1972 | Voices of Protest

Never trust the Leeds police

One of the more unexpected ways that David Oluwale has been remembered was on the terraces of Elland Road.

Leeds United fans, ‘not well-known for their support of black people’s rights’ in the 1970s (Farrar, 2015), adopted David Oluwale’s name to taunt the police following the trial of Geoffrey Ellerker and Kenneth Kitching.

Two chants are recorded by Kester Aspden in The Hounding of David Oluwale (2007, p. 195). The first was sung to the tune ‘Michael, Row the Boat Ashore’ and shows how recognisable Oluwale’s name was by 1972:

The River Aire is chilly and deep – Ol-u-wa-le
Never trust the Leeds police – Ol-u-wa-le

The second chant, sang to the music hall tune ‘My Old Man (Said Follow the Van)’, shows a knowledge of the trial and the accusation of murder levelled at the two officers:

Policeman said ‘Get in the van, don’t dilly dally on the way'
They had him in the van and in half a minute
They were down by the river and they chucked him in it.
Cos he dillied and he dallied, dallied and dillied
Lost his way and dint know where to roam
And you can’t trust a copper if your name’s Oluwale
When you can’t find your way home.

Time Come

Also inspired by reports of trial was Linton Kwesi Johnson, who was studying sociology at Goldsmiths College and saw poetry as a way of realising black liberation.

David Oluwale features in Linton Kwesi Johnson’s poem ‘Time Come’, which was written in 1972 but not published until later. The poem warns of race-related violence and includes the line ‘When yu kill Oluwale, I did warn yu’ (Johnson in Bradley, 2016, p. 42).

The poem links David Oluwale’s death to the beating of Joshua Francis in police custody and the suppression of the Black Panthers following the Mangrove Nine trial. In doing so, Linton Kwesi Johnson placed Oluwale at the centre of black British politics in the early 1970s. This is significant as he became a leading voice for black liberation, collaborating with the Race Today collective and using poetry and reggae as a form of activism (Lowndes, 2017).

Linton Kwesi Johnson returned to Oluwale’s story in another poem, ‘Night of the Head’, which appeared in his second collection, Dread Beat an Blood, published in 1975. ‘Time Come’ was also reimagined as the closing track of ‘Forces of Victory’, Johnson’s debut solo album released by Island Records in 1979.

Echoes of protest

The chants and poetry of the 1970s continue to have an impact.

In 2006, ‘Time Come’ was included in Mi Revalueshanary Fren, a compilation of Linton Kwesi Johnson’s poetry published as a Penguin Classic. At the time, Johnson was only the ‘second living poet, and the only black poet’ to be published in the Classic series (Poetry Archive, 2022).

The poem was later reproduced in the first Remembering Oluwale anthology and performed by Johnson at an event marking the 50th anniversary of David Oluwale’s death. He said then that ‘even to this day, I’m still convinced that racial prejudice is part of the cultural DNA of this country’ (Remember Oluwale, 2020), illustrating protest continues to be important.

In 2021, the Leeds-based singer songwriter Ellen Smith was asked to rework the football chants for use in a BBC Radio 4 documentary about David Oluwale (Smith, 2022).

We reached out to Ellen Smith about her involvement in the project. When asked how she had heard of David Oluwale’s story, she commented on her surprise to say that the first she heard of it was being asked to do the songs. It shocked her as she grew up in Leeds but had never come across his story (Smith, 2022).

We burst into song whenever we can: it's one resistance to the abjection of David Oluwale. Here is @ellensmith_uk leading the DO Choir, singing #LEEDSUTD's 1972 songs for DO at our #BluePlaque festival pic.twitter.com/hVLXIjwVdw

— Remember Oluwale (@RememberOluwale) October 24, 2022

Ellen Smith has now connected with the David Oluwale Memorial Association and other organisations, such as Leeds Museum, to arrange a series of performances in 2023. She told us that even though David Oluwale’s story is tragic ‘there are good parts to the story too’ (Smith, 2022).

The creative ways in which the public remembers David Oluwale’s story ensures that his story does not get forgotten. They are a form of public history that make the story more accessible to different audiences. While we cannot change the past, we can ensure we learn from the story, so history does not repeat itself.