"New negroes from Africa": slave trade abolition and free African settlement in the nineteenth-century Caribbean 9780253347039, 9780253218278

Table of contents :
Frontmatter
Acknowledgments (page xi)
Introduction (page 1)
1. Potential Laborers or "Troublesome Savages"? Settlement of Liberated Africans in the Bahamas (page 23)
2. "Binding them to the trade of digging cane holes": Settlement of Liberated Africans in Trinidad (page 63)
3. "A fine family of what we call creole Yarabas": African Ethnic Identities in Liberated African Community Formation (page 92)
4. "Assisted by his wife, an African": Gender, Family, and Household Formation in the Experience of Liberated Africans (page 126)
5. Orisha Worship and "Jesus Time": Religious Worlds of Liberated Africans (page 153)
6. "Powers superior to those of other witches": New African Immigrants and Supernatural Practice beyond Religious Spheres (page 182)
7. "Deeply attached to his native country": Visions of Africa and Mentalities of Exile in Liberated African Culture (page 203)
Conclusion: African Creoles and Creole Africans (page 234)
Appendix 1. Reports of Liberated African Arrivals in the Bahamas from Governors' Correspondence (page 241)
Appendix 2. Reports of Liberated African Arrivals in Trinidad from Governors' Correspondence (page 245)
Notes (page 249)
Select Bibliography (page 303)
Index (page 317)

Citation preview

“NEW NEGROES FROM AFRICA”

BLACKS IN THE DIASPORA

Founding Editors Darlene Clark Hine John McCluskey, Jr.

David Barry Gaspar

Editorial Board Tracy Sharpley- Whiting, editor in chief Herman L. Bennett Kim D. Butler Judith A. Byfield Leslie A. Schwalm

“NEW SLAVE TRADE ABOLITION

AND FREE AFRICAN SETTLEMENT

FROM AFRICA” IN THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY CARIBBEAN

ROSANNE MARION ADDERLEY

Indiana University Press Bloomington & Indianapolis

This book is a publication of Indiana University Press 601 North Morton Street Bloomington, Indiana 47404-3797 USA

http://iupress.indiana.edu Telephone orders 800-842-6796 Fax orders 812-855-7931 Orders by email [email protected] © 2006 by Laura Rosanne Marion Adderley All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses’ Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. Manufactured in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Adderley, Rosanne Marion. New negroes from Africa : slave trade abolition and free African

settlement in the nineteenth-century Caribbean / Rosanne Marion Adderley.

p. cm. — (Blacks in the diaspora) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-253-34703-3 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 0-253-21827-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Blacks—Bahamas—Social conditions—19th century—Case studies. 2. Blacks—Trinidad and Tobago—Trinidad—Social conditions—19th century—Case studies. 3. Africans—Bahamas—Social conditions —19th century—Case studies. 4. Africans—Trinidad and Tobago —Trinidad—Social conditions—19th century—Case studies. 5. Blacks —Cultural assimilation—Bahamas—Case studies. 6. Blacks—Cultural assimilation—Trinidad and Tobago—

Trinidad—Case studies. 7. African diaspora. I. Title. II. Series. F1660.B55A63 2006 305.89607296—dc22 2006001257

12345 11 10 09 08 07 06

FOR MY PARENTS,

Paul Lawrence Adderley AND

Lilith Rosena Thompson Adderley

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Acknowledgments x1

Introduction 1 1. Potential Laborers or “Troublesome Savages”?

Settlement of Liberated Africans inthe Bahamas 23 2. “Binding them to the trade of digging cane holes”: Settlement of Liberated Africans in Trinidad 63 3. “A fine family of what we call creole Yarabas”: African Ethnic Identities in Liberated African

Community Formation 92 4. “Assisted by his wife, an African”:

Gender, Family, and Household Formation in the Experience of Liberated Africans 126 5. Orisha Worship and “Jesus Time”:

Religious Worlds of Liberated Africans 153 6. “Powers superior to those of other witches”: New African Immigrants and Supernatural Practice beyond Religious Spheres 182

7. Deeply attached to his native country”: Visions of Africa and Mentalities of Exile in Liberated African Culture 203

Conclusion: African Creoles and Creole Africans 234 Appendix 1. Reports of Liberated African Arrivals in the Bahamas from Governors Correspondence 241 Appendix 2. Reports of Liberated African Arrivals

in Trinidad from Governors Correspondence 245

Notes 249 Select Bibliography 303

Index 317

BLANK PAGE

[S]ome hundreds of savages from Africa have been turned loose amongst them—unshackled from the restraints which the Laws imposed on the slaves. —Alexander Murray, Former Collector of Customs, Nassau, Bahamas, 1832

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

, The research and writing of this project was supported two Andrew W. Mellon Grants through the University of Pennsylvania, a Bernadotte Schmitt Award from the American Historical Association, and a Fulbright-IIE Fellowship. A year of writing was made possible by a Mendenhall Fellowship at Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts. Between 1997 and 2000 several grants from the Roger Thayer Stone Center for Latin American Studies at Tulane University facilitated research trips

to archives in Havana, Cuba, and multiple trips to conferences to present work related to this project. Conference trips have also been supported by the Tulane University School of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the Department of History. In the summer of 1997, a grant from the Committee on Research of the School of Arts and Sciences at Tulane funded a proposed research trip to the Sierra Leone National Archives in Freetown to examine records of the Liberated African Department that existed there in the nineteenth century. Renewed war in that country and a U.S. State Department advisory against travel made that trip impossible. During the academic year 1999-2000, I enjoyed the always-incalculable benefit of an uninterrupted year of research and writing through a postdoctoral fellowship at the Carter G. Woodson Institute at the University of Virginia. In 2004 and 2006 grants from the Georges Lurcy Charitable and Educational Trust funded some final manuscript preparations, most significantly the production of maps and the preparation of the index. These grants were administered through the Department of History and the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Tulane. Map expenses were also supported by a grant from the Stone Center for Latin American Studies. Archive staff at the following repositories made this project possible through their efficiency and exceptional diligence in the face of voluminous and often-last-minute requests: Public Record Office, Kew, England; Department of Archives, Commonwealth of the Bahamas, in Nassau; National Archives of Trinidad and Tobago, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad; Archivo Nacional, Havana, Cuba; Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society Archives, School of Oriental and African Studies, London; Baptist Missionary Society Archives, Oxford University; Church Missionary Society Archives, University of Birmingham; Rhodes House Library, Oxford University. I owe similar eratitude to college and university library staff at the University of Pennsylvania, Smith College, the University of Virginia, the University of the West Indies, the College of the Bahamas, and Tulane University.

xii | ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Although the oral history portion of this project is relatively modest, it is critical. After I completed those interviews, I often told friends that even if I never produced the written history, the time spent with my oral history participants in the Bahamas and Trinidad would always count as some of the richest experiences of my career. This sentiment and my profound gratitude have not changed a decade later. In addition to providing one of those interviews, the late Father William Thompson also mentored me through much of my graduate career as I moved back and forth between my home in the Bahamas and various other research and writing locations. The content and writing of the book have benefitted over time from the careful critiques of my advisors, Richard Dunn and Lee Cassanelli, and during my postdoctoral year from feedback offered by various colleagues affili-

ated with the Woodson Institute at the University of Virginia, including Adrian Gaskins, Joseph Hellweg, Joe Miller, Rolland Murray, and Dylan Pen-

ningroth. Two anonymous readers for Indiana University Press provided generous readings of the book’s promise and meticulous recommendations for its final revisions. My longtime friend Rhonda Frederick read the final version of Chapter 1 in November of 2003 and performed the truly heroic task of prodding and guiding me into producing a final version of everything else. Since my arrival at Tulane University in 1996, I have benefited from the

intellectual and professional communion that make university life so rewarding and any scholarly production possible. Among colleagues and friends in the History Department, Jim Boyden has offered uniquely timely advice and support, especially in the last two years of releasing this book from my desk. George Bernstein, Linda Pollock, Larry Powell, Randy Sparks, Lee Woodward, Justin Wolfe, and Trudy Yeager have also been critically supportive colleagues in numerous ways. To have had the mentorship, professional support, and friendship of a historian of Sylvia Frey’s distinction and grace over the past eight years has been an incalculable privilege. I can only

hope that this book in some small measure lives up to the faith that Sylvia has invested in it and in me. Cora Ann Presley was also a particularly important mentor during the years we shared at Tulane and has remained so since her 1998 move to Georgia State University. Beyond the History Department, I have enjoyed extended communities of colleagues and friends at Tulane in the interdisciplinary programs in

Latin American Studies and in African and African Diaspora Studies (ADST). A small writing group of ADST colleagues read the original version and played an important role as I began the process of excavating this book from that thesis. That writing group consisted of Gaurav Desai, Christopher J. Dunn, and Adeline Masquelier. In countless less-specific but no-less-im-

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS [> xu

portant ways, I have benefited from the support and friendship of Pamela Franco, Marilyn Miller, Gayle Murchison, Supriya Nair, Olanike Orie, Ben Reiss, Frank Ukadike, and Richard Watts. It was especially fortuitous that I arrived at Tulane during the same academic year as Michael Cunningham. Michael has steadfastly supported me and my work in all ways—from abstract needs such as encouragement and professional guidance to more mundane but equally necessary tasks, such as twice driving versions of this manuscript to the post office minutes before closing time. Last, in my most optimistic imaginings of my career, I could not have envisioned a more faithful or more generous mentor, colleague, and friend than Felipe Smith. More so than any other person, I am not sure whether without his support this project would have ever been completed. For the past three summers, the Super Scholar/EXCEL program at Xavier University of New Orleans has given me the most rewarding academic job I may ever have. To take on a new summer teaching job in the midst of trying to finish a major research project seems perhaps counterproductive. Yet, for nurturing my life as a historian, teacher, and human being, I owe a debt that is profound and almost indescribable to the students, staff, and faculty of that program, particularly to its director, Dereck J. Rovaris, Sr. My students at Tulane University, Smith College, the University of Virginia, and in the EXCEL Program at Xavier have been a source of inspiration to me in more ways than they could ever imagine. Tobie and Ming-Yuen Meyer Fong, two of my oldest friends, have provided constant moral support and a standing invitation for days of calm and rejuvenation in the warmth of their home. Although she may not remember this fact, Tobie Meyer-Fong is also the person who persuaded me over fifteen years ago to embark upon this journey of trying to make a life out of being a historian. (Saul Liwen Meyer-Fong sent a lovely picture to cheer up my study and kindly agreed to wait until the book was finished before insisting that I come to celebrate his birth in person.) Among other fellow scholars and friends who have supported this book and its author in innumerable ways over far too many years are Giselle Anatol, Edward Baptist, Fitzroy Baptiste, Bridget Brereton, Marsha Brooks, Michael Crutcher, Greg Dorr, Lisa Lindquist, Edda Fields, Michele Frank, Herman Graham, Virginia Gould,

Frank Guridy, Marsha Houston, Judith Lee Hunt, Tera Hunter, Natalie J. Ring, Renee Romano, D. Gail Saunders, Ian G. Strachan, Martha Vail, Laura Watts, Rhonda Williams, Edith Wolfe, Betty Wood, Kirsten Wood, and Jacqueline Woodfork. At various points of disillusionment or more casual discontent with this project, I have selfishly sought refuge among friends safely outside the pecu-

liar and often insular world of professional historians and university life.

xiv | ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Sydney D. Lewis has always been a willing listener and a source of much happiness, inspiration, and peace. Doug Anderson, Ajamu Baraka, Angelica Benton-Molina, Damian Cassells-Jones, Suha Dabbouseh, Kelly Frisch, Robert Horton, Pamela Johnson, Nicole Kirby, Bridget Lehane, Laura Moye, and Sunita Patel are also due particular thanks. I met a significant number of these

friends during periods of volunteer work with Amnesty International and the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond (an anti-racist communityorganizing collective). I especially thank my activist colleagues from Amnesty International and the People’s Institute for giving me an abundance of truly rewarding work to do. Jonah Sollins-Devlin arrived in this world long after I was exhausted of this project, therefore just in time to be a perfect friend and playmate, giving endless hours of respite from this book and joy as only he could provide. Many thanks are due his parents, Rachel Devlin and Stephen Sollins for so willingly sharing with me their son and their home. In addition to parenting a remarkable child, Rachel Devlin is one of the most challenging historians I know, in every sense of that adjective. Her reading and comments specifically strengthened the arguments on gender and family in Chapter 4. If I have succeeded in executing that chapter (and other parts of this book) with anything resembling intellectual boldness or courage, it is much to Rachel’s credit. She is further a friend beyond compare. At Indiana University Press, my editor Robert Sloan and assistant editors Kendra Boileau Stokes and Jane Quinet have brought this project to fruition with faith and patience, regularly tested by my dogged postponement of more deadlines than I care to remember. The inevitable and innumerable weaknesses which remain in “New Negroes from Africa” are of course all my own.

This book and its author have been blessed for more than a decade by the prayers and support of communities of faith in five different countries, including mostly Christian churches but also a Hindu pundit who raised prayers for the successful completion of my Ph.D. during Diwali celebrations in Trinidad in the fall of 1993. This book has been completed only through the grace of God, whose mercies and blessings are without number. My sisters Catherine and Paula Adderley are model siblings and my best friends who brighten and enrich my life daily, even across thousands of miles. They have done more to sustain me and this book than they will ever realize. Finally, this book is dedicated with love to my parents, Paul Lawrence Adderley and Lilith Rosena Thompson Adderley, who have made everything possible.

“NEW NEGROES FROM AFRICA”

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