Two hundred years ago today, a one-legged Black pauper lay in the infirmary of the St Giles-in-the-Fields workhouse, slowly fading away. It was a sad end to the remarkable life of Billy Waters – the first African American musician to become celebrated in Britain.
Billy, as he was widely known, didn’t perform on any stage. He fiddled, sang and danced as a busker on the streets of London’s West End. It was his sole means of supporting his beloved “Poll” and their two young children. But busking was deemed begging – and illegal. Billy constantly risked arrest, and some months prior to his final sickness he was taken to court and threatened with prison if caught again. Before entering the workhouse he pawned his fiddle.
