Lewis Hamilton’s Ethnicity and Family Roots
Lewis Hamilton is a British racing driver who won seven Formula One world championships, a record he shares with Michael Schumacher.
- Nationality
- British
- Born
- January 7, 1985, Stevenage, England
- Birth name
- Lewis Carl Davidson Hamilton
Where Lewis Hamilton’s roots are on the map
What is Lewis Hamilton’s ethnicity?
Lewis Hamilton is British and of mixed heritage. His father, Anthony Hamilton, is Grenadian-British, and his mother, Carmen Larbalestier, is white.[1] He was born in Stevenage, a town north of London, in January 1985. He lived with his mother until he was 12 and then moved in with his father.[1]
As one of very few Black children in Stevenage, he faced bullying and racist taunts at school, he told The Guardian in 2021. He later became the first Black driver in Formula One and set up the Hamilton Commission to bring more young Black people into motorsport.[1]
Where are Lewis Hamilton’s parents from?
Father’s side
Grandfather
Davidson Hamilton
Grenadian
Grandmother
Father
Anthony Hamilton
Grenadian
Mother’s side
Grandfather
Grandmother
Mother
Carmen Larbalestier
English
Lewis Hamilton
Father’s side
The family’s roots lie in Grenada, an island nation in the eastern Caribbean. Lewis’s grandfather Davidson Hamilton emigrated from there to England.[2] He died in October 2018, a few days before Lewis secured his fifth world title at the Mexican Grand Prix. Lewis called him “the godfather of the family”, and he carries Davidson as one of his middle names in his honor.[2]
Anthony Hamilton managed his son through the early years of his career.[2] When Lewis was racing go-karts as a boy, his father told him to answer the racism he met with results: “Always do your talking on the track.”[1]
Mother’s side
Carmen Larbalestier raised Lewis in Stevenage. He describes her as loving, although she did not fully understand what he went through at school.[1] In 2022 he announced that he would add her surname to his own as a middle name, so that her family name lives on alongside Hamilton.[3] She is British and was born in Birmingham, England, in 1955, according to the Brazilian broadcaster Band.[4]
Larbalestier is a well-known surname on Jersey in the Channel Islands. Several generations of Carmen’s family lived in Southampton. Hamilton’s great-grandfather on this side was born on Jersey in the 1890s, and records trace the family on the island back to the 16th century, the Jersey station Island FM reported.[5]
In his own words
“I really do aspire to be like him, as a strong, black man and as a father and as a human being for doing what he did in the difficult times the little that he had.”
“To have imported ingredients from Grenada & show me how to cook a dish my Grandma would have made was really thoughtful & loving.”
“I am really proud of my family’s name. My mum’s name is Larbalestier and I’m just about to put that in my name. I really want her name to continue on with the Hamilton name.”
Sources
- The Guardian: Lewis Hamilton, ‘Everything I’d suppressed came up, I had to speak out’ (July 10, 2021)
- Crash.net: Lewis Hamilton reveals grandfather died days before F1 title win (October 29, 2018)
- BBC Sport: Lewis Hamilton to change name to incorporate mother’s surname (March 14, 2022)
- Band: Saiba quem é Carmen Larbalestier, mãe do heptacampeão de F1 Lewis Hamilton (July 8, 2024)
- Island FM: Lewis Hamilton ‘Proud’ Of Larbalestier Name (March 14, 2022)
- South China Morning Post: 7 things to know about Grenada, the island of Formula 1 champ Lewis Hamilton’s ancestry (November 16, 2020)
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