From Antigua to Bermuda and Staten Island: Richard Hilton Tobitt and Twentieth-Century Black Internationalism

Recounting the life and times of Antiguan-born minister Richard Hilton Tobitt, this article recovers the marginalized narrative of a Black sociopolitical organizer in the twentieth century. Educated at the Antigua branch of Mico Teachers Training College, Tobitt could have enjoyed a comfortable middle-class life if he had upheld the British colonial order: White rule and Black subservience. Instead, through various organizational affiliations, Tobitt dedicated himself to the pursuit of Black self-determination and uplift. In 1902, Tobitt cofounded the first teachers’ union in Antigua. In 1910, after relocating with his family to Bermuda, Tobitt joined Black Bermudians’ decades-long fight against racial segregation, dispossession, and disenfranchisement. In 1920, with help from Black Bermudian women and men, Tobitt cofounded Bermuda’s first Universal Negro Improvement Association branch. By 1930, Tobitt and his family had relocated to Staten Island, New York, where he became an active member of the local NAACP branch and established a community center for Black youth. Tobitt’s captivating life story sheds needed light on often-overlooked sites where twentieth-century Black activism flourished.