‘My father felt protected from racism once he joined the RAF’
When actor Colin McFarlane thinks of his father, Sidney, he cannot forget the casual racist taunts and insults Sidney endured on arriving in depressed, post-war England from the Caribbean in the 1950s. Not to mention the lack of opportunities open to a well-educated young man with ambition.
“Dad was 20, recently arrived from Jamaica to help Britain get back on its feet,” says McFarlane, “and he could only get a job as a bus conductor.
“That was despite the fact he was a trained engineering draughtsman with a written reference from a British engineering firm, Reginald Aitken. The stories he told me of having to turn the other cheek in the face of discrimination will never leave me.”
But nor, however, will his father’s tales of how he overcame these setbacks by joining the armed forces, to do his National Service.
“When my father joined the RAF,” says McFarlane, “it did give him in many ways a safe space, as it did my mum and my two brothers. I always remember him explaining to me as a child that at least in the RAF there were rules and you would be more protected than his fellow countrymen and women on ‘civvy street’.”
Sidney rose through the ranks of the RAF, retiring after 30 years as a squadron leader. “He was an inspiration, refusing to take no for an answer,” says McFarlane. “I looked at him and realised that there was nothing to stop me achieving my goals.
“Of course, he couldn’t have done it without my amazing mother, Gwen, who sadly passed away in January 2023 after a long battle with arthritis and dementia.”
McFarlane, now 62, has certainly found his own successful path. Today, dressed in a long black leather coat and a Fedora, he draws all eyes at this discreet private members’ club in London’s Soho.
Probably one of the UK’s most hard-working actors, appearing in Hollywood blockbusters such as Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight trilogy, and the Outlander television series, McFarlane is a familiar voice on children’s television, too. He has been the voice of Sgt Slipper in ITV’s Dennis the Menace cartoon as well as taking roles in Peppa Pig, Hey Duggee, Mike the Knight and Fireman Sam. His latest success is narrating the CBeebies cartoon Supertato.
Happily married to Kate and father to three grown-up children, Josh, Em and Jonny, McFarlane is proud of his achievements so far – including work as a campaigner for the Windrush generation – and today he is here to champion the RAF Benevolent Fund, one of the charities supported in this year’s Telegraph Christmas appeal.
The Fund installed an access ramp at his parents’ home in Lincolnshire when Gwen, who met her future husband back in Jamaica when they were both in their teens, was in a wheelchair.
The family is still bereft at the loss of their matriarch, who came to the UK one year before her husband in 1954. “Dad is still grieving. He’s devastated to lose her. The RAF Benevolent Fund helped him at a difficult time and will still be there to help him if he needs them in the future.”
The RAF, which prides itself on inclusion and diversity today, was in many ways a refuge for Sidney. Before he joined up, the couple had to live in a single rented room with an accommodating West Indian landlord in Hackney. But it was too small for a growing family once their first son, Kevin, was born.
Sidney himself, in a taped interview with his wife for ITV News Calendar, explained the difficulties. “It was quite a common thing to take up a newspaper, looking for a flat and see ‘No blacks, no Jews, no Irish, no cats and no dogs wanted’.
“We just saw ourselves as ambassadors for our country.”
In the end, fate intervened; Sidney received call up papers for the armed forces – an irony, considering the fact that many members of the Windrush generation who came with him were later not considered British enough to have a right to remain in the UK.
“No one who arrived at that time from the Caribbean knew that they had to do national service so it was a bit of a shock,” says McFarlane, who explains that his mother’s brother threw himself down the stairs so he could be deemed medically unfit – which worked, but left him with a painful limp.
Unwilling at first, Sidney only intended to do the minimum required, but it turned out to be an opportunity that he couldn’t turn down. He excelled in his new career, and was commended at every NCO rank, from corporal to flight sergeant, before he became a commissioned officer. When Jamaica became independent in 1962, Sidney dispensed with his British colonial passport and took out a Jamaican one. However, as this did not prevent him being stopped and questioned when returning from serving in Bahrain, later in 1973 he and his wife decided to get naturalisation papers, which made them both eligible for a British passport, too.
“My father came to enjoy service life in the air force, from dances and balls in the Sergeant’s Mess and later the Officer’s Mess,” says McFarlane, “to the wonderful house parties in Cyprus that I would spy from my bedroom, to his days as a cricket umpire where he also excelled.”
The whole family benefited from Sidney’s long association with the RAF, which took them all over the world. “For example, in 1976 myself and my two brothers travelled unaccompanied on a RAF VC 10 flight to Montreal and then a greyhound bus to New York to stay with relatives. Other countries we lived in while my father served were Germany, Holland, the Middle East and Cyprus.”
McFarlane remembers special days growing up on base at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, although they had to evacuate when the island was invaded by the Turkish army in the early 1970s. “School days would start at 7am and finish at 1pm so there were whole afternoons on the beach. Me and my two older brothers had a great time; it was like being in paradise.”
A large contingent of West Indian RAF personnel were stationed on the island. “There would be these amazing beach barbecues, with us kids in the sea, the men playing dominoes and the women cooking amazing West Indian food. Even the invasion seemed like an exciting adventure to me and the other service children, but it wasn’t quite like that for the adults, who understood the seriousness of the situation.”
However, McFarlane says that his father was the only black officer he saw while growing up on RAF bases – and the RAF wasn’t immune from the racist attitudes that still permeated British society.
When the boys arrived at a new place and a new school, there would occasionally be abuse from other kids based on skin colour, but McFarlane says that he and his big brothers settled the matter very quickly and gained the respect of their peers, occasionally with fisticuffs. It was where he learnt how to make people laugh, with his striking ability to create different voices and caricatures – a forerunner of his successful career as a voice actor.
The RAF also made it possible for the boys to go to private boarding school – something that McFarlane says was key to building his confidence and where he started to appear in school plays, often in small roles but getting the lion’s share of the attention from the audience.
“Education was always vitally important to both my grandfather and my father. The RAF allowed us all to be educated at the brilliant Perse School in Cambridge.” His father agreed with his decision to study acting, but only if he did so at university. McFarlane went on to study drama at the University of Loughborough.
He is happy that Sidney, a staunch Catholic who sings in his church choir, has been rewarded for his life-long commitment to the RAF – he received an MBE for services to the community and the RAF, as well as an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Lincoln to reflect his contribution to the local community and the university since its inception.
And McFarlane doesn’t forget that the RAF also provided a vital stepping stone for him and his brothers. “The cultural experiences were vast and inspiring; we all learnt so much. It was a full and rich life that left him and my mother with so many wonderful memories and so much to be grateful for, and ultimately provided the foundation for the life and acting career I have gone on to enjoy.”
He adds: “I’m delighted to put a spotlight on his contribution and also highlight the excellent work the RAF Benevolent Fund does to support service personnel and their families.”
The RAF Benevolent Fund is one of four charities supported by this year’s Telegraph Christmas Charity Appeal. The others are Go Beyond, Marie Curie and Race Against Dementia. To make a donation, please visit telegraph.co.uk/2023appeal or call 0151 284 1927
