1st Black Honorand for Local Blue Plaque Scheme

Join Oxfordshire's Blue Plaque Board and Thames Town Council for a special event, to unveil a new blue plaque in the name of John Henry Smythe: the first Black and Sierra Leonian recipient of a blue plaque in the county. 

John Henry Smythe, an RAF navigator from Sierra Leone in West Africa, was shot down and captured in Nazi Germany in 1943. After he was liberated from a prisoner-of-war camp, he would go on to become a senior officer aboard the Empire Windrush and then a barrister, rising to the rank of Queen's Counsel. As the attorney general of Sierra Leone, he would meet President John F Kennedy in the White House. After retirement, he lived with his family in Thame, Oxfordshire, where he died in 1996. 

His blue plaque will be unveiled at 1 Garden City, Thame (OX9 3NT) on Saturday 26 July, at 11.30am. Refreshments will be provided by invitation of his son, Eddy Smythe, after the ceremony at 39a High Street, Chinnor, OX39 4DJ. If you would like to attend this event, please RSVP to Eda Forbes via phone (01865 552763) or email (eda.forbes@btinternet.com). 

The Blue Plaques Board welcomes suggestions for more people, events and places to recognise in Oxfordshire's local history. If you'd like to find out about how to make a proposal, or to learn about the stories behind their other plaques, go to the The Blue Plaques Board website.