JNF-The-Working-Class-Struggle-of-Half-a-Century

Grenada -Trinidad Federation
The southern colonies along with Dominica had already been enjoying
a measure of Representative Government. They were in a class by
themselves. The Leeward Islands were the backward lot. As up to that
point the people of Antigua, Montserrat and St. Kitts-Nevis (as this territory
was then called) had not been granted the right to vote. They had
not yet tasted the privilege of electing some of its members of their legislatures.
The Leeward Islands got a greater measure of political liberty
from the Commission’s report, because they were farthest back in the
line. The Report also proposed yet further advances for the units of
the south, but not complete self-government. This did not satisfy them.
They decided to launch out for a Federation of Grenada and Trinidad. In
other words, these two proposed to go it alone. Mr. Marryshow hammered
home the idea as he spoke at the meeting of the Trinidad Working
Men Association. Here he examined the report of the Closer Union
Commission. “The report is contemptible!” he struck out. “So far as
Grenada is concerned we are not accepting it.” Emotions ran high.
“Hold Fast!” he charged the audience. “Remember you have a sister
organisation in Grenada supporting the same principles...”
The eyes of our southern brethren were focused more strongly
on the particular goal which they wanted to reach than on the new
strides which the struggling islands in the north were just beginning to
make. When the “Guns of Grenada” boomed at the Apollo theater on
the evening of September 9 th 1932, they shook the people of St. Kitts,
Nevis and Anguilla into towards a new state of political consciousness
giving tremendous stimulus to the move towards self determination. T.
Albert Marryshow and G. Elmore Edwards of Grenada, made no mean
contribution to the cause of West Indian nationhood. But the power of
Grenada two years later was pitted against the common cause.
Marryshow’s Position
The Secretary of the State’s “Closer Union” despatch was debated in
the Grenada Legislative Council in November of that year. Mr. Marryshow
moved an amendment to the effect that the final ruling authority
for the colony should lie in the Colonial Office in London. On that day
he placed on record another example of West Indian oratory during the
course of the debate, and received the full support of all the elected
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