This is Part Four of a series of excerpts from the book I am readying for publication titled Blacks in the Defence of Bermuda. The series began in the Mid-Ocean News, setting the background from which my research sprang.

My notes last week opened with this paragraph: Bermuda on the whole treated her war veterans well and for the rest of their lives Blacks were not wanting for adulation amongst their own people. They were singled out as heroes.

True enough, whilst the First and Second World War BMA overseas veterans particularly, and later those serving overseas with the Caribbean Regiment were "not wanting in adulation amongst their own people". However on the other hand they were callously humiliated, given the short shrift and criminally shafted by the white power structure, which was aided and abetted by the so-called one-time white-only Bermuda War Veterans Association.

Facts and figures are well documented on how the blacks and their families were deprived of benefits legislated for all veterans by the Mother Country. Those are grist for a book on its own and constitute only a sidebar for my book.

However the black veterans were grieved, realising more protection for them and their families was not forthcoming from the Sir Reginald Conyers-Major Tom Dill nexus. Sir Reginald was Speaker of the House of Assembly, the most powerful man in the country before the advent of party politics in the 1960s. Major (later Colonel) Dill was Commanding Officer of the BMA soldiers making up the BCRGAs (Bermuda Contingent of the Royal Garrison Artillery) who served with distinction on the battlefields in France.

Sir Reginald, as I have noted in my book, died in office in 1948. He was profusely eulogised and editorialised as a lawyer, outstanding cricketer and great public servant during his 44 years as a Member of Parliament. His funeral was one of the largest in living memory. Dr. E.F. Gordon was amongst those in attendance

Three hours after attending Sir Reginald's funeral Dr. Gordon, addressing a huge labour rally in Hamilton, told the workers God had relieved the poor man in Bermuda of none of his greatest obstacles. He said he had attended the funeral of the 69-year-old Speaker to make sure he was "put in the hole". As a white man for the white man, was one of the best ever produced, but he was one of the biggest curses the nigger ever had in Bermuda.

Dr. Gordon dismissed as "damned nonsense", tributes about the late Speaker's great knowledge of Parliament,, adding acidly, "he never knew a damned thing about Parliamentary procedure. I don't know what the hell will happen when he's introduced to the bar on the other side."

There was revulsion in the media and community at large and even amongst Dr. Gordon's most ardent supporters over his remarks.

However, within six months public opinion swung heavily in Dr. Gordon's favour following probate of Sir Reginald's last will and Testament. It revealed among other things he had bequeathed money to the white public school in Southampton on condition that no black students ever be allowed to enrol; and in the event that happened, the legacy was to go to rigidly segregated KEMH hospital where black doctors from day-one of existence of the government subsidised hospital were not allowed to practise.

Dr. Gordon vindicated himself by declaring that people were now accusing him of having read the Speaker's Will before he died, enabling him to speak as he did so immediately after the funeral. "That is not true, I just knew the man," he added.

It was only after 1998 when the Progressive Labour Party came to power, that the grievances of Bermuda's War Vets, black and white were democratically and compassionately addressed, and amends began to be made.

Additional chapters in my book, Blacks in Defence of Bermuda deal with the unfair and unequal treatment of black veterans as against their white compatriots; civilian efforts to get the power structure to commission as officers black soldiers and finally the amalgamation of the black BMAs and white BVRCs into the Bermuda Regiment and the historic ascendancy of a black soldier to be Commanding Officer of the Regiment.