American military police tried to impose a colour bar on an English village in 1943. The village's three pubs responded by putting up signs reading: BLACK TROOPS ONLY. Bamber Bridge, Lancashire. Black American soldiers were stationed there and the locals liked them. When the US Army asked the village to segregate its pubs, the publicans complied in the most English way available — by barring the white Americans instead. On the night of 24 June 1943, white American MPs came to arrest a Black soldier at Ye Olde Hob Inn for a uniform infraction. British civilians and British soldiers in the pub intervened and told them to leave him alone. It escalated into a night of shooting between Black GIs and American MPs. One Black soldier, William Crossland, was killed. Dozens were court-martialed. British witnesses testified about the MPs' conduct, and sentences were reduced. The US Army quietly reorganised how MPs were deployed in the area. An English village looked at American segregation, understood it immediately, and refused to host it. The pub is still there. The sign is part of local legend.