Abolition

Born in the 1930s, Peter Stanswood knew he had black relatives and struggled with feeling a bit different from his friends and neighbours.

"In Portsmouth in those days, we were different to everyone else - I was suddenly aware of our colour... I'm ashamed to say that I was embarrassed by it."

But that shame was to later become pride as Peter and his cousin, Reynauld, explored their family history. 

Slave heritage

Their investigations led them to the Caribbean and the remarkable life story of their grandfather.

Peter had remembered his mother talking about her father who came from St Croix in the West Indies.

Their grandfather, Joseph Peterson was the son of a freed slave. He left St Croix on a leisure yacht - the Nerissa - owned by millionaire, Arthur Reynell Pack.

Peter and Reynauld

He arrived in Cowes on the Isle of Wight where he caused quite a stir after starting a relationship with a local woman called Letty Howell, who lived near the yacht squadron.

"It must have been an incredible love match. The kind of discriminations that they must have met in those days and the hostility they faced from different people - white and black together would have been quite something."

Scandal

But the romance was not without complications, up against the conservative sensibilities of Edwardian England.

Letty Howell was already married and news of Joseph Peterson - a black co-respondent - and the affair reached both the local and national press.

A torrid divorce settlement ensued, with the hearing at the High Court hearing of their courtship in no uncertain terms.

Leaving the judgment and the Island behind them, Joseph and Letty set up home in Portsmouth where Joseph worked in the dockyard. The couple had five children.

Joseph volunteered for military service in World War One in 1916 but was killed by gas poisoning.

Having been forced to deny their heritage for years, Peter and Reynauld are now proud of their heroic grandfather and his life, a generation on from the family's freedom from slavery.