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Oral history recording with Gloria Allen, born in January, 1940, in Kingston, Jamaica. Recorded as part of Race Council Cymru’s Windrush Cymru Heritage Project.

“Feeling Jamaican has never left me.”

Gloria Evans was born in January of 1940 in Kingston, Jamaica. Her father was a tailor. Her parents had nine children, Gloria being the third eldest and the only girl among them. She came to Wales at the age of 19 to pursue a career in nursing.

“I started off in the Anglican Sunday school and then church school…then Denham school but after the hurricane, things changed. Everything was upside down, I had to change schools and things got a bit difficult.… everything was disrupted, my father was well-known but things slowed down a bit, but life went on.”

“My dad came first to the UK, I was 19 when I came here. I always wanted to be a nurse, and God granted me that wish. I came here and studied nursing and midwifery.”

“I did my practical training in Book General Hospital, Shooters Hill, and did my midwifery in St David’s. I was married in 1961 and then moved to Cardiff in 1963… We had three children. Feeling Jamaican has never left me. In the hospital, it was multiracial and the change didn’t worry me. I think I’m a person who just adjusts.”

“I had intentions of returning to Jamaica when the children grew up, but as time went on, sometimes we have to admit our preconceived ideas don’t always work out as anticipated or expected. We have to be willing to adjust accordingly.”

“Looking back, sometimes I felt really isolated and it was the church, the teachings, there were principally naturally and spiritual embed in me despite some tremendous hardships. By the grace of God, I tried to maintain my integrity.