Ray Funk

Very early in their careers, three of the most important theatre and film professionals from Trinidad performed together for the first and apparently only time.

They were all based in London in those days, and were asked to travel west, to the port city of Bristol, to appear on a live BBC broadcast for the west regional broadcasting service.

The broadcast, on May 21, 1952, was a locally produced radio play called Dark Arrival. The Radio Times, which contained listings for all broadcasts, gave it only a short description: “imaginary case history of Negro stowaways from the British West Indies.”

The details are in the Bristol Evening Post column Radio Notes, by Mary Malone. The script was by Peter White, presumably a local journalist, who had researched stories of stowaways on boats coming into the port of Bristol and created the script from his interviews.

This BBC West radio production occurred less than four years after the HMT Empire Windrush arrived in England, and is one of the earliest to address the complex issues involved.

While most Caribbean immigrants came to England lawfully (as far as they knew) in this period, there were stowaways., including a few on the Windrush itself. Andre Williams and Shawn Randoo did an interview many years ago with Lord Kitchener for Radio 100 in Trinidad in which he discussed doing a concert on board the Windrush to raise funds to pay the passage of the stowaways.

Malone’s article about the Dark Arrival production in 1952 noted the stowaway situation was important and timely.

[caption id="attachment_1045039" align="alignnone" width="520"] Edric Connor -[/caption]

“Every year more and more Jamaicans (sic) driven from their own country by hardship, intent on either earning money to support the families they have left behind or finding an easier way of life, arrive in Britain.

“Few know what happens to them after once they have served a short prison sentence for stowing away in the boats.”

Malone praised the play for its depiction of the difficulties the migrants faced: “(T)he racial prejudices; the British workman who refused to work with the (black) men; the landlord who exploited them for their earnings; the employer who used them as cheap labour; the ignorance and ill manners of some of those they encounter socially.”

While not perfect, and not offering solutions to these complex issues, Malone concluded the radio play carried a ring of truth, “the truth brought home to the listener as the production moved…from courtroom to boarding house...to Employment Exchange to dance hall.”

Producer John Irving brought three young Trinidadian performers from London (and no Jamaicans!). These were the established performer Edric Connor and two younger drama students, Errol John and Errol Hill.

Connor arrived in England in 1944 and was quickly on the BBC, singing in different productions, and within a few months was featured in a BBC radio production of the Oscar Hammerstein musical Show Boat. He was featured singing spirituals in London churches, and