Generals' Nicknames
No91: Horace Sewell ('Sambo')
Brigadier-General Horace Somerville Sewell
(1991-1953) commanded 1st Cavalry Brigade from April 1918 until the end of the
war.
Near the start of an academic session a few
years ago I had the following conversation over the photocopier with my (then)
colleague Nick Cull, now Professor of American History at the University of
Leicester:
‘Hi, Nick, good summer?’
‘Yes, thanks, I’ve just got back from a
research trip to New York. Actually, I have some news for you.’
‘Oh yes, what’s that?’
‘I’ve found a black British general of the
Great War.’
Photocopiers give off radiation. This was
clearly affecting the young person’s brain. I struggled to find a
half-intelligent response.
‘How do you mean, an Indian prince?’
‘No,’ he replied firmly, ‘he was a
British Army officer. He commanded a cavalry brigade.’
A black general who commanded a cavalry
brigade? The man was clearly mad.
‘What was his name?’
‘Sewell,’ said Nick, definitively.
Blimey, I thought, there is such a person.
‘How do you know this?’ I asked.
‘I’ve been researching the British
Information Service in New York during the Second World War. I interviewed some
Americans who had dealings with the BIS and they described Sewell as “black”.’
I repaired to my room to check my notes. ‘Henry
Somerville Sewell, third son of Henry Sewell of Clinton House, Alresford,
Hampshire, and Steep Hill Castle, Ventnor, Isle of Wight. Harrow and Trinity
College, Cambridge. 4th Dragoon Guards. Attached British Information Service,
New York, 1939-45.’ ‘4th Dragoon Guards’ - a clue. I took my copy of
Richard Van Emden’s Tickled to Death to Go, his memoir of Ben Clouting,
a Trooper in 4/DG, from the shelf. Sure enough, there was a photograph of Sewell
(Plate 22). He doesn’t look ‘black’, I thought. I wrote to Richard Van
Emden. ‘Richard,’ I asked, ‘can there be anything in this?’ ‘I doubt
it,’ he replied, ‘but his regimental nickname was “Sambo”.’
I really have no idea what to make of this.
John Bourne
Centre Member Rob Thompson has been inspired to do some
research by this intriguing story. Here is a reply to his e-mail to the British
Information Service in New York:
‘Dear Mr Thompson,
Thank you for your e mail of 6th November, which has been
passed on to me.
As Nick Cull will have told you, very little
material on the history of BIS has been retained in these offices. However,
Who Was Who 1951-60 lists a Brigadier-General Horace Somerville Sewell who
died in 1953, and was attached to BIS, New York, during WWII; presumably it is
to him that you refer.
He is listed as having an American wife, and
addresses in both New York and Jamaica. There is also an exhaustive entry on
Brigadier-General Sewell and his lineage in the 1952 edition of Burke's
Landed Gentry. If you do not have access to these reference works in
Birmingham, I should be pleased to photocopy the entries and fax them to you.
I am afraid that I have no other information
on Brigadier-General Sewell. However, you may remember that for many years
Private Eye maintained, as a running joke, the fiction that Lord Gowrie was
black. Perhaps this was a similar joke.
Yours sincerely,
Peter McInally
Information Officer
British Information Services
New York
America's most accessed source of UK information
John Bourne writes:
I should not really be critical of Mr McInally’s
kindness in offering to send Rob Thompson a copy of Sewell’s entry in Burke’s
Landed Gentry. Kindness is an under-rated virtue that is often in short
supply. But I do feel compelled to point out that Birmingham has one of the
finest reference libraries in Europe. And, yes, I have read Sewell’s entry in Burke,
with its intriguing West Indian connection.
The plot thickens.
Kindly submitted by Elizabeth Mills:
I was fascinated to read the snippet about General Sewell
being known as Sambo. He was my Great Great Uncle and I recently met up with one
of his grandchildren in Warwickshire, Percy Sewell.
Percy tells me that Horace’s grandmother was probably
mulatto. Horace’s grandfather was a sugar planter in Jamaica, William Sewell
(who originally came from Haslemere, Surrey). His wife, Mary McCrea, was of
mixed race – allegedly the daughter of an Admiral McCrea (about whom I can
find nothing). I have not been able to find a record of their marriage, and
therefore do not know when/where she was born.
The family continued in Jamaica until after WW2. It
is probable that Sambo was Horace’s nickname because he came from Jamaica.
Elizabeth Mills
Oxford
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