June 10th 2020 marks the 53rd anniversary of the attempted coup d’état of the Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw, St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party government back in 1967.
The attempted overthrow is documented in books by the late Ronald Webster, Anguilla’s Revolutionary Leader and Chief Minister of Anguilla in his book “A Scrap Book of the Anguilla Revolution” and “Anguilla’s Battle for Freedom 1967-1969” co-authored by Anguillans Colville Petty and Nat Hodge, a former editor of the Democrat Newspaper.
Anguilla’s Battle for Freedom 1967-1969 notes that the high point of the revolution occurred on May 30, 1967 with the expulsion of the St. Kitts police. A few days later on the 10th, a party of armed Anguillans and 3 American mercenaries landed on St. Kitts to assist the PAM – People’s Action Movement – in several attacks on the Defense Force Camp at Spring Field, the Police Headquarters on Cayon Street, Basseterre and the Needsmust Power Station.
“The landing did not achieve its principle objective – the overthrow of the Robert Bradshaw government – but it had the effect of preventing St. Kitts from attacking Anguilla. The Anguilla Revolution ended on 19th March 1969 when British forces invaded the island and established the British Administration headed by a British commissioner,” said the co-authors, who added that the Anguilla Battle for Freedom 1967-1969 reflects the result of new research primarily through the interviewing of those persons who were in the vanguard of the revolution.