Born: 18 November 1921, Grenada
Died: 6 April 2013
Country most active: Grenada
Also known as: Hilda Gibbs
As governor of Grenada from 1968 to 1974, Dame Hilda Bynoe was the first – and remains the only – woman to hold the position, as well as the first person of African descent. She was the first woman governor in the British Commonwealth, and the first person born and raised in Grenada to be appointed its governor.
Decades earlier, she began her career as a teacher in Trinidad before travelling to the U.K. in 1942 to study medicine at University of London’s Royal Free Hospital, followed by the London School of Medicine for Women, where she graduated in 1951. She returned to the Caribbean in 1953, where Bynoe worked as a doctor in Guyana and Trinidad for the following 15 years.
From a young age, Bynoe held pan-Africanist sympathies and was a nationalist who was proud of her mixed Caribbean, African and European heritage. While in England, she’d helped found the West Indian Students’ Union (WISU). In this regard, she was in an interesting position as the British crown’s local representative as the “empire’s” colonial grip weakened.
In 1974, there were protests calling for Bynoe’s resignation, with the prime minister encouraging Queen Elizabeth II to dismiss her, accusing Bynoe of trying to undermine the premier’s authority. Bynoe chose to resign, returning to Trinidad and Tobago. She served as patroness of organizations including the Caribbean College of Family Physicians, the John Hayes Memorial Kidney Foundation and the Caribbean Women’s Association. Bynoe also published a volume of poetry, I Woke at Dawn, in 1996, and collaborated with biographer Merle Collins on an authorized biography, The Governor’s Story, which was published in 2013.