Incomplete Narratives
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Stanley Greaves
Cassa Pancho
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john and isabella smetham, northumberland
John (1826-1898), a blacksmith, and Isabella (1831-1910) of African/Caribbean heritage were enthusiastic members of the Primitive Methodist Church. They lived in Radcliff Terrace near Hauxley in Northumberland from about 1850 until the 1880s when they moved to Amble, Northumberland..
Their photos were taken by C. Plews of Sunderland St, Houghton-le-Spring.
stanley goodridge, County durham
Stanley Goodridge, born 1928 in Jamaica, was a cricket player and a ‘hostile and accurate’ fast bowler. He moved to County Durham in England to play as a professional for Seaham Park in the Durham County Cricket League. He played two non-first-class matches for Durham in 1956. In one, he took five wickets against Yorkshire’s Test cricketers.
In 1952 He married Jamaican-born Connie Mark MBE BEM (1923–2007), medical secretary and later an activist for West Indians in London, with whom he had a son and daughter.
Jacques M’Bondo, Gateshead
A gravestone in the Elizabethville Roman Catholic Cemetery in Birtley marks the resting place of Caporal Jacques M’Bondo of the Belgian army who died on 28th January 1918. Birtley was the site for a major munitions factory staffed by Belgians during the Great War, and operating, to an extent, under Belgian Military control.
Jacques was born in 1894 or 5 in what was then the Belgian Congo, now part of the Central African Republic. He left at a young age and may have spent time in England before reaching Belgium by 1911. At the invasion of Belgium by the German army in 1914 he enlisted in the Belgium forces. He was one of only 32 soldiers of colour in a Belgian army of over 100,000; enlisting before a colour bar was introduced.
Wounded in November 1914 Jacques was treated at Charing Cross hospital in London. He may have worked at a Munitions factory in Twickenham, but we do know he was transferred to Birtley on 2 nd January 1918. His stay was short as he soon thereafter contracted pneumonia and died. Find our more here.
John Roach, Newcastle
Born in 1806 in Monserrat, John Roach came to England as a freeman before the emancipation of enslaved people in the West Indies, as a servant to an officer. While the regiment was stationed at Newcastle, Mr Roach left and became ‘boots’ at the Queens Head Inn.
He later worked for The Royal Exchange Inn, where he saved enough money to open a successful coffee house on Grainger Street, named the The London Chop House. The coffee shop was popular and John Roach was said to be a well respected, courteous and hardworking businessman. Due to high demand, he moved the coffee shop to the larger Crown Hotel on Grey Street.
Alongside his work, he is said to have supported many charitable causes. He died in 1865 at 13 Grey Street. After his death, two stain glass window were installed at St Nicholas’ Church as a memorial to his life and contributions. He is buried in Jesmond Old Cemetary alongside his wife, Charlotte Green.
With thanks to Friends of Old Jesmond Cemetary for contributing information on John Roach
Elizabeth Hunter, Gatesehad
Elizabeth Hunter was born in Jamaica 1824, to Matthew Hunter, an enslaver and plantation owner, and Sarah Tharpe McFarlane, an enslaved woman. She first appears in Gateshead records in 1851 on the census working as laundress for William Atkinson, Rector of Gateshead Fell (St John’s Church Sheriff Hill). The Atkinson family had been involved in the sugar trade and enslavement since the early 1700s.
The census in 1861 shows that Elizabeth married Joseph Nicholson Elder (1817-1895), a successful stonemason from Gateshead. They had four children, Thomas, Sarah, Isabella and Joseph with one of her sons becoming a marine engineer. They lived on 11 West Street in Gateshead, a relatively prosperous neighbourhood. Their building yard at 11 West Street was replaced by Gateshead Old Town Hall.
Elizabeth’s siblings also lived and worked in the Northeast; Mathew (butler) near Alnwick, George (shoemaker) and Sarah (cook) in Durham.
With thanks to Gateshead Library and Archives
stanley greaves, newcastle
Born 1934 in Guyana, Stanley Greaves is one of the Caribbean’s most distinguished painters. From 1963 to 1968 he attended Newcastle University where he studied painting, majoring in sculpture for the B.A.Hons degree in Fine Art. He has had major exhibitions in the UK and Europe as well as throughout the Caribbean.
Cassa pancho, durham
Cassa Pancho, of Trinidadian and English heritage, studied at Durham University. She wished to write her dissertation on black ballet dancers and discovered when writing her dissertation that there were none. recorded.
She founded the award winning dance company, Ballet Black, in 2001, to provide opportunities for black ballet dancers and received an MBE in 2013 for services to classical ballet.
martini maccomo, sunderland
Born between 1835-1840 Martini Maccomo, who was originally named Arthur Williams, and likely from the Caribbean, initially worked as a sailor on the London docks.
He was recruited by William Manders, the owner of Mander’s ‘Grand National Star Menagerie’ in 1857 as a lion tamer. It is likely he was the first black Lion tamer in Britain. In his performances he would face around twenty lions and tigers. He performed throughout England and while performing in Sunderland he was bitten by a lion named Wallace, who is now displayed at Sunderland Museum.
He died at the Palatine Hotel in Sunderland in 1871 and is buried in Bishopwearmouth Cemetary.