“Be Wise in Time”: The British West Indies Regiment and Britain's War for Palestine

When the First World War erupted in 1914, thousands of black British West Indians attempted to volunteer for the British Army. Despite over a century of West Indian military service to Britain, these volunteers were turned away until 1915, when under pressure from the Colonial Office and King George V, the War Office finally created the “British West Indies Regiment.” Many know the sad story of how portions of this regiment were forced by the British Army to work as labour corps in France and Italy, but few are aware that several West Indian battalions fought as combat troops in Britain's campaign for Palestine. This paper examines the distinct experience of the West Indians at war for Palestine by providing glimpses of their everyday lives, and also by focusing on how competing visions of empire shaped their wartime experience. In particular, where did West Indian soldiers fit inside British hierarchies of race, and were they seen as potential threats to white, imperial supremacy? Did the military responsibilities of West Indians in the Middle East alter or reinforce these views, and how did West Indian soldiers respond when they came into contact with these ideas? Using the limited remains of West Indian correspondence, as well as court martial records and policy documents from the metropole, this paper assesses West Indian soldiers' perceptions of their imperial selves, particularly the development of new consciousnesses of belonging brought on by military and social interactions with Dominion soldiers (particularly ANZACs). By examining the various racial, economic, and imperial frameworks of governance that shaped West Indian experience during the First World War, this paper hopes to provide a window into the mechanics of British Empire at the very point in which the empire itself was undergoing profound transformations.