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Zhan Turner
Mr. N. Dill
Preserve our Heritage
March 21st 2016

Bermuda BELCO Riot: Who is responsible?

On February 2nd, 1965 a crisis erupted between rioters and the Police, known as the
infamous BELCO Riots. 1965 marked a stormy period for Bermuda and her people. The
Bermuda Electric Light company grew larger and stronger as tension had been building for
years. The people were enraged and felt as if they needed to gain back their power, through
violence. Starting from a simple question, I believe the violence of the BELCO strike was
sparked by the workers because of their displeasure for racism in Bermuda at the time, their
passion for their work as well as the known inequality that the black BELCO workers faced.
The 1965 dispute began when some of BELCOs employees approached management
one day because they felt that they should be unionised and treated just as the other white
employees had been. They were than denied the right of representation and called its first
members to strike on January 14th. Two full weeks had gone by and no response or action had
been made between the parties. The BELCO workers were starting to get more furious and they
were becoming more openly belligerent. By February 1st, police predicated that violence would
break out soon, as they were now outnumbered. There was a warning in the air, like thunder
before a rainstorm. In my mind I can still see the people picketing on Serpentine Road like it was
yesterday. says long-standing BIU president Ottiwell Simmons. The rioters were angry as they
realized that the injustice that they had witnessed for years needed to be corrected fast! This

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deliberate and planned resort to violence against the unarmed and vastly outnumbered police is
an obvious result of turning an honest strike into a symbol of union and racial solidarity. The
violence was extinguished with tear gas as seventeen officers were brutally injured, nine
demonstrators were taken to court and four
BIU members went to prison.
Island wide racism was a serious
problem in Bermuda. 6 years prior to the Belco
Riot, the Progressive Group led the people of
Bermuda in what we know now as the Theatre
boycott. This was a very historic event that took
place in the hopes of helping black Bermudians to
gain free access to cinemas without the colour bar
(segregation). Although this boycott had worked in
their favor, there still had been a huge race gap left in Bermuda. When the riot had taken place,
the aftermath of the boycott still lingered, especially for the blacks.
The police officers were white and the demonstrators were black, basic segregation.
Police Officer David Mulhall, who was injured during the rioting recalls a personal attack that he
endured from one of the rioters in an article in the Royal Gazette. A group of non-unionised
workers asked the police to open the picket line so that they could exercise their legal right to go
to work. When three policemen approached the picket line, they were set upon and severely
beaten by a group of about 60 men, many of them armed with weapons from a central cache.
says Mulhall. Some onlookers who werent workers also joined in the attacks. For them, this

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seemed to be the perfect time to show the whites how they really felt about the racist policies that
were in place in Bermuda.

Citation Page

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"Recalling My Experience On February 2nd, 1965 - Bernews.com." Bernewscom. 2015.

Web. 24 Mar. 2016.
"The 1965 Belco Riot One Officers View | The Royal Gazette:Bermuda News." The Royal
Gazette. Web. 24 Mar. 2016.
"BIU to Mark 50 Years since Belco Strike | The Royal Gazette:Bermuda News." The Royal
Gazette. Web. 24 Mar. 2016.
Swan, Q. (n.d.). Black Power in Bermuda: The Struggle for Decolonization(pp. 20-26).
Bermuda.