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the
report of the Constitutional Conference, the Anguillans didn't have the right
to a capricious change of mind. It also said there were constitutional ways to
do this sort of thing, without explaining what they were, and finished by
ordering the Anguillans to give back the guns to the policemen and start
behaving.
As
the Wooding Report says of this Statement: "It held out no promise to the
Anguillans. If it was intended as a call to the Anguillans to surrender it
failed because it misjudged the tempo of feeling on the island and the fact
that, if not world opinion, certainly the Press in Britain and in the Caribbean
as well as the Caribbean Bar Association was on the side of the
Anguillans."
(Actually,
the last part of that quote isn't entirely accurate. Nobody was on the side of
the Anguillans yet—it was still too early as of June 1, 1967 , for anybody to have picked sides at
all—though a little later everybody would be on Anguilla 's side, when the affair had been blown up
into an international incident. At two days of age, however, the rebellion was
still small potatoes. In fact, the press in Britain hadn't as yet even reported
its existence, though the press in New York would do so the next day; The
New York Times for June 2, 1967, under the headline " British
Help Requested to End Anguilla Revolt ,"
gave a brief six-paragraph summary of the events, in which each fact was just
slightly off, like a color television set improperly tuned. The item took no
sides.)
The
Anguillan delegation had already returned home when the Cabinet produced its
Statement, so a British journalist named David Smithers carried the Statement
from St. Kitts to Anguilla . Smithers also carried a letter he'd been
given by the St. Kitts Government, which he'd been told was a note from Bradshaw to Peter Adams; but when he landed
in Anguilla the envelope turned out to contain a copy
of the Emergency Regulations, which in effect promulgated the regulations on Anguilla and made them legally effective there.
Bradshaw had risked Smithers' neck in conning him this way (had the Anguillans
been a bit less civilized or more irritated, they might have killed the
messenger in the time-honored tradition), and as a result Smithers did take
Anguilla's side, and he did so with great enthusiasm, one unfortunate result of
which would be to create embarrassment for a couple of other journalists two
years later. In the October 1967 issue of Venture , a British magazine
published by the Fabian Society, Smithers did a pro-Anguilla piece that
included the following paragraph: "In March Premier Bradshaw imported from Britain a yellow Rolls-Royce. His deputy, Paul
Southwell, ordered a Bentley. The Anguillans—not least the sick
ones—despaired." Partisanship leads to a certain selectivity of the eye;
inadvertently or not, Smithers had left out the fact that the Rolls was vintage
1935 and had cost £700 ($1,680). By the time the Rolls-Royce item had passed
through the hands of several other journalists, it had blossomed into a lovely
work of fiction. The London Sunday Times of March 23, 1969 , reported that Bradshaw "drives a
canary yellow Rolls Royce which cost £8,000—the finance minister who oversaw
the purchase drives a Bentley."
Actually,
the spirit of the Sunday Times piece was accurate, even if the facts
were a little off. The annual per capita income in St. Kitts is £77 '($184.40)
and the Rolls-Royce cost £700, which is either one man's salary for nine years
or nine men's salary for one year. Adjusting the figures to an average
Englishman's income, £8,000 is dirt-cheap.
Let
us return, however, to the beginning of June 1967 and the beginning of the
Anguillan rebellion. The Cabinet Statement from St. Kitts did not have its
intended effect; that is, the Anguillans did not give the police back their
guns, and they did not decide to behave themselves. Peter Adams did, however,
get in touch with the Kittitian Government again, hoping to keep some sort
report of the Constitutional Conference, the Anguillans didn't have the right
to a capricious change of mind. It also said there were constitutional ways to
do this sort of thing, without explaining what they were, and finished by
ordering the Anguillans to give back the guns to the policemen and start
behaving.
As
the Wooding Report says of this Statement: "It held out no promise to the
Anguillans. If it was intended as a call to the Anguillans to surrender it
failed because it misjudged the tempo of feeling on the island and the fact
that, if not world opinion, certainly the Press in Britain and in the Caribbean
as well as the Caribbean Bar Association was on the side of the
Anguillans."
(Actually,
the last part of that quote isn't entirely accurate. Nobody was on the side of
the Anguillans yet—it was still too early as of June 1, 1967 , for anybody to have picked sides at
all—though a little later everybody would be on Anguilla 's side, when the affair had been blown up
into an international incident. At two days of age, however, the rebellion was
still small potatoes. In fact, the press in Britain hadn't as yet even reported
its existence, though the press in New York would do so the next day; The
New York Times for June 2, 1967, under the headline " British
Help Requested to End Anguilla Revolt ,"
gave a brief six-paragraph summary of the events, in which each fact was just
slightly off, like a color television set improperly tuned. The item took no
sides.)
The
Anguillan delegation had already returned home when the Cabinet produced its
Statement, so a British journalist named David Smithers carried the Statement
from St. Kitts to Anguilla . Smithers also carried a letter he'd been
given by the St. Kitts Government, which he'd been told was a note from Bradshaw to Peter Adams; but when he landed
in Anguilla the envelope turned out to contain a copy
of the Emergency Regulations, which in effect promulgated the regulations on Anguilla and made them legally effective there.
Bradshaw had risked Smithers' neck in conning him this way (had the Anguillans
been a bit less civilized or more irritated, they might have killed the
messenger in the time-honored tradition), and as a result Smithers did take
Anguilla's side, and he did so with great enthusiasm, one unfortunate result of
which would be to create embarrassment for a couple of other journalists two
years later. In the October 1967 issue of Venture , a British magazine
published by the Fabian Society, Smithers did a pro-Anguilla piece that
included the following paragraph: "In March Premier Bradshaw imported from Britain a yellow Rolls-Royce. His deputy, Paul
Southwell, ordered a Bentley. The Anguillans—not least the sick
ones—despaired." Partisanship leads to a certain selectivity of the eye;
inadvertently or not, Smithers had left out the fact that the Rolls was vintage
1935 and had cost £700 ($1,680). By the time the Rolls-Royce item had passed
through the hands of several other journalists, it had blossomed into a lovely
work of fiction. The London Sunday Times of March 23, 1969 , reported that Bradshaw "drives a
canary yellow Rolls Royce which cost £8,000—the finance minister who oversaw
the purchase drives a Bentley."
Actually,
the spirit of the Sunday Times piece was accurate, even if the facts
were a little off. The annual per capita income in St. Kitts is £77 '($184.40)
and the Rolls-Royce cost £700, which is either one man's salary for nine years
or nine men's salary for one year. Adjusting the figures to an average
Englishman's income, £8,000 is dirt-cheap.
Let
us return, however, to the beginning of June 1967 and the beginning of the
Anguillan rebellion. The Cabinet Statement from St. Kitts did not have its
intended effect; that is, the Anguillans did not give the police back their
guns, and they did not decide to behave themselves. Peter Adams did, however,
get in touch with the Kittitian Government again, hoping to keep some sort
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