Dr Michael Collins - "These Fine Men from Afar": Colonial Cricketers on Britain’s World War II 'Home Front'

As we mark Armistice Day and remember the wartime service and sacrifice of the past, this lecture will explore an unusual aspect of Britain’s World War II history: the role of sport in maintaining public morale  on the ‘home front’.

Sport, generally, was something the wartime British government was keen to manage as part of its propaganda effort. But in 1940, whereas football remained a national sport associated primarily with the industrial working class, cricket played a different role. It had cross-class, rural-urban, and north-south appeal. And, coterminous with its national importance and ‘quintessential Englishness’, cricket expressed a shared history of imperial camaraderie and unity of purpose. Unlike other popular sports, then, cricket had the unique ability to speak to a bond between England and its empire.

Surprisingly, between 1939 and 1945, at the heart of wartime cricket’s social, cultural, and ideological mix, a handful of black West Indian cricketers performed prominent roles, thrilling crowds and providing a physical embodiment of ’empire loyalty’. Drawing on elements of Dr Collins’ new book – Windrush Cricket: Imperial Culture, Caribbean Migration and the Remaking of Postwar England (Oxford University Press, 2025), this lecture offers an accessible and engaging look at the relationship between sport and identity, highlighting the historical relationship between Britain and the Caribbean, and the unique function of cricket as a form of both ‘cultural imperialism’ and a vehicle for anti-colonial nationalism.

Dr Michael Collins (DPhil Oxon, FRHistS) is Associate Professor of Modern and Contemporary British History. Dr Collins’ most recent book – Windrush Cricket: Imperial Culture, Caribbean Migration, and the Remaking of Postwar England – was published by Oxford University Press in the summer of 2025.