was able to attend and he brought the youngest descendant of Charles Milton Walker:

That’s one young lady who will never have cause to doubt that Black soldiers fought in the ‘Great War’ as her great grandfather was one of them!

We don’t think there’s any rule that says you can only launch a book once so another event will be taking place at the Guyanese High Commission in November.

A lot of people helped with the production of our book ‘The Walker Brothers and Their Legacy’ (see the ‘Forgotten History’ pages) but one of the nicest surprises was when a photograph of Milton Walker turned up in Guyana. The photo was considered so precious by the family that they didn’t want to entrust it to the postal service and so we had to wait for a relative to visit England and bring it with them.

Maria, co-author of the book, had never seen this photo of her father in his army uniform before so you can imagine how she felt.

It was small, a bit torn and tea stained. But, in spite of these drawbacks it was a wonderful portrait of a young man about to embark on a great adventure. We debated whether to include it in the book as it was (authentic) or whether we should try to get it enhanced to improve the clarity. In the end we opted to enhance the image and that’s what you will see in the book if you buy it. We think we made the right decision but judge for yourself, here are the ‘before’ and ‘after’ images:

The job was entrusted to Stuart Gleave. He described what he did as being a bit like performing a skin graft, copying a ‘clean’ piece of the picture and pasting it in over a damaged area. You can see many examples of his work at http://www.stuartgleavephotography.com/