All language subtitles for Black.Power.A.British.Story.of.Resistance.2021.WEBRip.x264-ION10

Black Power! People's Power!

[reporter] "Black Power."
The words can send shivers

down the spine of
the nervous white man,

but while the white man struggles
with his nightmare,

the Black man struggles
with his dream.

You have to organize
yourselves politically!

You have to say, "My power
is not only the power to defend myself,

but the power of the population to defend
itself by taking a collective action."

Black people!

[narrator]
West London, 1970.

A group of protestors march against
harassment by the police

of a Black-owned restaurant
called the Mangrove.

[reporter] "Hands off the Mangrove,"
says the slogan,

and the restaurant was
the gathering point for the march.

[narrator]
Black Power had arrived in Britain.

It was like an awakening.
It was like a Black awakening.

[narrator]
Young Black people were fighting back

against their hostile environment.

It was an immigrant community
in transition,

from victim to protagonist,
and I just thought: at last.

[narrator]
They stood up to the state,

and they defied
the brutality of the police.

We were not as acquiescent
as our parents.

We saw ourselves
as revolutionary, you know.

[narrator]
It was a conflict that reached

the highest courts in the land.

[woman] Since we've come here,
we've suffered a long trail of abuses

by the police, with the active knowledge
and support of the British state.

[Alan Moss] Policing,
you have to take charge,

and sometimes,
this wasn't possible.

Who had the prejudice?

[Frank Crichlow] You know,
I want to fight, I want to fight.

I need to argue.
I need to scream!

[narrator]
And the question of violent resistance

would increasingly challenge
the movement.

[reporter] The 20-hour siege
started just before two this morning.

[Farrukh Dhondy]
The outcome was quite tragic.

It was a criminal act,
but it was for political purposes.

[narrator]
For the first time on-screen,

many of the people who made it happen
will tell the inside story.

A forgotten history of the rise and fall
of the British Black Power movement.

I think Black Power said,
"We're not going back home.

Britain belongs to us.
We're here to stay."

We were fighting for our rights.
We're still fighting for our rights.

I think the youngsters in
the Black Lives Matter Movement

need to appraise themselves
of what has gone before,

so that they can draw some lessons

from the battles that we fought and won.

I've never been
a turn-the-other-cheek person.

You punch me in the face,
I am gonna punch you back.

[♪ Small Faces:
"What'cha Gonna Do About It"]

It was very interesting
when I came to London

because I came in 1965.

It was a Thursday,
and Top of the Pops was on.

[narrator]
Rock 'n roll and revolution.

In Britain, the swinging sixties
blew open a new era of possibility

for young people.

But not everyone felt included.

There was an unofficial color bar,
which meant that Black and Asian people

were openly discriminated against.

For Black teenager Neil Kenlock
and many like him,

it was the beginning of a struggle
to feel part of Britain.

As a young boy in Brixton,
and, um...

there was a-a club in Brixton...

and the person at the door said,
"We don't want your type here.

Go home."

I said, "I am not going to leave."

Typical Black person,
I am not going to go.

Um, they said, "Look, if you don't go,
we're going to call the police."

Now, I didn't know how to cope with that.
I didn't know what to do.

You'd walk into pubs,
and they'd ignore your presence.

You'd stand at the bar for half an hour,
and they wouldn't serve you.

Other customers would come in,
you know, white customers,

and they would serve them
straight away,

and then you'd get stubborn,
you know, you wouldn't turn away.

"Excuse me, can I have
two pints of beer?"

"Excuse me, you were not there."

[narrator]
For a young Winston Trew,

newly arrived from Jamaica,

the welcome he received
was a complete shock.

[Winston Trew] First day at school,
I am the only Black boy in the school,

and a white boy walks up
and punches me in the face,

so my first experience
coming to this country

was racism and violence.

Every Sunday afternoon
and Sunday evenings,

you'd have Tarzan movies
played on the TV.

You'd see Tarzan as a white hero,

and you'd see Africans fearful,
running from lions.

I feared going to school
on the Monday mornings

because white people would say to you,
"I saw you on the TV last night.

Was that your family
I saw on the TV?"

There were only three other
Black children in the school,

and I can only say my life there
was absolutely horrendous.

We were ostracized in the playground.

I remember kids putting up
their hands, and saying,

"Miss, Miss, why are all
these people coming here?

My dad says it's to take our jobs."

My opinion is that they're taking
all the jobs of the white-white people.

My husband's here now,
and he can't get a job anywhere.

They're a nuisance when you've got
to walk past them in the streets.

They won't move.

They're a nuisance at work.
They won't work.

[narrator]
Tensions had been building

since the UK government
invited its Commonwealth citizens

to come and help the mother country
get back on its feet

in the aftermath of
the second world war.

Working in Britain's transport system,
its factories,

and the newly formed
National Health Service,

the migrants played a key role
in rebuilding the nation.

Peter Knight, please.

[narrator]
But as Caribbean, African,

and Asian families began
to settle and create communities

in all the major cities,

some in Britain came to resent
their new neighbors.

I know there's a lot of
colored people working in hospitals,

and we couldn't do it without them,

but they're filling the hospitals up
for staff to employ them,

to look after them,
I mean the maternity.

I'm having a baby at the moment,
and look at our street,

absolutely full of
pregnant Indian women,

and they're there all the time.

[narrator]
The new arrivals often had to put up with

poor housing conditions,

and they were facing
increasingly hostile locals.

In 1958, violence exploded
in London's Notting Hill,

when gangs of white youths,
known as the Teddy Boys,

encouraged by far-right groups,

started attacking
the local Black community.

[muffled commotion]

[reporter] An angry crowd of youths
chases a Negro into a greengrocer shop,

while police reinforcements
are called out to check the riots.

After the riots,
I always remembered one afternoon,

I got attacked by some Teddy Boys.

I was about 14 at the time,

and this white woman came,
put her arms around me,

and took me away,

and she told these Teddy Boys
to go away.

"We've got sons as well.
We've got sons as well.

You can't do that
to a little colored kid."

Yeah, and I always remember that day.

Within our tight-knit community,

some of the white women
used to take our sides,

and this is why I just thought
I'd start taking photographs,

document some of these people,
while growing up.

But this was the era
that we had to go through,

fighting the Teddy Boys.

And this is how Kelso Cochrane
got killed.

But the police didn't do anything.

[narrator] Kelso Cochrane,
a carpenter from Antigua,

was stabbed to death by a white gang
one night near Notting Hill.

The police denied that the killing
was racially motivated,

and nobody was prosecuted.

For many Black people,

it appeared as if their lives
did not matter.

Even at school,

children were not safe
from institutional prejudice.

[Gutzmore]
The British educational system

was pushing Black children
into special schools,

misdiagnosing Caribbean youngsters

as educationally subnormal.

And the perception
was that Black boys, especially,

had low IQ and were big and dangerous.

[Zainab Abbas] It was just
the lack of opportunity.

I remember my teachers
telling my mother,

even though I was
a very bright kid,

that I should go and work in
the local GEC factory,

stripping electrical wires

because they decided
I wasn't going to do my O-levels,

and I wasn't going to do my A-levels,
and I wasn't going to go to university.

So, you know,
the anger inside me was just...

I can't describe it.

[narrator]
Anxiety for the future was magnified

when Zainab and her family
watched the news

and saw state-sponsored
racism in action

under the apartheid regime
of South Africa,

a former British colony.

Southern Africa, we would discuss
it virtually every day at home.

You're growing up,
you're a teenager,

and you're faced with
all these struggles around the world,

and looking at what
we were facing here.

They weren't killing us,
but they might as well have been

because they were killing our lives.
We had no future.

[Leila Hassan Howe] My mother
was East End working-class,

my father was Muslim,
and they married.

The marriage didn't last,
and I lived a very kind of

isolated existence,
'cause in my family,

which was a very large
working-class, East London family,

I was the only Black person.

[Leila Hassan Howe]
My experience led me to read.

Mr. James Baldwin
has hardly a need of introduction.

I read James Baldwin.
I read any Black literature going.

But Baldwin
was my kind of mainstay.

I...

[narrator]
James Baldwin was a radical activist

and writer whose books exposed
the impact of racism in America.

It comes as a great shock to discover
that Gary Cooper killing off the Indians,

when you were
rooting for Gary Cooper...

that the Indians were you.

It comes as a great shock to discover
the country has not,

in its whole system of reality,
evolved any place for you.

So I wrote to Baldwin
and probably poured my heart out,

and told him what I was experiencing,

and told him that his books
had given me hope.

Thank you.

[applause]

And James Baldwin
sent me a telegram back,

telling me to keep the faith.

I remember those words.

"Keep the faith,
signed Jimmy."

[narrator]
But keeping faith was increasingly hard.

The 1964 general election
showed that immigration and race

were now a political time bomb.

[Gutzmore] My initial job
was in a factory,

and I first became politicized in

the mid-'60s.

I was in the British Midlands,

where racism was
a big feature amongst the people.

We know in Smethwick place
there's the problem

of immigration, for example.

You and I know that here,
in this town,

this is a problem.

[Gutzmore] In fact, there was an MP,
a man called Peter Griffiths,

who stood on the slogan,

"If you want a nigger for a neighbor,
vote Labour."

[reporter] People have stuck up posters
like, "Keep Britain white,"

or "If you want a nigger neighbor,
vote Labour."

Yes, um, well, I understand that
the people who stuck up those posters

have since made
their statement themselves

that they did it entirely on their own,
and without any contact with me,

but this is a community
that wants to keep its identity.

That's why I have refused
to condemn people

who have made
extreme statements.

I have said,
if people feel so strongly

that they are prepared to put things
in these words,

we should find out what is it
that makes them feel so strongly,

and we should remove the causes.

[reporter]
I'd like to quote to you a slogan,

"If you want a nigger neighbor,
vote Labour."

I think that's an utterly squalid
and degrading thing for any Englishman,

or any member of
the Commonwealth to say.

It was said, in fact, I understand,

by the Conservative candidate
in the Smethwick division.

[reporter]
That is what the report says.

Yes, where they are, I think,

degrading politics to
about the lowest level

I have known in my lifetime.

Griffiths, Peter...

Conservative...

-Sixteen thousand...
-[cheering]

Sixteen thousand,
six hundred and ninety...

Seven percent swing to
the Conservatives in Smethwick.

And that's the context in which
my own politics emerged.

[narrator]
Conservative Peter Griffiths

won an overwhelming victory,

showing the electoral power
of racism in politics.

The government has agreed to make
big changes in the race relations bill.

[narrator]
Shortly afterwards,

the Labour government introduced
a Race Relations Act,

which sought to remove
the color bar,

and made the promotion
of racial hatred illegal.

It was a first attempt to address
the discrimination that was happening

in public places in the UK.

But the Race Relations Act
did not prevent discrimination

in housing, education,
or at the hands of the police.

[muffled police radio announcements]

[woman]
Certain rights in our jobs.

[indistinct] It's due to bloody coloreds,
that's why.

[reporter]
What's the matter with him?

[Peter Edrich] When I joined the Met
Police, I was posted to Harlesden.

That was a working-class area, really,
and a lot of incoming West Indians.

When I got there,
there was-there was definitely prejudice

because I remember on-on my first day,
when I was picked up,

and the police constable
was taking us to report,

took us Harlesden.

As we crossed the north circular
from when we enter Harlesden,

he said, "You can tell
you're in Harlesden.

There's your first spade."

[men] We do ask a great deal
of our policemen...

Thank you.

...the men empowered
to deprive us of our liberty.

But in the police force,

half of them never managed
to pass a single O-level at school.

[Phillip] The police and them
weren't bright, you know.

Police was like Teddy Boys,
National Front...

who joined the force,
and they had a license now

to beat up Black people.

[reporter]
The report criticizes, particularly,

the junior ranks of
the Metropolitan police, the constables

or sergeants, who, and I quote,
"go out nigger-hunting,"

determined, without instructions
from their superiors,

to bring in a colored person,
at all costs.

[muffled radio speech]

[Edrich] Police officers
tended to be prejudiced,

but I never went
after a Black person

and, you know, made up a crime
he was committing just to arrest him

and I'm not saying it didn't happen,
but I didn't do it.

There was certainly
plenty of crime going on.

Mostly boys
that couldn't get jobs,

or this kind of thing.

They were most likely to be
doing something wrong.

Our job was to just,
you know, lock 'em up.

[narrator]
In December 1964,

American civil rights leader,
Martin Luther King,

known for his non-violent philosophy,
stopped off in Britain

on his way to accept
a Nobel Peace Prize.

He delivered a speech
which highlighted the similarities

between British and American racism.

Skin may differ, but affection
dwells in Black and white the same.

This reveals that whether
they be in the United States,

or whether they be in
London, England,

the system is
on its deathbed.

[narrator]
The following year,

King's militant counterpart,
Malcolm X, came to Britain

and visited Smethwick's Black
and Asian communities,

where he spoke of
the need to fight back

against racial prejudice,
using whatever means necessary,

including violent resistance.

Now, your views differs fundamentally
from that of Doctor Martin Luther King.

Is it really a choice between
non-violence and violence now?

I think it's a choice between
intelligence and-and, uh,

the lack of intelligence,
and any intelligent human being

is going to protect himself
when he's attacked.

I've never been
a turn-the-other-cheek person.

I was never the big fan
of Martin Luther King's

turn-the-other-cheek
and peaceful demonstration,

and so I was attracted
to people like Malcolm X.

They made sense to me.

If you want to fight fire,
then you must take fire to fight fire.

[narrator]
Malcolm X's philosophy of self-defense

was becoming
increasingly commonplace

in Hyde Park
Speakers' Corner in London.

[Roy Sawh]
When I talk about white people,

you have killed more people
in two world wars

than people have died
from natural diseases.

Are you civilized?

We do not advocate killing
of white people,

but if kill we may to defend our rights,
we shall kill you.

We used to go, friends and I,
to Speakers' Corner, Hyde Park,

where Roy Sawh was speaking up

for the Black population
against racism.

Look at the map of Africa.
Every island belongs to a white nation.

Every island.
But look at Europe.

The whole concept of Black Power really
came out of a growing awareness

among many people within
the Black communities

who were influenced
by things around them.

We don't know how to use it.
Let's be a...

One aspect of that is clearly
Speakers' Corner,

and my memory of that is Roy Sawh.

You have committed more crimes...

This rhetoric was very dismissive
of white people.

He was quite plain about it.

...so when you talk about freedom
and you talk about...

[narrator]
The Hyde Park speeches

were monitored closely by
undercover police officers,

and Roy Sawh was
constantly being charged

with incitement to racial hatred.

Please, for taking your notes,

make sure you get the exact
things I am saying...

because at the last hearing
at the Old Bailey,

the police couldn't even read
their own handwriting!

[crowd laughs]

[♪ Nina Simone: "Revolution"]

[narrator]
Roy Sawh's provocative speeches

were an attempt to get Black people's
grievances heard.

Like many in the Black
and Asian communities,

he wanted improvements in housing,
equality in work, and fair policing.

In 1967, he formed the group called
the Universal Colored People's Association

with Nigerian novelist and playwright,
Obi Egbuna.

Well, life's full of every
constructive revolutionary movement

in this world.

What kind of ties does
your organization have

with the Black Power movement
in the United States?

Well, I cannot go into specifics,
but all I can say is that

there is an international link.

[narrator]
With the UCPA,

Obi Egbuna and Roy Sawh
had effectively kickstarted

the British Black Power movement.

But the man credited for
doing so by the press

was a Trinidadian immigrant to Britain,

who called himself Michael X.

[reporter] Michael X is 32,
and he comes from Trinidad.

He's the leader now
of an organization called RAAS.

[narrator]
He had started his own group

called the Racial Adjustment
Action Society.

[Dhondy] Michael X was actually
a fellow called Michael De Fratas.

He was a Trinidadian
of Portuguese origin, I think,

who turned up in Britain.

You mustn't be afraid to fight
for what you want.

You must not be afraid
to fight for what is just.

Brother Malcolm was once asked,
that was my first teaching,

Malcolm X.

[Dhondy] And then,
when Malcolm X came to Britain,

Michael changed his name
to Michael X.

I can't live in this system.
I don't like it.

I don't want it.
I want to destroy it, everything.

Down to the ground.
The lot. Ashes.

The Racial Adjustment Action Society
was Michael's baby,

but it didn't--it never--it never achieved
no kind of racial adjustment.

Michael was good
at selling himself.

[Charlie Phillips]
That was taken in Tabernacle.

On the left is Michael X,
smoking a cigar.

In the middle is Bobby,
a militant friend of Stokely Carmichael.

And Michael, he said,
"Take it down to United Press."

So I rushed down in United Press,
and I got two pounds, ten shillings.

That's the first photograph
I've ever had published.

That photograph was taken of
Stokely Carmichael outside the Cue Club.

I met him,
and I took the photograph of him.

[narrator]
Stokely Carmichael was born in Trinidad

and grew up in America.

He had become
a powerful campaigner,

working alongside Martin Luther King
in the American Civil Rights Movement.

Black people are not gonna let white
people just slap 'em anymore.

[reporter] Then what
do you see happening now?

Well, every time they slap us,
we're gon' move to break their arms.

[narrator]
After his friend was shot

while protesting peacefully
in Tennessee,

Stokely Carmichael stopped
calling for nonviolence

and started calling for Black Power.

There's a lot of confusion
about the phrase, "Black Power".

[reporter]
What does it really mean?

The coming together of Black people

to fight for their liberation
by any means necessary.

[narrator]
Stokely Carmichael was presenting

a new philosophy of Black unity
and self-empowerment

that had a profound influence on

the formation of the American
Black Panther Party.

I think I became aware of
the Black Power movement

when I snuck down to London, '67,

when Stokely Carmichael was speaking.

Isn't it absurd for them to say that
"Columbus discovered America"?

When Columbus got there,
he found people there.

And what of the Caribbean?

We did not wake up until
Sir Walter Raleigh came along

and discovered us.

And all of our history begins
when a white man comes along

and says, "Poof, I have discovered you.
Come alive, Black man!"

The white man's definitions is
what we find ourselves trapped by.

We have come to tell you that
if you see your lot and your culture

being thrown with that of England,

then we see you
as part of England,

who suppresses and oppresses us.

You will be with England
when the lines are drawn.

You had better come on home!

Home!

He was talking to us.
He was talking to young Black people.

We've got nappy hair.
We've got thick lips.

We're Black,
and we're beautiful.

Black Power, of course,
you know.

That was just wow. Wow!

We have finally come to tell you,
we know we are going to win.

-Thank you.
-[cheers and applause]

[♪ James Brown: "Say it Loud -
I'm Black and I'm Proud"]

James Brown,
"Say it Loud - I am Black and I am Proud".

That tune is one of
the first earliest rap tunes

because James Brown
isn't actually singing on that tune.

He is talking.

[♪ "Say it Loud -
I'm Black and I'm Proud" continues]

Put your hands like this!
Black Power!

Black Power!

Hey! One more time!

Black Power!

-Black Power!
-Yeah!

His name has become synonymous
with Black racialism,

and, for that, he will not be allowed
back into this country,

where the Race Relations Act is designed
to condemn racialism of any kind.

[narrator]
Stokely Carmichael's visit

had the Labour government
so concerned

that Special Branch
ordered him to leave the country

and he was banned from re-entering.

Soon afterwards,
the Home Secretary, Roy Jenkins,

set up a secret police department

specifically to monitor
Black radical groups in Britain.

But the impact of the Black Power message
had been felt by many,

particularly Michael X,
who took the baton and ran with it.

What do you hope to gain from

the sort of inflammatory speech
that you made last night?

I do not make inflammatory speeches.

I simply speak the truth.
I speak the truth,

and when I speak the truth,

white people say
this is inflammatory statements

because they would like
to see Black men

pretend and be Uncle Toms

and aspire solely to go
to the Queen's garden parties.

Well, I don't give a damn about
the Queen's garden parties.

That's not where I want to go.

[narrator]
Michael X's words were calculated

to shake up enduring colonial attitudes
around Black subservience.

But when he made a statement,

that called for the killing
of any white man

seen to physically abuse
a Black woman,

the state decided to prosecute him.

He became the first person

to be sent to prison
under the UK's 1965 Race Relations Act.

A law which had been designed to protect
Britain's Black and Asian populations

from discrimination.

Watching very closely
how the state dealt with Michael X

was Darcus Howe,
a legal student,

who had arrived in Britain
from Trinidad in 1961.

What struck me
about Michael X was,

I used to like to hear Black people
say things that were brave and bold.

Even though if it didn't make sense,
because we were too quiet.

And almighty Darcus, yes,
his photograph came up in the darkroom,

and I was very impressed with it.

The leader, well-educated,
as we know,

Darcus has been an incredible person.

He-He never talked down to people.

And he doesn't insult anybody,

And he were determined that, you know,
things should change in this country.

[narrator]
Darcus was heavily influenced

by his uncle, C.L.R. James,

a renowned Trinidadian writer
and intellectual.

His politically charged books inspired
a new generation of Black Power activists.

Is there a measure of
racial prejudice in the police?

[narrator]
When Darcus was invited to speak

on a BBC television program,

which highlighted the numerous cases
of police framing Black people

for crimes they had not committed,
he seized the opportunity.

The policeman who frames
the Black man is doing so

with a confidence that the system
is going to give him a conviction,

which reproduces
a lack of confidence in the Black man.

[reporter]
Why do so few people complain?

Who is going to take up a case,

when you have that whole weight
of the system against you?

And-And-And the West Indian,
the Black West Indian isn't doing this,

and I don't think one should
ask him to do this either.

Darcus was a lawyer by training,
you know,

and, of course,
he contributed very strongly.

But it's presented out of context.

[narrator]
The program caused

a storm of controversy,
and on live television,

Darcus confronted the Deputy Commissioner
of the Metropolitan police, Robert Mark.

It's a complete disrespect
for the way of life,

historical and present-day
of Black people.

[Darcus Howe]
Educated in the world of reason,

I was equipped
with a certain confidence.

And I knew what was happening in America.

I had been there,

and I wasn't going to come back here
and put up with that crap.

A policeman is only racist
in that he is part of a racist society.

And you cannot ask the policeman
to change his racist clothing,

if you don't change the society,
and that is the only solution.

The Black community says,
"Stop it, and stop it now."

[reporter]
The violent death

of America's negro apostle of
nonviolence.

The Reverend Martin Luther King is dead,

killed by an assassin's bullet.

Compounding the tragedy,

there's now rioting in the streets
of many American cities.

[narrator]
While the voices of Black Power

were causing a stir in the UK,

the progress of the Civil Rights struggle
was dealt a devastating blow

when Martin Luther King was
assassinated in America.

[♪ Nina Simone:
"Why? (The King Of Love Is Dead)"]

It affected me very deeply
that Martin Luther King is dead,

but, um, I feel that
his name will live on,

and that, um, what he had to do,
we'll continue to do it.

In this country,
in 15 or 20 years' time,

the Black man will have
the whip hand over the white man.

[narrator]
Two weeks after King's assassination,

the Conservative MP,
Enoch Powell,

in a bid to position himself
as party leader,

delivered a speech that put
race and immigration

back at the center
of the political debate.

We must be mad,
literally mad, as a nation...

to be permitted the annual inflow
of some 50,000 dependents.

The discrimination and the deprivation,
the sense of alarm,

and the resentment
lie not with the immigrant population...

[chanting]
We don't want to be replaced!

...but with those among whom
they have come.

And are still coming.

This is why to enact legislation of
the kind before parliament at this moment

is to risk throwing a match
onto gunpowder.

What the great British public think
is that he is telling the truth

on behalf of his constituents.

A gunpowder--
well, gunpowder to me

means Guy Fawkes Day
and blowing up Parliament.

Gunpowder also can mean
the assassination of Martin Luther King.

It could do, yes.

[narrator]
Enoch Powell was speaking out

against a new expanded
1968 Race Relations Act

that attempted to prevent discrimination
in housing and employment.

As a former Health Secretary,

Powell had once championed
the recruitment of people

from the Caribbean to come
to Britain to work in the NHS.

His re-casting of immigrants
as an invading force

now struck fear into the hearts
of Black and Asian communities.

It was a watershed because
we knew that there was this attitude

in the Tory Party,
and he thought to himself

that he would speak about
the rivers of blood.

It wasn't at all welcome,
but he put it out in the open,

and we could now
fight against it openly.

Men like Michael De Freitas.

Exactly what
Michael De Freitas has said.

It's really equivalent to what
Mr. Enoch Powell said,

but Mr. Michael De Freitas
goes in jail.

Now, why?

There must be a reason,

and the only reason that I can see
is that one is Black and one is white.

[narrator]
The Black and Asian population

of the country was now over a million,
and for many of them,

the fickle attitudes
of British politicians

could not be allowed
to pass without a fight.

Black Power groups started
to form all over Britain

in cities such as London, Manchester,
Birmingham, Leicester, Cardiff, and Leeds.

Black is a symbol for me of
the opposition against oppression.

I had two friends
who were both poets,

one of them was called
Farrukh Dhondy.

It seemed that they were going to be
involved with the Black Panther movement.

The way that I was first introduced to
an actual organization of Black Power,

which I wanted to join,
was Alexandra Palace,

where there was a large conference

of all the radical organizations
of Asians and blacks.

[male activist]
And we can never regard them

as revolutionaries...

I went, and a lot of the speakers
were bullshit rhetoric,

but Althea Jones.

[Althea]
To us, Black people...

She spoke very eloquently,

and she said she was from
the Black Panther movement.

[narrator]
Althea Jones LeCointe

came to England from Trinidad
to study biochemistry

at University College, London.

She was a fierce opponent of
state-sponsored racism

in Britain's former colonies,

and soon became leader
of the Black Panther movement.

The camera is there to protect
and to help and to show.

This is Althea.

Althea is one of the most striking,
strong, determined young women.

Despite a protest from that section
of the British population,

your government is prepared to continue
supporting the racism and repression

that the South African
regime represents.

Our brothers and sisters
in the townships in South Africa,

our brothers and sisters who
are fighting right now

in Zimbabwe
and taking these words...

I became a member of the Black Panther
movement as a consequence

of hearing Althea LeCointe Jones,

the leader of the Black Panthers
in Brixton, speak.

She was bright,
she was articulate,

and I decided I wanted
to go to meetings,

to-to find out more about
this Black Panther movement.

[Althea]
This is what the system's getting at.

Our generation
can't tolerate schools

that only prepare us
to do the menial tasks.

[Jean Ambrose]
It was in Southeast London.

The organization was called
Black Unity and Freedom Party.

There were predominantly
young men,

and, at the meeting,
we had a speaker.

It was like an awakening.

And I just went back,
all full of excitement

about what I had heard and seen,

and invited my school friends
to come with me the following week.

There were lots of us.
It was a young movement.

A young movement
of young men and women.

There were the Fasimbas.

There was the Black Liberation Front,
Black Panthers.

I came to join the Black Unity
and Freedom Party

because I was ready
to join a movement.

[male speaker]
We need more Black symbols,

Black Tories...

March 1970, I joined
the Black Power organization,

the Fasimbas.

I walked into the room,
and I saw a sea of Black faces.

The first time that
I had experienced that.

I was overwhelmed.

The best armor we have
against the prejudice...

Listened to the speaker speak,

said we had been exploited
for centuries.

Now time for us to unite.

He said, "Black Power,
Black Power, Black Power."

[cheering and applause]

I felt the hairs on the back
of my neck stand up.

I found something I could belong to,
something I believe in.

It was Black people standing up
for the first time,

in a way that was
extremely militant.

It wasn't begging.

It wasn't trying to show
we were equal.

It was saying,
"We know we're equal,

and we're not putting up with it."

That's the attraction
for all of us.

We were all part of a huge
movement of belief.

I mean, Black Unity and Freedom Party
people knew people

in Black Liberation Front.

We knew people in the Panthers.
We all knew each other.

My wife was a member of
the Black Panther movement.

Um, I was BLF,
she was Black Panther,

so we came together,
we got married,

so there was that kind of synergy.

We were just part of
a bigger Black movement

and wanted to, you know,
do what we had to do.

Demonstrate. Demand.

[protesting and chanting]

[narrator]
This feeling of solidarity

and increasing membership saw
Black Power groups

staging large demonstrations
against police harassment.

What are we here for?
What do we want?

I got involved with
the Black Liberation Front

because it was a doer organization.

The main focus of
the Black Power movement

of that era was education
and social programs.

That's what we were about.

There was nothing devious
about what we were doing.

[narrator]
With immigrant communities

feeling stigmatized by politicians
and the press,

these activists were standing up
for their rights

in housing, education, and policing.

Rhodan Gordon, a community activist,
originally from Grenada,

set up a Black citizens advice center
in the heart of Notting Hill.

It was called the Black Peoples'
Information Centre,

and Black self-empowerment
was the organization's objective.

We started off with
the Back-Ah-Yard restaurant.

It was an advice and action center

around the issues of housing,
education and legal services,

and it was fundamentally
a Black Power institution.

I felt that there was
a bigger picture here.

♪ Young, gifted and black ♪

Times were changing.

Marcia was singing,
"Young, gifted, and Black."

♪ To be young, gifted, and Black ♪

♪ Open your heart to what I mean ♪

It was just a different time.
It-It felt good.

It felt like you could express yourself.

And I had an afro.
The style of the day was afro.

I wore all the-the African gowns.

And I remember
I went into school once

and asked the teacher
why we couldn't have Black history.

[♪ Carl Douglas:
"Kung Fu Fighting"]

Wednesday, we used to have
an advanced karate class.

Martial arts were very important to us
because it gave you confidence.

Enormous amount of confidence.

Black power for us men.

We weren't going to take
any rubbish.

We weren't anymore
going to be victims.

I felt great.

[♪ Niney the Observer: "Blood And Fire"]

The musical soundtrack to
the Black Power movement

was Jamaica reggae tunes,
you know.

Tunes like "Blood and Fire" by Niney,

which was kinda apocalyptic.

[♪ "Blood and Fire" continues]

Talked about Black redemption.

I was, like many youth
of my generation,

swept along by the wave
of new consciousness,

and all that has to be seen in the
context of the anti-apartheid struggle,

the struggle for independence
in African territories.

[♪ "Blood and Fire" continues]

We all saw American athletes
give the Black Power salute

in Mexico, 1968.

♪ Let it burn, let it burn ♪

That had a major impact on my life.

Some could hear the screams worldwide.

Black people around the world
reacted to that.

[narrator]
This spirit of revolution,

combined with the possibility
of real cultural change,

was inspiring people
like Linton Kwesi Johnson.

The Black Panther Movement
had a profound effect on me

and helped me to look at myself
in time and space, if you like.

It was there for the first time
I discovered Black literature.

It was a-a revelation because
as a schoolboy,

I wasn't even aware
that Black people wrote books.

One of the books was a book called
The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. DuBois,

and it was that book that stirred
something within me,

that got me writing poetry,
and there were also records.

But one record, in particular,
by The Last Poets.

African American poetry,
they were talking about revolution,

you know, they were just telling it
like it is.

[♪ The Last Poets:
"When the Revolution Comes"]

And I thought to myself,

well, this is the kind of poetry
I want to write,

but from a Caribbean perspective,
or roots.

[narrator]
But as a new generation

of young Black people were exploring
their identity in Britain,

relations with the police
were deteriorating.

In those days, it was clear to
the Black youth of my generation

that the Metropolitan Police force
had declared war

against the youth of my generation.

The canteen culture,
the racist culture,

is so ingrained in the police.

The police was the enemy.

[Linton Kwesi Johnson on recording]

Look out! Look out! Look out!

Wi feel bad

Look sad

Smoke weedan

And if yu eye sharp

Read the violence inna wi

We goin' smash this guy
with the bad, bad blood

Look out! Look out! Look out!

[Moss] There's an old saying that

the community gets
the policing it deserves.

When I was a sergeant,
I was at Brixton,

and what was surprising to me

was the almost, like,
boisterous hostility

you faced as a police officer
on the street.

[commotion and honking]

If you're called to an incident,

you have to exert your authority,
you have to take charge,

and sometimes, in Brixton,
this wasn't possible.

And so, not believing that I would
do a professional job,

you know,
who had the prejudice?

We had that spirit,
that tradition of defiance

from our experiences,
going about our daily lives,

the racial profiling,
harassment, and treatment.

That war that the police
had declared against us

manifested itself in all kinds of ways.

Being arrested for sus, attempting
to steal from persons unknown.

The raids on our--on our parties.

[♪ Gregory Isaacs:
"Black Liberation Struggle"]

A war of attrition against
sound systems,

that provided the nexus
for our culture of resistance

through reggae music and so on.

[♪ "Black Liberation Struggle" continues]

[Moss] One of the
conflict points, if you like,

was sort of noisy parties
on a Saturday night.

A house full of two or three
hundred Black people.

[Phillips] There wasn't any music
entertainment to suit our tastes,

and half the time,
we weren't welcome,

so we created these house parties.

The West Indians
love to have parties.

Big parties, small parties,

and the person holding the party
would buy all the stuff,

and then people who came
to the party would pay,

and that is technically illegal.

I mean, it's a nothing-crime,
but it was technically illegal.

[Moss] The police have
to uphold the law,

and white people didn't
have noisy parties in Brixton.

If it had been
a white people's party,

they wouldn't have been raiding it.

Oh, yeah, it was racism.

Mostly there was just
a little squad that did it,

but for some reason,

this one night,
they were going to raid about six houses,

and they wanted volunteers,

so we volunteered.

It was exciting.
Plainclothes, you know. Wow.

Went into this house, and there was
loads of West Indians there

having a big party,

and I remember
one of the police officers,

they bashed down
the living room door.

And, I mean, I said,
"Why'd you do that?"

It was an absolute melee,

and they were arresting people,

and a police officer
got hit over the head.

And we ended up dragging about
half a dozen of these West Indians

back to the station in the van.

And then after that,

the one man they thought had-had-had
smashed a beer can

over the police officer's head,
they took him into a cell.

And this one police officer
from Kilburn,

a really big fella,
just beat him up.

And I just remember
standing there, watching.

He was bleeding,
and-and he was just...

and he was pleading,

and he was just saying,
"No, stop it."

I-I-I don't remember, he was just,
he was just asking them to stop it

and asking God to help him.

That's all I remember,
and-and-and I thought,

"I-I didn't join the police
to beat people up."

[sighs]

And I was just very upset about it,
and I was kind of ashamed I was there.

But I didn't do anything.
I didn't say anything.

I didn't have the courage to do that.

I mean, in a perfect world,
I would have stepped in

and said, "Stop this right now,
otherwise, I will report everybody."

But I was a young police officer
on probation.

It-It never even occurred to me
to do that.

I just-- I didn't know what to do.
I just didn't know what to do.

[narrator]
With brutal treatment

at the hands of the police

a constant source of outrage,

the Black Power movement
needed strong leadership.

And as far as
the press were concerned,

Michael X was the movement's
de facto leader.

Now released from prison,

Michael X's talent for self-promotion
had garnered him financial support

from celebrities such as
John Lennon and Yoko Ono,

who auctioned off their hair

to raise funds
in the name of Black Power.

[reporter]
I don't want to sound unkind,

but don't you think that, um,

this may have been pursued
as just another "Lennon stunt"?

Well, we tried to keep it quiet.

-It'd be nice if it did.
-I don't care. It came useful for this.

[narrator]
But Michael X's past

revealed another side to him.

[Dhondy] Michael X,
he was quite charismatic,

but he was basically a hustler.

[Desmond Gittens] Michael X, in his early
times, was a strong-arm man

for a landlord that rented,
to poor people, bad housing.

Why will you not take the rent
from this man here?

I don't own the property.

But your name is on the rent book.

[narrator]
Michael X set up a new group

called the Black Eagles,

and with it, a radical commune
in North London,

which he called the Black House.

And he had recruited one of the
most powerful voices in the movement.

A group of friends were returning
with me from Speakers' Corner,

and, as we were going along,
two Black guys started selling

their newspapers called
The Black Eagle.

So, my friend Shahid bought a paper,
and this guy asked me,

"Would you like to buy a paper?"

I said, "I'll share his."

This guy said,
"Will you share his prison sentence?"

And that was Darcus Howe.
A loose cannon.

At the time, Darcus was looking for
a place to-to settle,

and Michael X,
the so-called leader of the Black Eagles,

he depended on Darcus,
who was more political.

He depended on him
to give him a kudos.

He wasn't an intellectual.

He didn't know much
about Black Power.

He would take things,
and then use it.

[Darcus Howe]
The press

made him the militant activist he was,

and he had a remarkable capacity
to raise money

from the likes of John Lennon
and Sammy Davis.

Michael never organized
any large numbers of people

in pursuit of any right,
civil or human.

Michael was a hippy
with a commune always,

and I was the Prime Minister
of his commune at one time.

Michael, he was still involved
in criminal activity,

and it bled into the Black Eagles
and the Black House.

[reporter]
Do you think that the Black House

could have succeeded?

Yes, it could.

[reporter]
Why don't you think it did succeed?

Because Michael was putting
every single cent he could get

in his own pocket.

He didn't care about Black people.

[narrator]
Faced with allegations

of violence and corruption,

the Black Eagles fell apart,

and the Black House was burned down
in mysterious circumstances.

Facing arrest for extortion,
Michael X fled to Trinidad.

Darcus Howe remained
in West London,

where the British Black Power movement
was about to face its biggest challenge.

Darcus was wise enough
to kind of leave,

and ended up working
with Frank on the Mangrove.

[muffled commotion]

[narrator]
Frank Crichlow's Mangrove Restaurant

was located in the heart
of Notting Hill.

The Caribbean community
had put down roots here

since the turmoil
of the 1958 race riots,

and now celebrated the rapidly-growing
Notting Hill Carnival,

which showcased
the pride of Caribbean culture.

Frank Crichlow was
a local restaurateur,

originally from Trinidad,

who had set up the Mangrove
to serve Caribbean food.

He had no idea that
his new business venture

was about to become the focal point
of the British Black Power struggle.

The Mangrove quickly
proved its appeal,

attracting a diverse range of customers,
including celebrities

like Sammy Davis Junior, Bob Marley,
Nina Simone, and Vanessa Redgrave,

who were keen to be a part
of the new Caribbean scene.

And it became
an unofficial community center,

with outspoken Black power activist
Darcus Howe working behind the bar.

You have a society with
a million and a half Black people

on the sidelines.

That is what you have.
Everything goes on.

Parliament goes on,
the economy goes on,

everything goes on,
and all they need Black people for

is to produce whenever
they want them to produce.

Apart from that,
you stand on the sidelines,

rotting, dying, festering.

The Black youths today had been
through so much police harassment,

being hounded by police officers.

Police is bad news.

Police in the Black community
are bad news.

[Phillip]
The police are watching all of us!

Every night I leave the Ladbroke Grove,
I had a search.

If you come off All Saints Road,
you are guaranteed to get a search.

[narrator]
All Saints Road,

where the Mangrove restaurant
was situated,

was considered a high-crime area
by the police.

[Moss] The briefings we had

for the Notting Hill Situation

was that they had their fair share
of rising drug crime...

rising street robberies,
and the center of activity

was all around All Saints Road
and the Mangrove Club,

so the Mangrove club was
raided on numerous occasions.

[narrator]
Local people were convinced

that the Mangrove was being
unfairly targeted by police officers.

When Frank opened the restaurant,
the police approach him.

This policeman,
everybody knows him, Pulley,

he don't forget a face,
and he know everybody,

and then he had a way,

he would talk with these accents
he would put on.

"What's happening?
Open up na."

And talk like he was a Jamaican.

It was a racist thing that
they can take liberty with us,

but Frank wasn't having it.

Pulley was a notorious police constable
from Notting Hill Gate Police Station.

He was absolutely racist,

because all he did was harass
Black youngsters.

He was very well-known
for being that kind of a policeman.

[reporter] "Hands off
the Mangrove," says the slogan.

A favorite haunt of West Indians,
and which has been subject to

frequent visits by the police.

No charges have ever been brought.

[Darcus Howe]
I was working at the till,

and the police,

they said that there was
marijuana being sold there.

There was none!

There were three raids on the restaurant,
ostensibly for drugs.

Nothing was found!

[Darcus Howe]
They want it closed down.

So they started raiding the place.

Because there was nobody

to take on the police at that time.

[narrator]
The constant raids on the Mangrove

meant that Frank's customers
started to stay away.

It was complete harassment

on this restaurant.

Complete harassment
on a Black business.

And they end up by destroying it.

Destroying it because
they would raid on a Friday night,

which is the busiest night,

and people got fed up
and stopped coming.

Frank used to walk around the block,

just looking to see if
the police van or truck.

It caused a kind of battle thing.

[Darcus Howe] I was sitting
downstairs of the Mangrove.

Frank was talking to
a member of parliament

about how the police
were raiding the restaurant.

So I sat listening to this,
and a young terror I was.

After they left, I said,
"Frank, let's have a demonstration,

and we're going to march
to every police station in the area."

You know, I want to fight,
I want to fight.

I need to fight
to express something.

[reporter] Mm-hmm.

I need to argue.
I need to scream!

That is the situation
that British society has placed me in.

[narrator]
With feelings of anger

rising within the community,

the Black Panther Movement,
led by Althea Jones LeCointe,

stepped in to help
organize a peaceful protest.

I believe the Mangrove,
what they seek to do

is not to close down a restaurant,

but to close down what they see
as an area where Black people

can collectively put up
some kind of resistance

to day-to-day harassment
by the police.

[narrator]
But some locals doubted

whether the protest
would remain peaceful.

Demonstration, I agree with it,
but me and Frank fell out over it

because I went in there,
and I see them writing up these placards.

"The Pigs," "Police Harassment,"
and then I see them stapling it

onto some flimsy piece of wood,
so I said to Frank, I said,

"Frank, what you doing?"

I said, "Frank, you need some
two by two to defend we-self."

He went mad, he said,
"Listen, every time you come here,

you're preaching violence."

I was into violence

because I used to feel so hurt inside

when I see liberties
taken with people.

[distant clamoring,
indistinct speech]

[narrator] On Sunday 9th
of August 1970,

a crowd of over a hundred people
gathered outside the Mangrove Restaurant

to show their support.

Darcus Howe stood on the roof of a car
to address the crowd.

[Darcus Howe on recording]
It has been for some time now

that Black people
have been caught up

in complaining to police
about police, yeah,

complaining to magistrate
about magistrate.

[laughter]

Complaining to politicians
about politicians.

[♪ B.B. Seaton: "I Want Justice"]

[narrator] The protestors,
now numbering about 150,

set off with the intention
of peacefully marching past

several police stations in the area.

[♪ "I Want Justice" continues]

Up to that time, blacks hadn't moved
to that kind of militancy before...

but the police,
in their relations with blacks every day,

had prepared blacks to revolt,

and we called the demonstration
to express politically

what was at large socially.

[narrator]
By the time the demonstrators

reached Notting Hill Police Station,

there were over 500 plainclothes
and uniformed police officers

surrounding the marches.

With the protestors
vastly outnumbered by police,

resentment on both sides
was at fever pitch.

[Darcus Howe]
What I want activists to do,

what this is going to continue to be

is a concerted, determined attempt

to prevent any infringement
on our rights.

[chanting]
Hands off Black people!

We went to Notting Hill Police Station,

by which time

it had accumulated
in the minds of the policemen

who were on that demonstration
that we had taken that issue too far.

They believed, what are these cheeky
West Indians doing on the street,

challenging our authority
with such confidence?

[crowd chanting]
Hands off Black people!

On our way to
Harrow Road Police Station,

there was trouble.

[Phillip]
We see a bus with police.

Police and dem jump on the bus,

fighting start.

[♪ Peter Tosh:
"Them A Fi Get A Beaten"]

[narrator] The police strategy
at the demonstration

raised concerns amongst activists.

[male activist]
Immigration bill!

[narrator]
A new conservative government

was pushing
a harsher immigration policy

through Parliament,

and the fear was that
the sensational news

about riots in Notting Hill
will be used to justify it.

I believe that's why
that attack was launched,

and why subsequent to that attacks
by the police are being launched.

This thing was
blown out of all proportion,

was that the government
had certain things in mind

for Black people in relation
to the population as a whole.

Where have you heard anywhere
of a demonstration

in a community of about 150 people
hitting the Manchester Guardian,

The Yorkshire Post.

That thing is projected to the population
for a particular reason.

They wanted to justify
the Immigration Bill.

They wanted to justify
saying that Black people

had to register with the police,

that Black people had to
ask permission to have certain jobs,

and to move from place to place.

They wanted to justify
these kinds of measures.

[Darcus Howe] The police,
Special Branch, Scotland Yard,

and Reginald Maulding, the Home Secretary,

and political people, all of them, met

and decided to put us in jail.

I thought this is a hell of a thing,

this is serious trouble.

[narrator]
For the nine people arrested

following the Mangrove Demonstration,

it seemed like the whole
machinery of the state

was now set against them

and the idea of Black Power in Britain
was being unfairly demonized.

[reporter]
The Mangrove Nine,

two women, seven men,

31 charges.

[Gittens] Some of
the more vocal people

like Rhodan, Darcus, Frank,

Altheia, Barbara Beese.

They were targeted.

That was a method
of actually decapitating

the Black Power leadership,

the effective ones.

[narrator]
The trial of the Mangrove Nine

began in October 1971
at the Old Bailey.

Representing one of the nine defendants
was Ian MacDonald,

a young barrister,
who was to become a pioneer

of anti-racist legal practice in Britain.

[Ian MacDonald]
The Mangrove Nine came in '71,

and it was really an attempt
to put on trial the leadership

of the Black Panther Movement,

which was one of the largest, um,
mass movements of Black youth

that there has ever been
in this country.

They were charged with affray,

they were charged with
assault on police,

and then they were charged with riot
at the last minute.

[narrator]
Now facing up to five years in prison,

Darcus Howe demanded an all-Black jury,
citing the Magna Carta,

a medieval charter that asserted
the right of citizens to be judged

without prejudice
by a jury of their peers.

[MacDonald]
It was really a kind of statement

that they were making,

that they weren't going
to be forced by

any kind of racist part of the court.

The structure of the court
is such that, uh,

there is a tendency for that jury
to identify, uh, with the judge.

Ian Macdonald, he wasn't saying
what the other lawyers were saying,

and they knew that.

He attacked
the whole structure of the court,

He tell the jury how the judge
keep them under control.

He tell the jury how the judge
keep us under control.

He tell the jury
how the judge sit on high,

everybody have to bow to him.

He don't have to bow to nobody,
and he exposed that whole structure,

and how it meant to psychologically
terrorize ordinary people.

[narrator]
Defying legal convention,

Darcus and Altheia decide to
represent themselves in court

so they could spell out
their case to the jury,

that the police were lying,

and they had been motivated
by racism.

[Altheia]
Since we've come here,

we have suffered a long chain
of abuses by the police,

with the active knowledge
and support of the British state.

[Darcus Howe] This case
is about a real situation

involving people who are prepared
to come to say what that situation is.

[narrator]
Darcus wanted to convey

this real situation to
white working-class members of the jury,

who he believed they were more likely
than their middle-class counterparts

to have experienced
everyday police injustice.

[Darcus Howe]
At the end of the day,

I knew there were white people
I could convince.

Ordinary whites, working whites,
that I could speak to

about what their police
was doing to me, and win.

I remember attending demonstrations
at the Mangrove Nine trial.

Darcus, you know,
he had style, and he had flair.

[Darcus Howe]
I am interested in the truth.

You come from Brixton,
you are unemployed,

you steal something,
not a single lawyer in this country

is going to talk about
your unemployment,

is going to talk
about the housing condition,

is going to talk about the pressures
under which you live.

And that is central
to your case,

and central to the case
of every Black person in this country.

[Dhondy] Darcus bought
his lawyer's skills to bear

about the cross-examination
which he gave the police.

Darcus was extremely flamboyant.

He would use quotations from
Shakespeare in defending himself.

You know, "The time is out of joint,
O cursed spite,

that nine West Indians
were born to put it right."

[♪ Derrick Morgan:
"Conquering Ruler"]

The Mangrove trial generated
a lot of publicity

and Darcus and Altheia
used it as a platform

to publicize the discrimination
that we felt.

I think this is why more and more
people should defend themselves.

However inadequately,
some of the truth will get through.

[♪ "Conquering Ruler" continues]

[reporter]
Radford Darcus Howe, not guilty.

Frank Crichlow, not guilty.

Not guilty.

[narrator]
All of the Mangrove Nine

were found not guilty of riot
and were spared prison.

The police had been
humiliated in court.

Crucially, the presiding judge
said in his summary

that he had found evidence
of racial hatred on both sides.

It was the first official acknowledgment
from anybody in the British state

that there was racism
in the police force.

[MacDonald]
It was a watershed trial

because it was the beginning

of a realization that the police
didn't behave like gentlemen,

and all the rest of it,
by the establishment in this country.

That was a historic victory.

It was a sense of what Black Power
was all about.

Black Power really meant

the only way you are going
to effectively challenge racism

was to organize yourselves
and fight back.

[narrator]
The Mangrove victory

created a sense of possibility
as other Black activists

were making progress in their struggle.

[Leila Hassan Howe]
You know, we were young radicals.

We were going to change the world.

We'd seen the big protests against
the Vietnam war,

which was revolutionary.

We'd seen the women's liberation
movement come to the fore,

and that was revolutionary,
so, for us,

yeah, we were about revolution.

[♪ Bob Marley & The Wailers:
"Coming In From The Cold"]

[narrator]
In South London,

Black Panther member Olive Morris

worked alongside other notable
Black and Asian women

to create a pioneering
feminist movement

for women of color.

[♪ "Coming In From The Cold" continues]

Olive Morris was the most fearless
Black woman I have ever met.

And we created the first
Brixton Black women's group.

[narrator]
Olive also led the Black community's

fightback against
poor housing conditions

through her involvement
with the Squatting Movement.

She was a woman
with a lot of guts,

and she saw squatting
as a political movement.

[narrator]
Darcus Howe found a new platform,

editing in a magazine with
the Race Today Collective.

He was joined there by poet and activist
Linton Kwesi Johnson.

The Black Parents Movement challenged
racism within the education system

by creating supplementary schools
to improve teaching for their children.

Being Black,
being confident,

being assured of who you are
and what you believe in,

that's what
the Black Power movement did.

[narrator]
Much of the energy of the movement

was devoted to forcing the state
to acknowledge equal rights.

But there was a growing backlash
for those involved.

The police continued
to raid the Mangrove

and harass its owner,
Frank Crichlow.

[Crichlow]
I think I suffered very badly

for what has happened.

I have been arrested on nearly
every year in the '70s.

I was on bail--you can easily say
I was on bail for ten years.

One case after the other.

Don't ask me what kept me going.

Um, I think that I was standing up
for my rights,

and that's where I got
my strength from.

[reporter]
Police took two alleged Panthers

with them as hostages
and as shields.

[narrator]
The early '70s saw governments

on both sides of the Atlantic
cracking down on Black Power.

They saw these groups
as a hotbed of criminality

and potential terrorism.

[rapid gunfire]

In America, the Black Panthers
were ruthlessly eliminated

by the FBI and the police.

[reporter] Yet as
Panther raids go these days,

it was unique in that no one,

policeman or Panther,
got killed.

[narrator]
The UK government continued to spy

on Black Power groups,

concerned that some might be
planning acts of violent insurrection.

In their sights was
a North London group

called the Black Liberation Front,

who had established close links
with the American Black Panthers.

[Abbas] We reproduced an article
in Grassroots, our newspaper,

which was from the Black Panther
newspaper in the United States.

And in it was an article about
how to put together a bomb.

Now you've got to remember,
the Panther newspaper

was freely available not only in America,
but also in the UK.

[narrator] Publishing
bomb-making instructions

was the all the state needed
to prosecute

one of the Black Liberation
Front's leaders,

known as Tony Sonares.

[Ansel Wong] Even though the
publication is a collective effort,

Tony was arrested for incitement
to, um, racial hatred and to murder

and was found guilty.

[Abbas]
It was a mistake,

and it was a mistake not done by Tony.

He had nothing to do
with that article appearing.

Tony took the fall because the police
insisted he was in charge

of the newspaper
at that moment in time.

[narrator]
Despite the bomb article being a reprint

from a publication already
in circulation in the UK,

Tony would be held in prison
for several months for this offense.

We were then put under
surveillance by Special Branch.

[Abbas]
In the early days of phone tapping,

you could hear
the phone being tapped,

and I have had conversations
I have had on the phone read back to me.

[Abbas] In every Black organization,

there's no doubt,

there were people who were
working for the security services.

[narrator] As the
Black Liberation Front struggled

to survive the imprisonment
of one of its leaders,

it rallied support from other
Black Power groups.

Winston Trew was a member
of the Fasimbas,

a youth group in
the Black Power movement

which encouraged community work,
education, and self-defense.

On the morning of 16th of March 1972,

I had gone to sign on, as normal,
at Peckham Labor Exchange.

In the evening, we had a meeting
to go and see the Black Liberation Front.

We had left the meeting at about 10:15,
took the train from Manor House,

changed at Leicester Square,

got the northern line
to Oval underground station.

The bottom of the escalator was very,
very crowded, so we decided to walk up.

Halfway up the escalator,
there were two men in front of us,

wouldn't let us pass.

When we got to the top,
two men suddenly turned round and said,

"Get over there!
Get over there!"

"What do you want?"

"We are police."
I said, "So? Where's your ID?"

[narrator] Winston and
his three Fasimba colleagues

were arrested for allegedly
stealing handbags

and assaulting police officers.

[Trew] The detective
in charge of our arrest

was called Detective Sergeant
Derek Ridgewell.

After we were arrested
and taken in the police station,

I said to them, "We've got
a right to a phone call."

He ran over to me,
looked at my face,

and said to me, "You blacks
got no bloody rights."

[narrator]
Winston was facing the very thing

he and other Black Power groups
had campaigned against,

being fitted up
by corrupt police officers.

The charge had said there's
a head-on collision of evidence.

Either defendants are lying,
or the police are lying.

Now what jury is going
to say that the police are lying?

When they announced
the guilty verdict,

I was in a state of shock.

I couldn't believe it,
but I had to believe it.

I woke up the following morning
in wormwood scrubs, 9th of November.

The 9th of November was
the birthday of my oldest son.

I felt like crap.

[narrator]
Building on the example

of the Mangrove Nine,

Winston and his friends
quickly became known as the Oval Four

and captured media attention.

[reporter]
Back at the Oval station,

Ridgewell had arrested
a group of Black youths,

the group that became known
as the Oval Four.

[narrator]
When a BBC journalist

started investigating
Winston's case,

it was revealed that Detective
Sergeant Derek Ridgwell's testimony

was directly contradicted
by eyewitnesses.

They claim that after getting off
a train at the Oval,

three of the youths
jostled an elderly passenger,

while Trew ran his hand
over the man's pocket.

Ridgewell claimed that he saw Trew
put his hand into the pocket

of another elderly passenger,

but the police didn't
produce either victim,

and the only witnesses were
the anti-mugging squad themselves.

But Mrs. O'Connor,
the woman who intervened

and tried to break up the fight,
says otherwise.

He definitely hadn't got a handbag
at that stage when I saw him.

[narrator]
The media account of Winston's case

helped him to appeal
and his sentence was reduced.

But the judge did not
overturn the conviction,

leaving Winston with
a criminal record.

It later emerged that Derek Ridgewell
was a corrupt police officer

whose tactic was to arrest Black men
for crimes they had not committed.

On this occasion,
Ridgewell's actions

had helped to destroy
a Black Power organization.

So I came out of prison,
July 1973.

People were so shocked by
what happened to the four of us,

the Fasimbas closed,
they disbanded.

I lost confidence in myself.
I became turned inwards.

It was hell.

[narrator] The British press
had for a long time,

used Michael X's activities
to tarnish the image of Black Power.

Despite his absence from the UK,
he was still reported on

as if he were the movement's
overall leader.

But Michael X had been arrested
4,000 miles away

after two bodies were found
buried in shallow graves

on his commune in Trinidad.

All he was after, Michael X,

was taking money from people.

He was slightly mad,

and he murdered
poor Gail Benson,

a woman who had gone
following his charisma.

[reporter]
As Michael X is taken into custody,

the search goes on for the sort of clues
that might help unravel

this murder mystery at
his burnt-out home at Arriva,

16 miles from the capital.

In the burnt-out shell
of Malik's house,

there is a great deal
of Black Power literature,

but there is a strong feeling here

that Malik was using his connections
with the Black Power movement

as a cover for other activities.

The one hard fact Malik
will have to explain

is how two bodies brutally murdered
came to be buried in his garden.

[Dhondy] Michael X
made the biggest noise of all

and had the least effect on

any reform or change or progress

in the lives of Black people in Britain.

[reporter]
His lawyer says

the only money he's had
towards the defense case

has come from John Lennon and Yoko
Ono, who are friends of Michael X.

[narrator]
But this time,

Michael X's celebrity friends
couldn't help him.

He was found guilty of murder by
Trinidadian court and sentenced to death.

On the 16th of May, 1975,
he was hanged in Trinidad for murder.

The fall of Michael X
showed how vulnerable

the Black Power cause
was to being hijacked

and the fine line between
revolutionary ideas and criminal deeds.

I think one of the issues for
the Black Power movement

was that you were really
an open church to any and everybody,

and there are groups of people
within the BLF

who did certain things that were
very much on the fringes of criminality,

on the edge of subversion
and terrorism.

[reporter]
The siege started

just before two this morning

when police surrounded the restaurant.

Take everything out of your pockets,
and put it on the counter! Move!

[narrator]
On the 28th of September, 1975,

three armed men claiming to be
from the Black Liberation Front

entered a restaurant in Knightsbridge
and demanded money.

When police quickly arrived
on the scene,

the gunmen took six members
of staff hostage,

and a standoff began
that would become known

as the Spaghetti House Siege.

The ensuing events would be turned into
an iconic film by director Horace Ove.

It was a total surprise.

It is not part and parcel of,
or-or action that we wanted to endorse.

We now can confirm that there are,
in fact, three gunmen.

[narrator]
The three gunmen were identified as

Wesley Dick, Anthony Munroe,
and Frank Davis.

They were all regular attendees
at Black Power meetings.

All three claimed to be members,

but there was a doubtful issue
about who is a member of the BLF

because we didn't have membership.

Nobody paid any money
to become a member.

[Abbas] I knew one,
but he wasn't a member.

He was an interested young person.

[reporter]
The scene outside

the Spaghetti House restaurant

is taking on something
of an air of permanence.

As the traffic flows past
just a few feet away,

the police have erected
a scaffold and tarpaulin canopy

that completely hides
the building from public gaze.

My instinct was,
this is criminal activity.

My instinct was,
"You can't--you can't do this. Surrender."

On the other side,
I was getting political pressures

to say these are freedom fighters.

These are people
taking up the struggle.

You can't ask them to surrender.

[narrator]
The siege rolled on for five days

with crowds gathering
outside to watch.

Inside the restaurant,

the three gunmen,
led by 24-year-old Wesley Dick,

were making
politically-motivated demands...

but police commissioner Robert Mark
was quick to point out the problem.

I have, in fact, asked for the release
of, uh, two prisoners,

who have completed
their sentences.

[reporter] These people are not
in prison, is that correct?

[overlapping commotion]

[reporter #2] But you can see,
as was said earlier--

But it is--but it is right to say that
that is only one of their demands,

and their demands
are very confusing.

Because the brothers were asking
for someone from the BLF

to go down,
to talk to them,

so that their demands
could be made in public,

Ansel and Tony, in their wisdom,
decided to send me,

and what they sent me to
was the strangest situation

I have ever been in
in my life.

You couldn't even tell
it was a restaurant

because the police vans
and cars and everything

blocked off the whole
of Knightsbridge,

and I was taken in,
downstairs to a basement...

surrounded by policemen,

and I was shouting up
to a hole in the wall.

They are asking me to ask you
to give yourselves up...

which is the only way they'd let us
speak to them.

We couldn't get out
what they wanted to say.

The police confiscated it immediately,

so they handed, um,
a-a written statement out,

but I got to view it for 30 seconds.

[reporter]
It's obvious from the careful surveying

of the whole building

that's been going on that
the police are considering

and drawing up plans to cope
with all possibilities.

I have never understood
Spaghetti House.

Everybody in the BLF thought
it was a criminal act gone wrong.

[reporter]
Just before four o'clock this morning,

ambulances began arriving
at Spaghetti House Restaurant.

Minutes later, the six exhausted
but unhurt Italian hostages were led out.

Shortly afterwards,
handcuffed to detectives,

came two of the captors,
who'd surrendered peacefully.

Seconds later,
the third gunman shot himself.

[Dhondy] He didn't kill himself.

He was taken to hospital,

straightened out,
tried, and jailed.

[Wong] Consequences
of that siege, for me,

it really knocked me back,
in terms of my own understanding,

belief and commitment
to the BLF.

Something that I could not support.

[narrator] The confusion over,

the Spaghetti House Siege

proved to be a turning point,

exposing the messy realties
of revolutionary politics.

The radical energy of
the British Black Power movement

appeared to be waning.

[Leila Hassan Howe]
By then,

the Black Power movement
was in decline in Britain.

Definitely, we were a hodgepodge
of different ideologies,

and of course, the government did
respond to the change in Black Power

because they co-opted
many of the Black Power people.

Money was being poured into
the Black community for projects

to try and defuse the demands
that were being made.

So, if your demand was
for decent housing for young Black men,

they would give you
money for a hostel.

So the demand for decent housing
was defused

'cause they didn't get
decent housing.

They got a hostel.

But the hostel was run
by a Black person.

[Gutzmore] Nothing in the nature
of social movements

exists forever.

If you have hundreds
of Black young people,

militant, eager,
wanting to do something,

what do you actually get them to do?

So, they march,
they attend meetings,

and then you run out
of things to do.

The achievement of the movement
was that it represented

a population that was not prepared
to put up with what British society

had defined it should do.

I think Black Power said,
"We're not going back home.

Britain belongs to us.
We're here to stay,

and we're going to fight for
our rights, here in this country."

That's what Black Power did.

[narrator]
Black Power had moved on,

and so had the country.

The Notting Hill Carnival,

which began as a response
to racism of the 1950s,

was now a global attraction with
a quarter of a million people attending.

A new Race Relations Act in 1976
made it illegal to discriminate

in housing or in education,

two of the key concerns
that motivated Black Power.

But the police remained legally exempt
from anti-racist legislation,

and at the Carnival in 1976,

they now faced a new generation
of young people

who had grown up with
the Black Power message

and would not back down
in the face of police brutality.

[Gutzmore] The Notting Hill
1976 Carnival,

the Metropolitan Police tried, by force,

to police the carnival
into submission.

How many policemen
are you using this year?

Approximately about fourteen hundred.

And last year,
it said that there were only sixty.

[narrator]
As tensions around the carnival mounted,

Darcus Howe warned of the risk
of using the same policing tactics

deployed at the Mangrove protest.

If there is a risk
on carnival day,

then it's going to be
an explosion of the kind

that hasn't been seen
in this country before.

I say that with no joy.

[narrator] And he was right.

Heavy-handed policing
resulted in a riot

that was the biggest seen
on British soil

since the second world war.

It signaled a new era of confrontation
with the police,

where organized protest gave way

to spontaneous outbursts
of anger and rioting.

For many Black people,
these were known as uprisings.

[Abbas] People talk about
the United States in terms of racism,

as though it was so much better here.

You've got to remember,

who were the pilgrims to America?

They were Brits.

OK? All over Africa,

who was in the forefront, besides
the Portuguese, of slavery?

It was the British.

[glass shattering]

[narrator]
Fifty years after the Mangrove protests,

relations between the police
and Black people remain problematic.

The police are no different
towards young Black men

than they were to me
when I was a teenager.

They don't beat you up
in the police station anymore

because all things are recorded.

But they still tell lies.

They'll still verbally
deny your rights.

What kind of country do we live in?

[chanting "Black Lives Matter"]

I have been in
the Black Power movement

and proud to have been in it.

I am very conscious
of the color of my skin

because I won't deny
the color of my skin.

I'm 70 years of age,
and I was born in Britain.

And to this day, people ask me
where I come from.

To this day!

This is a v-- a very strange country.

[Trew] On the 5th of December,
I walked into the Court of Appeal,

with my wife before
the Lord Chief Justice

to have our convictions overturned.

He quashed the convictions.
I was so happy.

I was even seen smiling.
I was so happy.

Today the Lord Chief Justice has told me
exactly what I wanted to hear.

He said he is only sorry
this has taken so long

for this injustice to be remedied.

[interviewer]
How long had it taken?

It had taken me 47 years.

That's where my Black activism
comes in. I was not giving up.

[Johnson] I think that the youngsters
in the Black Lives Matter movement

need to appraise themselves
of what has gone before,

so that they can draw some lessons

from the battles
that we fought and won.

[narrator]
The story of Britain's

Black Power movement has,
until recently,

been largely overlooked,

but to ignore this history

is to risk not learning
key lessons from the past.

The Black Power story reveals
the struggle faced by British citizens

to be treated fairly by the state

and their willingness to fight back
when they weren't.

Black Power in Britain showed that
with unity and self-empowerment,

it was possible to take a stand

and bring about change.

[♪ Linton Kwesi Johnson:
"Time Come"]