The Book of Negroes
"Make no mistake about it," Thomas Peters said as he thanked me. "I am going to England. And while I am there, I will not for one day forget the situation of our people."
Peters' boldness and ambition made me aware of how much my own will had weakened. There had been a time when I wanted nothing more than to go to England, and from there to find a way back to Africa. But now I would not travel. I stuffed moss in the spaces between logs to protect my cabin from the wind, and hauled wood from the forests to keep my stove burning through the nights. I had little left but the cabin, and worked each day to keep it clean and dry for Chekura and May. If they ever returned, I wanted the comforts of home to hold them forever. I tried to distract myself with work, but memories of Chekura and May shadowed me.
In Birchtown, we soon forgot about Thomas Peters. But the next year, he returned to our church to say that he had been to England and had met some white folks who were prepared to send us to Africa. It seemed ludicrous. He had no details to back up his story, and none of us believed him. Before he left, however, Peters promised that more information would come to us soon.
A few days later, while reading the Royal Gazette, I came across a notice from the chairman and twelve directors of the Sierra Leone Company in London, England: FREE SETTLEMENT ON THE COAST OF AFRICA.
The notice claimed that the Sierra Leone Company was willing to receive into its African colony Free Negroes who could produce testimonials of their character, "more particularly as to their honesty, sobriety and industry." It said that every "Free Black" who could produce such a written testimonial would have a grant of twenty acres of land in Sierra Leone for himself, ten for his wife and five for every child. Blacks and whites would have the same civil, military, personal and commercial rights and duties in Sierra Leone, and it would not be lawful for the Sierra Leone Company to hold any person in slavery or to traffic in the buying or selling of slaves.
Once I started reading the notice to people in Birchtown, others asked me to read it over and over again. I read it in Daddy Moses' Methodist chapel. I read it in the Baptist church. I read it anywhere and everywhere that folks wanted to hear about it. I read the document aloud enough times to memorize it. Still, I could not understand who would be allowed to travel to Africa, how they would get there, how they could pay for the journey, or who was behind this scheme and why they were offering it. Everybody asked me where Sierra Leone was, but I did not know.
We soon discovered that it was unsafe to discuss the scheme publicly. In Shelburne, three men beat up a Negro cooper who stepped into a coffee house with a copy of the Gazette in his hand. Some people in Birchtown worried that all the talk of moving to Africa would amount to nothing more than an excuse for white people to riot against the Negroes again.
A few days later, an Englishman named John Clarkson rode into Birchtown on his horse, wearing his full uniform as a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. He was a young-looking man. I was about 46 that year, and he appeared to be half my age. Young, but earnest. He had a boy's face, small nose, pursed lips. He was clean shaven but with wildly bushy sideburns. He asked to address Daddy Moses' congregation. Hundreds of people crammed into Daddy Moses' chapel and just as many crowded outside the doors, so we all moved outside. John Clarkson stood with his back to the ocean, brushing the hair out of his eyes. We gathered around him in a giant horseshoe shape, looking out at the bay.
John Clarkson had a high-pitched voice but it carried well. We stood motionless and silent so as not to miss a word.
"Reverend Moses, ladies and gentlemen, my name is John Clarkson, and I am a lieutenant with the British Navy. I am not here, however, on a military mission. I am here on a civilian purpose, which is to offer those of you who are interested and eligible passage to Sierra Leone, in Africa."
The people cheered so loudly that Lieutenant Clarkson had to wait for the roar to subside. I was stuck by his paleness, and could see a blue vein near his temple. His eyes were lively, however, and appeared to study all the people before him while waiting for them to settle down. His gaze fell on me. I imagined that his eyes were lingering on the orange scarf wrapped around my head. John Clarkson's own hair was blond and receding. Bald spots extended back from the top of his forehead. He wiped sweat from his brow and buried his eyes in his palms, like a man who was fighting sleep because he had too much work to do.
When the crowd had grown quiet once again, Clarkson said that he had been born in Wisbech, a small port some ninety miles from London. He and his relations believed that the slave trade was a stain on Christianity. He said that he had become acquainted with the fact that Negroes who had served the British in the war against the rebellious Colonies had been denied land and opportunities in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
"I am here to tell you today that I have been authorized by the proper authorities in England to offer loyal Negroes passage to a new life in Africa."
Clarkson went on to issue numerous promises to those who wished to found a new British colony in Sierra Leone. "Adventurers," as he called them, would have the freedom to govern their own affairs. They would enjoy political and racial equality. They would have seeds for crops, implements to tend to them, and land to call their own.
"We don't even have our own land here," someone yelled.
"I cannot alter your circumstances in Nova Scotia," Clarkson said, but the Sierra Leone Company would give free passage to the colony and land to all who went there.
"Where is this place you call Sierra Leone?" Daddy Moses called out.
Clarkson asked if he should draw a map. Everybody demanded one. "You realize," he said with a grin, "that I failed all art classes in school."
"So did we," Daddy Moses said, to loud laughter.
Clarkson removed a quill and some paper from his carrying bag, and quickly sketched the contours of Africa. He drew it like a long oval, with the bottom left corner chopped out. North of a spot where the continent bulged to the west, he drew in a big dot and called it Sierra Leone. To the west, he said, was the Atlantic Ocean. To the northwest, something he called Wolof country. To the southeast, areas known as the Grain, Ivory, Gold and Slave coasts. When he had finished, he passed the paper through the crowd.
Clarkson said, "I did fail art, but I had to learn a little about maps in the Navy."
I liked the warmth with which Clarkson spoke, and I liked that he said that many of us could teach him a lot more than he could teach us about Africa.
"Draw us a lion," someone yelled.
"But it might look like an elephant," he said.
When the laughter died down, Clarkson grew serious again. He said that all adventurers to Sierra Leone would have to refrain from dishonest, disagreeable, unchristian, and immoral behaviour. And reading from his notes, he said, "Criminality, drunkenness, violence, theft, licentiousness, adultery, fornication, bawdiness, dancing and any other displays of uninhibited emotion will be strictly forbidden."
A few groans went up in the audience. One man standing near to me muttered, "Hell, man, we go all the way back home and can't dance about it?" A few people sniggered, but Clarkson ignored them and continued.
Criminals and disreputable people would not be allowed to join the trip. Single women would not be permitted to journey alone, unless a man could vouchsafe for the integrity of their character and promise to ensure their welfare.
Clarkson asked for an assistant to take minutes of the meeting. Several people shouted my name.
"And who is this Meena?" Clarkson asked.
I stepped forward, so he asked me also, "Would you point me to Mr. Meena?"
"I am Aminata Diallo."
He scratched his sideburns and looked bemused.
"My name is Meena, for short," I said. "You wanted a note taker, and I can help."
"You can?" John Clarkson lowered his hand.
His face lifted into a smile the likes of which I hadn't seen in years. It was an I am so indescribably happy to meet you sort of smile. It was an I think the two of us could
be friends sort of smile. To my great surprise, I felt the same way. I liked the man from the instant I met him.
I was given writing materials and a stool to sit on, and I took notes as the meeting continued.
Clarkson asked for the names of the leaders of the community, so that he could quickly obtain and relay information in the coming weeks. He was given the names of three ministers. He asked if anyone was opposed to the idea. One Birchtown resident named Stephen Blucke argued that Negroes should make the most of what they had in Nova Scotia. Why risk losing everything on a dangerous journey to an unknown land?
Rather than taking offence, Clarkson merely urged Blucke and any others who felt they were doing well to stay put in Nova Scotia. I liked the way Clarkson was confident enough to let folks speak their minds.
Clarkson took pains to answer every question. Word by word, he gained my respect. No, he said, the ships would not be slave vessels.
He raised his finger to emphasize a point. "Slavers of many nations still trade in men on the coast of Africa. Some of them do their vile work in Sierra Leone. But there will be no question of slavery in the colony we create."
The Sierra Leone Company was directed by men whose life's passion was to abolish slavery, he said. The ship or ships would be outfitted with modern conveniences and stocked with proper food so that every man, woman and child could cross the ocean in decent conditions.
Clarkson said he hoped that the adventurers would be on their way within two months, and said that it would take about nine weeks to sail from Halifax to Sierra Leone.
The Sierra Leone Company, he continued, would spare no expense in removing us from Nova Scotia, out of the twin sentiments of duty and patriotism. Duty, because black people had a right to live free of slavery and oppression, and what better way to set them on the right footing than to send them back to Africa, where they could civilize the natives with literacy and Christianity. Patriotism, because we, the black colonists of Sierra Leone, would help Great Britain establish trading interests on the coast of Africa. No longer would the empire have to depend on slavery for enrichment. The land was so fertile, Clarkson said, that figs, oranges, coffee and cane would leap from our farmlands. We would meet our own needs easily and help the British Empire bring to market all the rich resources of Africa.
There was the small matter of those who had gone before us, Clarkson said. Some black people from London had settled five years earlier in Sierra Leone, but their colony had failed to prosper. However, we would have use of their old townsite, on which we could expand and make improvements.
I found myself believing that Clarkson's promises were real, but felt that I could not go with him. If I travelled back to Africa, I would never see my daughter or husband again. And so, as Clarkson held forth, I found my attention wandering a little and I missed one or two of the questions and answers that I was supposed to be writing down. The dream of my lifetime was finally within reach, and yet it didn't seem right to take it.
After the meeting, the lieutenant hoisted Daddy Moses onto his cart and the two men came to my cabin for a visit. We ate apples, buttered bread and cheese that Theo McArdle had given me for the occasion, and we drank my own hot libation of mint, ginger and honey.
"My stars," Clarkson said, "this sure clears out the nasal passages, doesn't it?" He peered at the stove rigged up for cooking and heating, looked over the utensils hanging on the wall and bent over to examine the books on my shelves.
"They look well read," he said.
I told him that I had read each book many times.
"Isn't reading a fabulous escape from the world?" he said.
I laughed, surprised at his directness.
"Don't tell me you've read Gulliver's Travels?" he said.
"Many times," I said.
"Don't you just love that term 'Lilliputians'?" he said. "Where on earth did Swift come up with the word?"
"They may be small but they do wreak havoc," I said.
"Sounds like the English," he said.
Daddy Moses and I laughed, and I served Clarkson another hot drink.
"How would you like to be my assistant?" Clarkson asked me. "I need someone to take notes, communicate with the Negroes and help me organize the adventure."
"I will help, but I cannot go with you." I said.
"Perhaps I can help if you are indentured or in debt," Clarkson said.
"I am free and have no debts," I said. "But I am waiting for my husband and daughter and could not leave without them."
Clarkson asked what I meant. He listened carefully and tapped his fingers together while I told him about Chekura and May.
"I don't know what to say about your daughter," he said. "Given that the Witherspoons are wealthy, they could have taken her to any number of cities or countries. But let's talk about your husband. You say that his ship was called the Joseph?"
"Yes."
"And that it was bound for Annapolis Royal?"
"Yes."
"And that it left New York City on November 10, 1783?"
"That's right."
"Then I should be able to dig up some naval records. When I'm back in Halifax, I'll see what I can do."
I agreed to work for Clarkson for three shillings a day, plus room and board. Clarkson said that he would be needing me night and day until the departure for Africa. He would get a room for me at the Water's Edge Inn in Shelburne, and after a few days of work we would sail to Halifax to finish the job.
"Could I have another spot of that tea?" he said. "It is the most marvellous drink."
Perhaps one day, I thought, I would tell him about drinking mint tea with my father in Bayo. But for now, I wanted to know more about the men who directed the Sierra Leone Company.
He said the Company included some of the leading abolitionists in London, his brother Thomas Clarkson among them. They wanted to create a profitable colony in Africa, where liberated blacks could live productively and in dignity, and from where Great Britain could build a profitable trade with the rest of the world—trade, he said, that did not rely on the evils of slavery.
JOHN CLARKSON APPLIED HIMSELF EVERY WAKING HOUR to the details of registration. "Necessary civilities," he called it when we paid a courtesy trip to the Shelburne mayor, knowing that he opposed the adventure. The mayor predicted that the Negroes would die en route, or be consumed by tropical diseases, or cannibalize the naive Europeans who took them to Guinea.
John Clarkson heard every imaginable objection in the five days that we registered Birchtown residents for the trip, and I heard every term under the sun for people from my homeland. People called us Ethiopians, darkies, and those of the "sable race." They called our land Sierra Leone, Serra Lyoa, Negritia, Negroland, Guinea, and the dark continent. They called us ingrates for wanting to leave Nova Scotia. Knowing that slaves, indentured workers and debtors would not be allowed to sail with Clarkson, some people accused Negroes of having debts or of being indentured to them. My job was to ensure that every Birchtown resident who wanted to leave showed up to register at the Water's Edge Inn, and to find evidence to disprove false allegations.
Although we had to rush through our work, Clarkson always took a few moments to ask if I needed anything—food, drink, ink or quills. When I was tired, he told me that he felt the same way. And when we had a few minutes alone to eat at the end of our long hours of work, Clarkson entertained me by mimicking some of the people we had met that day. The man could pick up any person's accent. But ultimately he was completely serious about his assignment, and I liked the fact he respected my efforts to help him.
The nights, however, were difficult for Clarkson. I don't know how he had survived naval battles with his mind intact. The slightest insult or provocation set his anger simmering for the rest of the day and night, and either prevented him from sleeping or plunged him into nightmares. The walls at the Water's Edge Inn were as thin as parchment and each night his screams awoke me. "No," he would shout out, "I said, let her go right now." Afte
r the first eruption, I understood that these were merely nocturnal anxieties. I had had my share of nightmares too, so I did not judge him.
Over tea in the morning, he would tap the table, ask me to remind him to write a letter to his fiancée that night, and fuss over the Negroes who were being prevented from leaving for Africa. When a tavern owner claimed that one Negro still owed him five pounds for unpaid beer and fish, Clarkson paid the debt himself and warned the adventurer not to set foot in any more taverns for the rest of his stay in Nova Scotia. Clarkson wore his worries on his face, and sometimes dissolved into tears while we were discussing unfinished work. But neither Clarkson's tears in the day nor his outbursts at night prevented him from carrying out his long hours of work. I admired him for persevering in the face of his own struggles, and I made a private vow to support him to the best of my abilities.
When we finished the registration process in Shelburne, Clarkson advised the six hundred adventurers who had been accepted for the journey to Africa that he would send ships to bring them to Halifax. After reminding Daddy Moses and Theo McArdle to keep their eyes open for Chekura or May, I set sail with Clarkson.
I had a cabin of my own on the two-day trip to Halifax, and felt an odd sense of relief to be leaving the place I had inhabited for eight years. I had time to think during the long nights alone, and it struck me that good white men weren't likely to stay sane for very long in this world. Any white man who wanted to help Negroes "raise themselves up," as Clarkson liked to say, would be an unpopular man indeed among his peers. I hoped that Clarkson would retain his faculties long enough to get us safely to Africa. His tantrums and outbursts worried me. He was just too concerned about Negroes. It didn't seem natural.
HALIFAX WAS A FLEDGLING TOWN when I arrived in November 1791. It was not as attractive or meticulously laid-out as Shelburne. It lacked the array of storehouses and public buildings that the black people of Birchtown had built in Shelburne, but it was a gentler place to be, and far less menacing for Negroes.