Page 3 Advertisements Column 4

Taihape Daily Times, 3 January 1918, Page 3

BLACK AND WHITE MAR- ' KIAGES. ' , THE LURE OF HIGH WAGES. Within the last tew months I 'am told (writes the London correspondent of a Home paper), there has been a perfect epidemic of marriages between English girls, principally munition workers, and negroes who have J come to Britain from the West coast of Africa on war work. Seldom a j week passes now that, a dusky bride- ( o-room does not figure in a matrimonial ceremony in some part of London. The negroes are engaged in factories and at the docks, and while thousands of white men are in the fighting line the coloured ones are winning their way into many an English home. Already there is quite a negro colony in the East End of London, and the police are becoming anxious as to the future. They have no complaint to make against the coloured men, who, by all accounts, are on their best behaviour, and giving very little trouble. Some of the negroes, I learned on enquiry, are earning handsome money, not a few of them turning over an income of £lO and £l2 a week. This in itself is always an attraction to a girl of simple birth. The coloured men, however, show their affection and devotion in various ways, and nut content with buying fancy presents for their English sweethearts, they also “look after” the fathers and mothers of their brides. SWIFT COURTSHIP. A registrar in an East End area says that he has married no fewer than 100 couples in the last six weeks, and that there is quite a boom in East End weddings. “The courtships appear to be swift and sweet” he smiled, and to be frank the pairs that come here all seem to i be quite happy and contented. I asked { one brunette why she couldn’t find an ( English husband and she replied that she wouldn’t exchange her nigger boy , for all the white men in the world. A favourite explanation is that colour makes no difference to the affections of the heart.” One of the instances communicated was that of an 18-year-old girl, who renounced a private in a London regiment and transferred her heart to a. negro. She had met the latter at a dance, and was so carried away with him that they were married in three weeks. Another story is told of a “"flapper” who vanished from home, and when next heard of was settled down with a coloured man in the West End of London. He had -wooed and won her in less time than it takes to have a cup of tea, and their wedding was quite a lightning affair. POND OF FOREIGNERS. “This wave of weddings is nothingnew,” said a police inspector of a large district close to the London docks. “The girls seem to take very quickly to foreigners, and down here we have young -women married to Chinamen, Japs, Senegalese and Zouaves_ The addition of the negroes from West Africa will add to the gaiety of the neighbourhood. So far as their general conduct is concerned, I must say that we have no objection t'b raise. They give very little trouble, and are usually well conductec. Our experience in this quarter is that whenever a shindy arises it is the woman’s fault, and not the nigger’s.” A clergyman took a different view. “I have repeatedly warned the girls in this district,” he observed, “but my words continue to fall on deaf ears. It seems to me that the real attraction is the money which the negroes are able to command in munition factories throughout the country. No, I cannot tell you whether such alliances turn out happily, but I deplore the increase of weddings with negroes on national as well as sentimental grounds.”

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