You have got to do this, on your own, take your family and friends, if you are just visiting London check out the Black History Walks website and if a tour is on – do it!
This past wet Bank Holiday weekend Mr Muse and I did the Black History Walk around the City of London. It was fascinating. Led by the director, Tony, we travelled back to the Roman times, through the era of the ‘virgin’ Queen Elizabeth 1, the British Empire, the Windrush post-war migration, as well as throughout the Caribbean and back and forth across Africa, and even taking in Australia – all without leaving the square mile of the City.
The Black History Walks have been running for five years and the City walk starts at St Paul’s tube station and almost three hours later ends at Bank tube station. What links up this journey is the people of the Africa and its Diaspora.
Tony describes how the wealthy institutions of the City have built substantial wealth and influence on the backs of and largely unpaid labours and lost lives of African people. He tells the stories with rising anger, and incredulity of how it is that people have been able to get away with this and the truth is not acknowledged.
However, he argues through his walks, if we look carefully and know what we are looking at, we can, claim and identify our place even more clearly in British history. From the crest on the front of the Bank of England, the leopard on the garden gates behind the HQ of Lloyds bank, to the grandeur of Goldsmiths Hall and the interconnecting Guilds; to the beautiful square of the Guildhall, at the Barbican, even in the 1,000 year-old St Giles’ church – all have a not quite so hidden connection with our past.
Tony is an engaging, passionate leader and historian, and he really particularly encourages the young people on the walk, getting them to guess answers, and to spot places on the maps or images that he produces throughout the walk. For a couple of the young teenagers, this was their third Black History Walk; and the oldest member of our group of 20, was a 75-year-old, here on visit from Jamaica.
For me, I just wished that there could be more positive encouragement of the people on the walk to get involved with these institutions that we were being shown. It was great to walk through the city on this quiet Saturday afternoon, though I would have happily watched the glamorous looking black wedding that was taking place at St Paul’s Cathedral – the romantic in me loves a good wedding.
It is just that while Tony connects up the histories, ultimately we are here now – and from what I could tell pretty much capable Londoners. There is no reason why we cannot get involved with these institutions. So for example, there is a stop at the Museum of London, where we had the chance to purchase Olaudah Equiano’s book, but I think that it would have been good to have been given an up-to-date explanation of why this particular Museum has this book so readily available.
As far as I know the Museum of London is very committed to getting all Londoners involved in its projects and shows, and it seems to me a shame that Black History Walks is not a bit more connected up with this. Also the British Museum, I have heard, is also looking at ways to get more people to be involved and to visit, and I would have thought that the Black History Walks could be networking a little bit more than Tony suggests that it is.
Just so that some of the more positive things that are going in on London today, which are also part of our current story are also represented. I think that it is about creating networks that take our histories on in a way that we can all be a part of. I did not want to leave the walk feeling excluded and in many instances I don’t think that we really are, despite the fact that others might still feel that these institutions only belong to them or that they should not have to explain or rethink how they define their pasts.
Right at the end of the walk we were ‘treated’ to the most Caribbean-like downpour, and so we took shelter on the steps of Royal Exchange, and yes despite past times, this is a truly fine city. Unfortunately for us the blue skies and sunshine did not magically appear, as it would have done in the Caribbean!
I am pleased that I did this walk and will definitely take part in others. Back at home there was a story in the paper that academics had re-dated an African skeleton found in the nineties at an archaeological dig in Ipswich.
Apparently this discovery proves that there were Africans in England during the medieval times. And it follows on from the African Princess in York, also found many years ago, but it is only through the recent improvements in carbon dating techniques that have enabled the realisation that this lady was a very wealthy African. What about that Tony – you’ll doing these walks all around the UK before long!
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This article was originally published on May 5 2010 on the blog Black History News
