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The Bat Bomb Invention and Other Odd Facts from History and War

Khalid Elhassan May 10, 2020 33 min

35. Comedy in the Caribbean

British diplomat William Whitlock. Wave Train

As the situation deteriorated in the newly semi-independent St. Kitts-Nevis-Anguilla, things took a turn towards comic opera. Robert Bradshaw, the St. Kitts leader who loathed Anguillians, threatened to invade their island, insisting that it had been taken over by the American mafia. In the meantime, Anguilla’s provisional government launched an abortive raid on St. Kitts. It hoped to kidnap Bradshaw and hold him hostage, until Britain recognized Anguilla’s independence from St. Kitts.

Britain sent an incompetent diplomat named William Whitlock, to try and solve matters. The Anguillians greeted him with pro-British posters, and crowds sang God Save the Queen. Whitlock responded by demonstrating his contempt for Anguillians, refusing to ride in a motorcade organized to receive him or to dine with the island’s leader. Instead, Whitlock had his flunkies toss out leaflets to the crowd – “as a famer might throw corn to fowl” in the words of an Anguillian newspaper – detailing his proposals for a settlement.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.