Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw

Prior to becoming the first premier of Saint Kitts and Nevis, Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw worked as a minister, politician, and labor organizer.

In the Saint Kitts village of Saint Paul Capisterre, Bradshaw was born. When Bradshaw was nine months old, his father left for the country, leaving Bradshaw to be raised by his grandma. At the time, Saint Kitts offered the seventh grade as the highest level of primary education, and he attended St. Paul to complete it. Bradshaw grew interested in the labor movement while working as an apprentice machine builder at St. Kitts at the age of 16. He joined St. Kitts and Nevis as a secretary in 1940, leaving the sugar mill following a strike for increased pay. In 1944, Bradshaw took over as union president after Joseph Matthew Sebastian. He married Kittitian-Lebanese Mildred Sahaley in 1963.

Bradshaw was a political stalwart of the nation and backed the cause of the road builders. In 1945, he was elected party leader of the newly established St. Kitts-Nevis-Anguilla Labor Party. In 1946, when he first joined politics, he obtained a place on the Legislative Council and later was elected to the Executive Council. He served St. Kitts-Nevis-Anguilla as secretary of manufacturing and commerce in 1956. Bradshaw was elected to the House of Commons and served as the West Indies Federation's finance minister from 1958 and 1962 when the West Indies Federation was in existence.

Bradshaw passed away from prostate cancer at his Basseterre residence on May 23, 1978. He was laid to rest in Springfield Cemetery. Paul Southwell, his deputy prime minister, succeeded him.

Bradshaw was given the first National Hero title by the Congress of Saint Kitts and Nevis posthumously in 1996, and he is commemorated every year on National Heroes Day, which is observed on his birthday. Golden Rock Airport in Saint Kitts was renamed Robert L. Bradshaw International Airport in his honor on the first National Heroes Day in 1998. At the location of Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw's birth in St. Paul, a memorial park was constructed in 2007. The Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw building on the University of Windsor Medical School's Cayon campus was dedicated on September 17, 2010.

To conclude, Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw:

• was the first prime minister of Saint Kitts and Nevis, also serving as a minister, politician, and labor organizer.
• became interested in the labor movement while working as an apprentice machinist in St. Kitts at the age of 16.
• was elected party leader of the St. Kitts-Nevis Anguilla, then elected to the House of Commons and served as finance minister of the West Indies Federation between 1958 and 1962.
• died of prostate cancer at his Basseterre estate in 1978 and is laid to rest at Springfield Cemetery.
• was posthumously awarded the first National Hero title by the Congress of Saint Kitts and Nevis in 1996 with a series of landmarks named after him.