Bill Hern

Since retiring from the British Civil Service in 2016 Bill, from Sunderland, England, has developed a passion for researching and writing about black history.

A regular visitor to Barbados, Bill has visited and written about each of the World War 1 Commonwealth War Graves on the island.

Football's Black Pioneers: The Stories of the First Black Players to Represent the 92 League Clubs is Bill Hern's first major published work and has recorded sales across the world. Football's Black Pioneers was co-authored with David Gleave.

Bill Hern and David Gleave are currently working on the biography of Mona Baptiste a Trinidadian singer/actress who came to England on the Empire Windrush in 1948.

Continuing on the Windrush theme Bill is currently writing a pen picture of each of the 1,027 passengers, plus stowaways, who travelled on the Windrush in 1948.

Bill is a proud member of the Barbados Museum and Historical Society.

Wendell Valentyne Byer World War I Commonwealth War Grave St Barnabas Churchyard St Michael Barbados

World War I Commonwealth War Graves – Barbados

/ 7 minutes of reading / Bajan People, Barbados during World War I and World War II, Black History Month, Remembrance Sunday / 2 Comments

On 25th August 2021 it will be exactly 100 years since the death of Wendell Valentyne Byer. Who was Wendell you may ask? A famous cricketer? A politician perhaps? No, he was none of these, Wendell was once a trainee schoolteacher in St George. He was strong and fit – 5 feet 11 and a …

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Empire Windrush docking at Tilbury Docks, Essex, on 21 June 1948

Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beautiful? The Empire Windrush story.

/ 23 minutes of reading / Bajan People, Barbados Post World War II, Black History Month / 3 Comments

Only five of the 1,027 passengers on board the Empire Windrush began their journey in Barbados. Bill Hern writes about them here and explodes some myths about the iconic ship and its historic journey to England in June 1948. Background:The Windrush scandal erupted in 2018 where people mainly of Caribbean descent were wrongly classified as …

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Black Bajan footballer Walter Tull

Black Bajan footballers who were English Football League Club pioneers

/ 34 minutes of reading / Bajan History, Bajan People, Barbados Genealogy, Barbados Post World War II, Black History Month / Leave a Comment

Thanks to a select group of pioneering black Bajan footballers, no country in the world has had a greater impact on the history of English football than Barbados. That statement might come as a shock to some. After all, Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica have reached the World Cup Finals whereas Barbados has never come …

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