SS Empire Windrush - SS Empire Windrush - Icons of EnglandIn 1948, the ship SS Empire Windrush arrived in Britain, carrying a few hundred people from Jamaica who wanted to make a new life for themselves in Britain. You can see a group of them in the photo. Symbolically it was the beginning of a wave of immigration from the British Empire, encouraged by the government who needed workers to rebuild Britain. The Jamaicans who arrived, however, often found Britain was not what they had thought. This site gives some information on this generation of immigrants often omitted from the history books.
