Black Britons Speak of a Motherland That Looks Upon Them as Outcasts
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World War II was raging when Allan Wilmot set sail for England from his native Jamaica to serve, in his words, “the mother country.” Like blacks in Britain’s other West Indian colonies, Mr. Wilmot was taught in school that his island had been colonized by the world’s greatest civilization. He patriotically sang “Rule Britannia” and waved the Union Jack. When recruitment posters for the Royal Air Force flooded Mr. Wilmot’s hometown, Kingston, there was no question that he would sign up. But Mr. Wilmot said he and thousands of other West Indian volunteers arrived in England to find that Britons “weren’t expecting us.” ‘They Knew Nothing About Us’ “We had learned so much about the people, geography, the economy of England,” said Mr. Wilmot, who was 18 years old when he came here. “But they knew nothing about us. They believed that colored people had tails but that we cut them off to come to Europe. When we danced with English girls at dance halls, we could feel their hands going down and down and down, feeling for the stumps of the tails.” More : query.nytimes.com |