Stories of the Barrel Children
This evening's screening of Nadine White's Barrel Children, in the #VoicesofWindrushFestival, left the packed audience emotional & yearning for more information on the plight of children left behind in the Caribbean, & Africa too, whilst their parents tried to create a better life in the UK before sending for them.
The film tells the tale of people left behind in the Caribbean through the eyes of musician Blacker Dread and others, and presents a sociological analysis of the experiences & implications, woven within the narrative of race & the Windrush Scandal. We heard that the practice not only caused trauma in the children left behind, but in the grandparents who had those children taken away from them, & in the parents who made the difficult decisions to travel without them.
We heard the moving story of Colin Lee-Own who travelled from Guyana in 1968 aged 2. In Guyana he'd been raised by his grandmother before coming to the UK. He said he couldn't accept this "stranger" as his mum & would be chastised for saying so. He was also concerned that his siblings born in the UK, appeared to be treated more favourable to him. The audience was stunned when he said he was only able to forge a good relationship with his mum 2 years ago, after decades of a poor relationship, without bonding or affection. At 17 Colin joined the army, serving in Northern Ireland, and was surprised to find that many of the Black people in the army were actually barrel Children, which be believes was evidence of a certain resilience & the need for belonging.
Marion Smith found the film emotional. Her dad left St Kitts when she was 6 months old & her mum, months later. Her & a sister, Patsy, lived with their Grandma, Mama, in a one room shack on stilts, with an outdoor pit toilet & copper bath, sleeping at the foot of grandma's bed. Before coming to the UK, she was shown a picture with two girls & told they were her sisters. She didn't know them or even her correct name. In 1966, she arrived in Southampton by boat with a sister & grandma & taken to St Albans where she met the parents she did not know. Watching the documentary made her realize that what she had experienced was trauma, but undiagnosed. She never called her mum mum; she is Mary. Her Grandma was her mum & she was heartbroken when she died. Her relationship with her mum & the siblings born in the UK was strained but after her mum's 85th birthday, celebrated in the Caribbean, there was some healing. Marion, a former dancer & now a secretary at Leigh Day, says her experience informed how she raised her own son - with endless love and hugs.
Shaun Pascal of @BLKWALLST_MEDIA, invited the audience to contribute, which revealed that many others had been left behind or knew people who had, with the prevailing experiences of uncertainty, rejection & heartbreak. The phenomena is very much part of the #Windrush story.
