In celebration of Black History Month, students in the School of History have been writing blogs about key figures in black history. MA History student John Matthews has written this blog about calypso singer Lord Kitchener
When the SS Windrush docked at Tilbury on 22nd July 1948, among the passengers was a calypso singer named Aldwyn Roberts who used the stage name Lord Kitchener. His performance of the calypso “London is the place for me” on the quayside was recorded on the newsreels. He continued to perform regularly in the 1940s and 50s.
Among his best remembered calypsos was a celebration of the West Indies cricket team defeating England at Lord’s in 1950 – “Cricket lovely cricket, at Lord’s where I saw it”. He later returned to Trinidad where he died in 2000.
In 2018, the Thurrock Local History Society produced a short video at Tilbury with Tyler Fayose as Lord Kitchener.