A couple of weeks ago I was browsing through the posts over at Barbados Free Press, and followed a link to this Nation newspaper editorial which mentions, in passing, “controversial Barbadian-born international figure Sydney Burnett-Alleyne”. Having never heard of this gentleman, and being intrigued by the characterisation of him as a “controversial international figure”, I decided to do a Google search for his name.
I found a Time magazine article from 1981, which describes Mr. Burnett-Alleyne as a “mystery-man gunrunner with [a] novelish name”. He was apparently one of the central figures involved in a plan to overthrow the government of Dominica. A 2006 article from the Nation suggests that Burnett-Alleyne was also involved in an attempted coup in Barbados, with the ex-Prime Minister of Dominica apparently looking to become head of some sort of “Commonwealth of Barbados and Dominica”. It’s not clear to me whether this coup attempt is the same one referred to in Time, or whether Mr. Burnett-Alleyne was just very persistent. Finally, I came across this recent, but unrevealing, submission to the Nation’s editor from one Sydney Augustine Burnett Alleyne.
The most informative thing I turned up was a post at the Barbados Forum which quotes at length a 2003 article (original source not indicated, but it sounds like the Nation again) about Burnett-Alleyne. Here are the opening paragraphs:
Is the Burnett-Alleyne of today the same person who spent several months in jail after being caught in Martinique’s waters with a yacht full of guns and ammunition, supposedly bound for Barbados to try to overthrow the Tom Adams administration in the middle 1970s, or is he the soft spoken man in Britain who recently converted to Roman Catholicism and who recently told the SUNDAY SUN that he loves Barbados and Barbadians?
Is he the same man who once vowed that the streets of Barbados would “run red with blood” if he didn’t get his way by having a government of “national consensus” to replace the freely elected administration in Bridgetown?
Streets running red with blood, wow. That’s some strong language. I never imagined that modern Barbadian politics had ever involved the sort of conspiracy and turmoil revealed by these tales. But I suppose that back in the 1970s (back before my time, I’m still a young(ish) yam) revolution was in the air.
Overall, what I’ve read makes me, to somewhat misquote Lewis Carroll, curiouser and curiouser. I would love to know more about this Sydney Burnett-Alleyne guy. Can anyone help me out?