Dear Editor,
I am an African person, a Guyanese African, and I know my history well. I also know that the only one who can tell African people about their history is a cultured and well-informed African man or woman; no one else. I do not know Mr Bisram but we could find out if he is truly qualified to ‘preach’ about African history.
I know that African history is the most suppressed history in the world, and what takes the place of the suppression is a mutilation and manipulation by all sorts of people of the true story of Africa and of its sons and daughters. The history of slavery is the story of the forced migration of African men and women during the Middle Passage of the Slave Trade. The slaves were brought from Africa to the New World which was made up of North and South America and the Caribbean. Families were torn apart and many of our ancestors were fed to the sharks by the white slave traders. Indentureship was voluntary migration and bears no relation whatsoever to slavery.
On the occasion of the observation of Holocaust Day on October 12 each year, African Guyanese are reminded of their history and are prepared by their elders to face the challenges of the years ahead. Our history is a signpost to the future. A small part of that history will be shared through this writing of a slave. The following is an extract from the writings of Charles Ball, an American slave. (The Life of an American Slave (1859))
“My mother had several children, and they were sold upon master’s death to separate purchasers. She was sold, my father told me, to a Georgia trader. I, of all her children, was the only one left in Maryland. When sold I was naked, never having had on clothes in my life, but my new master gave me a child’s frock, belonging to one of his own children. After he had purchased me, he dressed me in this garment, took me before him on his horse, and started home; but my poor mother, when she saw me leaving her for the last time, ran after me, took me down from the horse, clasped me in her arms, and wept loudly and bitterly over me.
“My master seemed to pity her, and endeavored to soothe her distress by telling her that he would be a good master to me, and that I should not want anything. She then, still holding me in her arms, walked along the road beside the horse as he moved slowly, and earnestly and imploringly besought my master to buy her and the rest of her children, and not permit them to be carried away by the negro buyers; but whilst thus entreating him to save her and her family, the slave-driver, who had first bought her, came running in pursuit of her with a raw-hide in his hand. When he overtook us, he told her he was her master now, and ordered her to give that little negro to its owner, and come back with him.
“My mother then turned to him and cried, ‘Oh, master, do not take me from my child!’ Without making any reply, he gave her two or three heavy blows on the shoulders with his raw-hide, snatched me from her arms, handed me to my master, and seizing her by one arm, dragged her back towards the place of sale. My master then quickened the pace of his horse; and as we advanced, the cries of my poor parent became more and more indistinct – at length they died away in the distance, and I never again heard the voice of my poor mother.”
This is just a tip of the iceberg of African history and slavery.
Yours faithfully,
Juliet Holder-Allen
