Background
William Henry Bramble was born on 8 October 1902 in Montserrat.
government official politician
William Henry Bramble was born on 8 October 1902 in Montserrat.
Received his primary education in Montserrat.
Secured employment on a plantation and later he became a dealer in sea island cotton and subsequently worked as a skilled carpenter and an undertaker. His interest in politics and labor union activities was aroused during the latter half of the 1930s when economic suffering throughout the West Indies caused widespread labor disturbances and rioting.
Although legislation enacted in 1939 legalized trade union activity, a system of sharecropping under virtual absolutism of the estate owners prevented any form of political and labor organization among agricultural workers. Only in 1946 did a local politician, Robert Griffith, decide to organize the Montserrat Trades and Labour Union (MTLU). Bramble became active in the MTLU.
In 1951 universal adult suffrage was introduced, and in elections in 1952 Bramble won a seat on the Legislative Council. There he began an intensive struggle against the rich and powerful merchants and planters who dominated Montserrat. He founded the Labour Party, more of an informal organization for the purposes of electoral mobilization than a formally organized political party. Bramble became the chairman of the Social Services and Public Works Com-mittee, as a result of his post on the Council, and made an attempt to improve the housing conditions of the masses and to champion the lot of the homeless and landless.
Bramble also became a dominant figure in the Trades and Labour Union, and was elected its president in 1954. His unceasing efforts to ensure that the poor had access to land for rent led to the end of the system.
In March 1958 Bramble won the Montserrat seat on the federal legislature of the Leeward Islands. Later that year his Labour Party won four of five elective seats in the Montserrat Legislature. After this victory, he concentrated on politics and allowed the union to fall into abeyance. By 1959 it was all but dormant.
In 1960 a new constitution created a ministerial system and an expanded Legislative Council where elected members had an overwhelming majority. Bramble became chief minister, the first for the colony, as well as minister of trade and production, after the 1961 elections, in which the Labour Party won five of seven elective seats on the council.
In 1966 Bramble won another election despite severe criticism of his devel¬opment program and his seeming authoritarian approach to party and government. By 1970, however, his oldest son, Percival Austin Bramble, a former minister in his government, was his chief rival, and William Bramble and his Labour Party were swept out of power, failing to win a single constituency. Following his defeat, the elder Bramble quietly faded out of political and union activity.