Somalis in Britain in the early 1900s: Ibrahim Ismaa’il: an autobiography

Interesting:

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@Javelin and @AbdiFreedom

So 100 yrs ago we have Mary Abdi mixed daughter of a Somali sailor, marrying a Yemeni who was also probably a sailor. I wonder if their descendants are still Somali/Yemeni?
 
Interesting:

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@Javelin and @AbdiFreedom

So 100 yrs ago we have Mary Abdi mixed daughter of a Somali sailor, marrying a Yemeni who was also probably a sailor. I wonder if their descendants are still Somali/Yemeni?
I have relatives in Cardiff from my great grandfather's gen who moved there. he was born in the late 1800s and lived into the 2000s. There descendents live there in communities I used to go Cardiff in the summer when I was a kid and there very much is a present and insular somali Community
 
I have relatives in Cardiff from my great grandfather's gen who moved there. he was born in the late 1800s and lived into the 2000s. There descendent live there in communities I used to go Cardiff in the summer when I was a kid and there very much is a present and insular somali Community
Did their kids end up marrying Somalis? I’ve heard of a lady whose a friend of a friend but she’s a white gaal but with a Somali Muslim
Surname, she seems proud of her Somali roots bless her, but apart from that she’s a white lady with a white husband.
 
Did their kids end up marrying Somalis? I’ve heard of a lady whose a friend of a friend but she’s a white gaal but with a Somali Muslim
Surname, she seems proud of her Somali roots bless her, but apart from that she’s a white lady with a white husband.
Over time a lot of them brought there families from back home and moved to Cardiff over the years so most aren't even from a sailor background only the original men who first settled were. women were brought over aswell over the years. Plus there all well off when it comes to comparing them to other somalis from western diasporas across the world. They have established themselves in Wales and have been there for a few generations but are very quiet and hidden away from somalis in general I would sat there well integrated yet still very insular. But yes a lot of mixed kids but many have married back into somalis.
 
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Try farah it's a common somali name as an alternative for abdi
A lot of marriages and deaths. Also, there’s a lot of names like Elizabeth Farah. I don’t know if that means she’s mixed of Somali descent. I don’t know how common Farah is with non Somalis. A running theme though is incredibly early deaths of the ones that are definitely Somali like Mohamed Farah died in Cardiff ect.
 

j&jenterprises

A landheere always pays his debts
Has anyone come across Nadifo Mohamed’s book The Fortune Men? I haven’t read it but a period early I was doing research on the same topic. It is about the last man to be put on capital punishment in UK, his name was Mahmood Hussein Mattan. Born 1923 and put on CP in mid 1950’s. Sadly he was wrongly charged. As far as I was aware the 1940’s-50’s were the earliest Somali arrival into Cardiff/Liverpool docks. I’m assuming the ones who came pre-Commonwealth Act of 1948 didn’t settle but return after their work on the docks was done as opposed to the post-1948 ones who took up the offer and stayed.
 

Yusuf Abdi Ali Rashid

King of Prussia
I came across this fascinating text:

In the autobiography, Ismail also recounts his experience of life in Britain. He witnessed the anti-immigrant riots which engulfed Cardiff in 1919 at the end of the First World War. Returning from the trenches of the Western Front, white British servicemen directed their frustrations at the lack of employment at the black and Asian residents of Tiger Bay.

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All of this happened a 100 yrs ago and I’m very interested. I have a lot of questions, did Ibrahim end up going back to Somalia? Or did he end up staying and having kids in the UK? Where are his descendents? I wish we had more sources about the lives and experiences of Somalis that lived in the UK a 100 yrs ago.
I'd appreciate it if you could change the title of this thread, Ismail was not Somali, but rather a member of the Darood ethnic group.
 
Found it for anyone who wants to watch it


Interesting video. Understandable as to why interracial couples were prohibited and taboo back in the day, sentiments of inceldom and being ‘cucked by the foreigners’ leads to low morale amongst the young male population. Thus leading to further civil unrest.

Also interesting to know that dumb lazy nitties complaining about muh foreigners stealing muh jobs was always a thing in the UK. People in the past really weren’t that different from us tbh
 
Guys if you have any interesting picture/articles/texts about Somalis in Britain in the early 1900s, post it in this thread!
 
So, from doing a lot of digging many Somalis were in the UK by 1904. I’ve tried various names like Hassan and names like Hassan Elmi ect comes up. Cardiff seems to have been Somali central at that time period. Also, even as early as 116 years ago there are a lot of recorded marriages with white local women. I wonder where their kids descendants are? They have probably blended in with cadaans and their Somaliness is probably nothing but a footnote in history. I came across dozen upon dozens of marriage records btw.
 

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