Harold Moody, a physician and campaigner for civil rights, was born in Kingston, Jamaica. He travelled to the United Kingdom (UK) to study medicine at King's College, London in 1904, qualifying as a doctor in 1910. Unable to find work as a doctor because of racism, he started his own practice in Peckham, South London in 1913.
Frustrated by the continual racism he and others experienced, Moody organised a meeting in London on 13th March 1931 to look at ways to address racial discrimination which black people in the UK were facing on a daily basis. The League of Coloured Peoples (LCP) was founded at this meeting with the following stated aims:
1. To protect the social, educational, economic and political interests of its members
2. To interest members in the welfare of coloured peoples in all parts of the world
3. To improve relations between the races
4. To cooperate and affiliate with organisations sympathetic to coloured people
In 1937 a fifth aim, "to render such financial assistance to coloured people in distress as lies within our capacity" was added.
During the second world war the LCP campaigned against racial discrimination in the armed forces. In July 1944 the League organised a three day conference in London to draw up a 'Charter of Coloured People' that demanded full self government at the earliest opportunity for people living under British colonial rule, and an end to discrimination on racial grounds in all spheres of public life in the UK.
Prominent members of the LCP included Constance Cummings-John, C. L. R. James, Jomo Kenyatta and Una Marson. Cummings-John, a Sierra Leonean, established a branch of the LCP when she returned to her home nation in 1938. James and Marson were both active contributors to the LCP journal, The Keys, which was produced quarterly.
Moody died on 24th April 1947, ten days after returning from a tour of the Caribbean Islands to raise funds for the LCP.
Click on the following link to watch a clip about campaigning by the League of Coloured People:
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