On this day, 6 December 1918, Black soldiers in the British West Indies Regiment stationed in Taranto, Italy, mutinied and attacked their officers against appalling and racist treatment. The regiment consisted of over 15,000 people from the Caribbean. Many had been spurred to volunteer by activists like Marcus Garvey, who believed that if Black people showed loyalty to the British king, then they would show they deserved to be treated equally with whites.
Hundreds of volunteers never made it to England, suffering frostbite on the journey and being discharged without compensation. Those who made it to the war zone discovered that they were not allowed to fight, and instead were assigned dangerous and dirty work like digging trenches and loading ammunition. All of the commanding officers were white, and Black soldiers could not rise above the rank of sergeant.
A poem by one of the regiment, illustrated how the man felt:
“Stripped to the waist and sweated chest
Midday’s reprieve brings much-needed rest
From trenches deep toward the sky.
Non-fighting troops and yet we die.”
After the war ended, BWIR troops in Italy were forced to perform menial tasks, like cleaning toilets for white soldiers. And they discovered that white soldiers received a pay rise while they did not.
On December 6, tensions exploded and soldiers in the 9th Battalion revolted and attacked their Black officers. Three days later, the 10th Battalion went on strike, and a senior commander who had ordered them to clean the toilets of a white unit was assaulted.
A machine-gun company and another battalion were sent to suppress the mutiny, and one mutineer was shot. Key organisers were arrested, and 60 put on trial for mutiny, of whom one was executed and others jailed for three-20 years.
Although rebellion was crushed, many of the participants resolved to oppose colonialism back home and organise strikes for better pay. And many veterans participated in the strike wave in the Caribbean after the war. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1600936556758155/?type=3
