[This obituary was written by my aunt Jill, about her husband George. It was submitted to The Guardian but it was shortened for publication. Published version.]
GEORGE POWE
My
husband, Oswald George Powe, always known as George, was born in Kingston Jamaica
in 1926. He had a happy childhood in a family with high aspirations for its
children. His father was a Chinese conjuror, from Canton,
China, who emigrated to Jamaica and became a
merchant, along with his brothers. George’s parents made sure that he
had a good education and he was part way through college, studying to become an
electrical engineer when he volunteered, in 1944, to join the Royal Air Force.
Trained in radar, he spent much of the time stationed in Devon and Cornwall. He went back to
Jamaica a couple of years
after the war ended, and was demobbed, but decided to returned to England
within a few months. He stayed here for the rest of his life.
In
the 40’s he was very aware that there
was widespread racial discrimination in the forces and in the civilian world.
He saw horrific treatment of black people in London, was on the receiving end of much
of it, and was soon fighting to attempt
to turn this situation around. He joined the Communist Party, which at that
time was probably the most active group promoting the rights of disadvantaged
and exploited people. At some point in
the 40’s he wrote a pamphlet called
“Don’t Blame the Blacks”.
He
moved to Birmingham
and later to Long Eaton, Derbyshire. He eventually left the Communist Party and
joined the Labour Party, retaining his Labour Party membership for the rest of
his life. In the early 60’s he was elected as a Labour Party Councillor in
Long Eaton, and was, I believe, the first black man to achieve such a
position in this country. He moved to Nottingham
in 1971 and after a few years was elected, again as a Labour Councillor, on
Nottinghamshire County Council.
I
first met him just over 50 years ago, shortly after Cuba Crisis Week. We were
pushing leaflets about the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament through letterboxes on opposite sides of a
road on a snowy evening. I remember thinking that he must have been feeling
very cold, as I assumed he had just arrived in this country after a long
journey in a boat.
Little
did I know that he had been over here for 20 years!
In
the 60’s black people were still being
treated very badly in public places such as pubs, clubs, schools, shops and in
courts of law. He and I started a
campaign against a Nottingham pub where black
people were not welcomed in the same room as whites. A large number of people,
black and white came along to try to be
served and then stay there as long as they could, drinking very slowly indeed,
in order to make it a bad night for the pub’s profits. I ordered two half pints
of bitter, and was about to be served when the landlady realised that one of
them was for George. She said “ I’ll serve an Indian or a Pakistani but not one
of those black…………..” She snatched the
beer back and we were unable to get a drink. It began to turn a bit nasty, and
at one point a glass of beer was emptied over the bar, but we all left peacefully.
The pub was closed down a few weeks later.
Thankfully
over the years such direct action became less necessary, and more Black and
Asian people started to become active in
local and international politics, many
of them joining the Labour Party, with some involved in smaller and more hard-line
groups.
George
always spent part of his spare time in strictly political campaigns. He devoted
just as much time in assisting individual people to gain the treatment they
were entitled to expect from the police, the education system, and in their
places of work. Although the majority of these people were from Jamaica and the wider Caribbean, India, Pakistan
or Africa, he was also instrumental in
assisting many white people to gain their rights.
He
was the prime founder member of the Afro-Caribbean Centre (ACNA), formed in 1971 by a number of black organisations, eventually securing
permanent premises in Hungerhill
Road, Nottingham,
opening as a community centre and social club in 1978. He acted as Company
Secretary until few years ago, and was an
active Director until he died. The ACNA Centre stands as part of his legacy.
When
British Governments passed various Immigration Acts, it was clear that many
people would need help in dealing with all the problems they caused. Hundreds,
possibly thousands, of people have been helped by him to resist this new type of discrimination. Whenever a
Jamaican had a relative who was refused a visa to come to Britain, and came to George for
help, just as long as he knew they were telling him the truth about their circumstances, he would
advise them about any grounds on which they could appeal. I cannot remember a time when any of these
cases which went to appeal with his help were turned down.
I
am proud to have been married to a man who was so generous with his time, and
who fought hard for the rights of all communities. He had both Jamaican
and British citizenship, and could move
freely and successfully in both societies. I went to Jamaica with him four times over
the past thirty years. To see the respect he was afforded when in Jamaica was
amazing. So many people in Spanish Town, Kingston and
beyond knew him, and those who didn’t would never guess from the way he walked
and talked, spoke and listened, that during his life he had so spent much more
time in England than he
did in Jamaica. Wherever he went people
treated him in line with one of his favourite expressions – respect and
dignity.
He
was not a religious man, but he had strong moral compass. He never forgot his roots. It was a privilege
to be part of his life.
Jill
Westby September 24, 2013
He died on September
9, 2013. He is survived by his second wife, Jill, whom he married in 1982;
4 children, 3
grandchildren and 2 great-grandchildren from his first marriage to Barbara
Florence Poole in 1949; and 4 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren from a
previous relationship with Lilian Elisabeth Willis during the time he was
stationed in Devon.
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