Still going strong at 104
If
you were in a room next to Howell Burke and heard him talking you’d never guess that he’s a centenarian.
There’s no quiver in Burke’s voice as he states firmly that he joined the police force on “January 7, 1939” and that he’s “104 years and eight months” old.
“I will be 105 on August 5,” he declared as he graciously granted the
Jamaica Observer an interview while members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) in Clarendon, led by divisional commander Senior Superintendent Fitz Bailey, listened in awe to Howell Granville Buxton Burke’s life story.
Standing on the verandah of his house in Rock River, Clarendon on Monday this week, the former cop pointed out that he was better known in the police force as HG Burke.
He was born in Fair Prospect, Portland and stated that he started working at the Fair Prospect Elementary School as a pupil teacher when he was just 14 years old.
However, he lost the desire to remain in that profession after three unsuccessful attempts at getting into Mico Teachers’ College, despite passing all his examinations.
Eventually, he joined the police force.
“Training in those days was six months, but because of the war (World War II) my squad, which was the first squad, spent eight months because we had to do duty aboard the ships that were running away from submarines,” he said.
“All of them were packed like sardines in Kingston Harbour; it was the responsibility of the Government to protect them, so instead of sending us out like the other men, they kept back the first squad,” Burke related.
Upon completion of his training, he was assigned to the Chapelton Police Station in Clarendon in October 1939.
Those days Jamaica was still under British rule and the constabulary was run by the colonial masters.
“During the colonial days it was like going through hell, because, not that we were looking freedom, but it was sorta half slavery going on with us,” he said, pointing out that a policeman’s pay at that time amounted to five shillings per day.
“But after the change came (Independence in 1962) we could breathe a little better,” he said.
Burke remembers when Basil Robinson became the first black man to be appointed police commissioner.
“It was the right move,” he said. “We had to have a commissioner. As a matter of fact, anybody could have become the commissioner, because all we wanted was a man with dignity, a man who was strict to duty, devoted to his task and who had interest in the work and the interest of the men under him.”
“Men and women,” a member of the group interjected, but Burke corrected him: “We never had women in those days.”
Burke, it turned out, was among the policemen involved in the violent clash between police and Rastafarians, known as the Coral Gardens incident, in April 1963. At the time, he said, he was stationed in Montego Bay.
To tell the entire story, he said, would take a long time. However, he gave the group a bit of what transpired.
“I was the first policeman on the scene and I always say I was the last man to leave, because it was after [Superintendent] Bertie Scott was shot and killed that it ended,” Burke said. “It was he who led us into battle. But I can’t give it to you piecemeal like that.”
Not wanting to have Burke stop relating the story, the
Observer asked him how he felt about the incident.
“We, the policemen, up to the time when we left the scene when Bertie was killed, no one could tell why such a thing happened, why the attack on the Rastas took place,” he said.
“So basically you were acting on orders,” the
Observer suggested.
“Oh yes,” he responded firmly.
“You see, we were defending the police, the Government and the people of Jamaica, because when we went there, at the spot where Bertie was killed, one detective was already hacked to death, Detective Melbourne; and two other policemen were supposed to have been killed, but luckily one survived. I can’t remember the name of the other one, but the one who survived was Campbell, a young policeman. He was left on the wayside to die, because even when we were going up in the river to look for the gang of men who were supposed to be in the hills, we passed him lying there with the other man, and we gave him up as dead,” Burke explained.
His reference was to Constable Errol Campbell who, at the time, was rendered permanently disabled because of severe injuries to his head and was wheelchair bound from that time.
Last December, Public Defender Arlene Harrison Henry sent a report to Parliament, the result of an investigation into several incidents, including the bloody Coral Gardens clash, for which she recommended reparations and that the Jamaican State apologises to Rastafarians.
It was obvious that while Burke would have said more about the incident, he did not want the interview to drag. So the
Observer asked him to give his retirement date.
“August 5, 1971 after doing 32 years, six months and 29 days,” he quipped, eliciting expressions of awe from the group.
“Do you have any regrets?” the newspaper asked.
“No, and I’m saying so from my heart,” he replied, adding that when he retired he was a sergeant.
But while he was not bitter, he did express disappointment that although he entered the police force with his teaching credentials he was not given better treatment.
“Even when I was called upon to act for seniors, I was not paid,” he said.
Asked to give his view of the constabulary today, Burke said: “We have a more intelligent force than the one I joined. Because the one I joined, you just had to be a big, burly fellow with stout, sinewy arms, and big, big feet; and upstairs, very little, if anything.”
The response elicited laughter from the group.
“But today’s force it is not so… even though discipline is not at its highest as in the days gone by,” he added.
However, he had a few words for the current members of the police force.
“The Jamaica Constabulary Force is the best university, the best institution… you will never find another institution where you are taken from out of the dust and made into good powder,” he said. “By joining the force you leave it a perfect gentleman, that is if you want to become a gentleman, because you are the master of your own destiny, no man can rule your destiny for you.”
Added Burke: “The JCF is a wonderful force, and it is here to stay. There is another thing I want to leave with the young men and women of the force; you can take the man or woman from the force, but you can’t take the force from the man or the woman. So keep it going, keep it afloat, don’t make it sink.”
Before wrapping up the interview, the
Observer asked Burke to state what he thought was the reason for his longevity.
“Longevity wasn’t promised to me, it was a gift from God Himself, because He spared me from four instant deaths during my life,” Burke said.
Two of those close encounters, he said, occurred on the job, one being during the Coral Gardens incident, and the other in Frankfield while he was transporting a prisoner who tried to stab him in the back of his neck with an ice pick. But the attempt was thwarted by another policeman who grabbed the prisoner’s hand and broke it in three places.
“But, if you would serve the Almighty God, and serve Him alone, believe in Him, stay close to Him because if you read your
Bible you would see where He says if you stay close to me I will stay close to you,” Burke preached.
“And He said, never you be in a hurry for anything. Wait upon the Lord. He also said if you wait on Him you will renew your strength, you will walk and not be weary, you should run and don’t faint, you will even mount up with wings like eagles,” Burke added.
He said his father, who lived to be 102 years old, told him never to chase land, money or women, “because they will all run away from you”.
Last July, Burke suffered a personal tragedy when his wife Eslin passed away.
“Oh yes, the good lady gone,” he responded when the
Observer inquired. “She died at the age of 93, after we were married for 70 years; lived together like Jacob and Rebecca.”
The couple had two adopted sons. “I love them more than I love myself,” he shared.
Although Burke has a bit of trouble hearing and his vision is cloudy, he said he’s thankful that his health is “not bad for my age”.
“There are many little things I can do, things that I used to see other men and women of lesser age couldn’t do. So I am thankful to the Almighty that I am able to get up out of my bed, go to my bathroom, come back out, sit on my verandah, and if I want to walk back in I do so by myself,” he said.
Burke, who stood for the entire interview, said he was unaware that he was the longest living ex-member of the JCF. However, he expressed gratitude to SSP Bailey and his team who were there to install new bathroom fittings donated by the police force.
They also informed Burke that Governor General Sir Patrick Allen is scheduled to visit him today as a show of gratitude for his many years of service to Jamaica.
In addition, Bailey invited Burke to this Friday’s passing out parade of new police constables at the JCF’s National Police College.