To mark Black History Month, an exhibition of photographs showing the Windrush generation arriving in Britain is being staged at Coventry station.

The exhibition has been assembled through a partnership between Avanti West Coast and the Museum of Youth Culture and shows photos of arrivals from the West Indies at Waterloo station in the 1960s.

The images were taken in 1962 by photographer Howard Grey at London’s Waterloo station and show people being greeted by friends and family, after getting off the train from Southampton that had taken them to London after their voyage from the West Indies.

Howard was one of the very few photographers who were there to capture the historic scenes, but his photographs were underexposed and were hidden away until 2014 when scanning technology was used to recover the lost images.

The display, which will remain as a permanent fixture of platform 1 at Coventry station, coincides with the 75th Anniversary of the HMT Empire Windrush arriving in Southampton with the first of thousands of travellers from the Caribbean that eventually decided to settle in Britain.

Some of the people shown in the photographs are unidentified, and Howard Grey is working with the Railway Museum to help track them down to hear their stories. If anyone thinks they might know people pictured in the exhibition, they are asked to get in touch by emailing [email protected].

The exhibition marking October as Black History Month follows similar displays last year at Coventry station by the Museum of Youth Culture who hosted exhibitions in the city’s Herbert Art Gallery and Museum as part of Coventry City of Culture.

The Museum of Youth Culture would also like to get hold of more images for its Black History Month archive, and if anyone has items of interest they can find out how they can be of help here.

Station Manager Maria McCarron said: “These displays are always really popular with our teams and customers who find them fascinating. It’s important we celebrate this period and I am really pleased it will stay up at Coventry station permanently.”

Jamie Brett, Creative Project Manager from the Museum of Youth Culture, said: “These are such beautiful images of people arriving at the train station, dressed up and wanting to start a new life for themselves. It’s a fantastic series of work.

He added: “We’ve loved being able to put up these displays in Coventry. It’s full of untapped potential and hopefully, we can do a lot more in the future.”