IllmaticDelta
Veteran
There were definitely South Carolinian rooted emigrants to Liberia. You even had Kentuckians
The Liberian Connection | Kentucky Life
Kentucky in Africa
American-Liberians=/=African-American
- Thread starter xoxodede
- Start date
There were definitely South Carolinian rooted emigrants to Liberia. You even had Kentuckians
The Liberian Connection | Kentucky Life
Kentucky in Africa
xoxodede
Superstar
Definitely. Especially in Charleston, South Carolina due to the large population of Creole/gens de couleur libres/Free People of Color. I'm sure Mobile, Alabama as well - as they too had a sizeable Creole/gens de couleur libres/Free People of Color population.
On Kentucky - they had a very strong colonization movement by whites. Many of them in Kentucky were freed on the condition that they would go to Liberia and many died on the way there or under a year in Liberia. This research paper is very eye-opening and detailed - and a great read: The Negro Colonization Movement in Kentucky.
On South Carolina:
The first settlers came to the Province of Carolina at the port of Charleston in 1670; they were mostly wealthy planters and their slaves coming from the British Caribbean colony of Barbados.
You can learn more about the history of SC and their "Free People of Color" since the late 1600's in Hubs of Empire: The Southeastern Lowcountry and British Caribbean and
Black Masters: A Free Family of Color in the Old South
South Carolina/Charleston "Free People of Color" also had a big push in the 1830's-1840's to go to Liberia. Between 1848-1852 - 252 Free People of Color left Charleston for Liberia. You can read more in Family or Freedom: People of Color in the Antebellum South
More about "Free People of Color/gens de couleur libres/Creoles -- and where they settled in the U.S.
- Slave owners, slaves, and gens de couleur libres—arrived in Havana, Kingston, and Cartagena, but especially in port cities on the North American mainland, stretching from Philadelphia to Baltimore, Charleston, Savannah, Mobile, and New Orleans. . Source
- St. Thomas Parish Annals note that in 1728, the inhabitants numbered 565 whites, 950 negro slaves, 60 Indian slaves and 20 free negroes.
- We do know, however, that the largest relocation sites in the Americas were Cuba, Louisiana, and Jamaica. Nowhere did this relocation matter more than in eastern Cuba and New Orleans, where the influx of refugees doubled the size of local populations and permanently altered the character of local life.4 Norfolk, Charleston, Philadelphia, New York, and Baltimore also proved popular resettlement sites. Source
- The United States incorporated a distinctive two level caste system based on black and white. The most notable exception (besides New Orleans) to this rigid system in the United States was developed in Charleston, South Carolina.12 To a far lesser extent, the cities of Mobile and Pensacola briefly had free people of mixed racial heritage who attempted to model their place in society according to the three-caste system model.13
- In New Orleans in 1840, for instance, free people of color numbered 19,226 of a total population of 102,193 or 18.8% of the population. Only Baltimore, Maryland could claim relatively similar numbers of free people of color. Of Baltimore’s total population of 102,313 in 1840, 17,967 or 17.5% were free people of color. Other southern cities did not even come close to approaching such levels. In the same year, in Charleston, another southern city in which a significant population of free men and women of color resided, only 5.4% of the population or 1,588 of a total population of 29,261 were free people of color.1
On Kentucky: Kentucky was not playing about getting Blacks (Free and Enslaved). They even passed a few bills to make it happen. But, most Black people/enslaved and free weren't interested. The Colonization Movement was popularized in Kentucky on the ground that it would drive "almost from their own door, some, at least, of the worse than useless population of free blacks, to the land of their fathers."- One free Negro, a Baptist minister named Jones was taken to the colony of Liberia in 1833 for the purpose of studying and reporting on conditions. On his return he published a Journal, in which he wrote: Sooner than carry my wife and two sons there to settle, with only what property I now possess, I would go back into slavery as a far better lot.
- Not only was the Kentucky Colonization Society unable to get the free Negro to go to Liberia to settle, but it was even unable to get any to go as a special representative.
- If any group in Kentucky should have welcomed the efforts of the Kentucky Colonization Society it should have been the slaves. For them meant not only an opportunity to start life anew in a country that they could call their own~ but~ if the movement proved successful~ it actually meant freedom for many of them. Strangely enough~ this was not the case. Not only is there no indication of any real enthusiasm on the part of the slaves for the movement, but there is actual evidence of considerable opposition on their part.
- Nelson Graves, on his death, left his twenty-five slaves free on condition that they migrate to Liberia. By complying with the terms of the will~ the Negroes were to divide among them a bequest of $10,000.1 The Negroes refused to accept their freedom under a condition of exile.
- On the other hand 6 the Negroes had ample cause for their opposition in the reports that came back to them from Liberia. Large numbers of the early emigrants died 6 either ~ route, or within a year of reaching Liberia. In the expedition with which the first Kentucky emigrants went out, 66 out of a total of 270 died within a year. Of the remaining 204, only half that number were still living ten years later.l
From the time of the first expedition to Liberia from Kentucky, in 1833, to 1866, a period of thirty-three years, Kentucky sent to Africa a total of 675 Negroes. Many of them died.
The Negro Colonization Movement in Kentucky
Desegregating the Altar: The Josephites and the Struggle for Black Priests ...
Aristocrats of Color: The Black Elite, 1880–1920
The Oxford Handbook of African American Language
xoxodede
Superstar
@IllmaticDelta Do you know why so many people died when they got to Liberia? What was going on? It was not the look to go based off reports. Was it the weather, food supply?
IllmaticDelta
Veteran
IllmaticDelta
Veteran
Mississippi in Africa: The Saga of the Slaves of Prospect Hill Plantation
'This is surreal': descendants of slaves and slaveowners meet on US plantation
At Prospect Hill in Mississippi, people came from as far as Liberia for an unlikely gathering that led to a scene of visible emotion – with ‘a lot to talk about’
Their leader, Evangeline Wayne, noted that her ancestors had been taken from Africa during the slave trade. After decades in the US, their descendants had been allowed to immigrate “back” to Africa, though they’d never actually been there before.
Then, as a result of Liberia’s civil wars, which lasted from 1990 to 2003, Wayne herself immigrated “back” to the US, though she had likewise never been to the country before.
At Prospect Hill she found herself being embraced by people she’d never met as if she were a long-lost friend. “I didn’t expect this,” she said, smiling and fighting back tears. “I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t this.”
Wayne cannot definitively document her connection to Prospect Hill because Liberia’s national archives were destroyed during the civil wars, though she remembers her grandmother mentioning a Mississippi plantation and a “Captain Ross”.
Isaac Ross, a revolutionary war veteran, founded the plantation and provided in his will for the freeing of its slaves to emigrate to a colony in what is now Liberia – Prospect Hill’s primary claim to fame.
“To be honest, I’m unsure of who, and what, I am, and where I fit in,” Wayne observed, with visible sadness. “I’m considered a foreigner in Liberia, even though I’m from there, and it’s the same in the US.” When she met James Belton, a descendant of Prospect Hill slaves who had chosen not to emigrate, they both encountered someone whose life represented what their own might have been, had their ancestors made a different choice.
Unsure what to say, they simply embraced.
Claudius Ross, who was born in Liberia and immigrated in 2007 to the US.
Belton said the reunions had helped him see Prospect Hill’s history from different vantage points. “In this country, we have so much division, black, white and what have you. And things like this, if it’s put out there where you can see it, it will let people know you can have unity regardless of what happened 150 years ago. It was a rare opportunity for everyone.”
Claudius Ross, a Liberian, visited Prospect Hill in June, when he was interviewed by the documentary film-makers Alison Fast and Chandler Griffin, who have been compiling footage from the reunion events. He became curious about his own background after his family was threatened by fighters from Liberian indigenous groups who were at war with his own ethnic group, freed slave descendants known as Americo-Liberians.
After he moved to the US in 2007, Ross was distressed to read that some Liberian immigrants had enslaved members of indigenous tribes. Then he read about Prospect Hill and recognized his family’s connection.
In Liberia, he recalled being told: “‘You don’t belong here. Go where you came from.’ So I was humiliated. I was sad. It led me on this journey of trying to find out exactly who I was. You know, ‘What does my name come from? What does it mean? Who does it belong to?’”
Visiting Prospect Hill, he said, “brings all the pieces back together”. He added: “It’s also a celebration for me, knowing that I do have a history. I’m not just a wandering person in the galaxy. I do have a spot, I do have a name, I do have a light.”
'This is surreal': descendants of slaves and slaveowners meet on US plantation
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Mississippi in Africa update
Kaiser Railey, January 2001
It was a remarkable story that seemed to unravel into thin air. Several versions had been in circulation for generations -- for more than 150 years, in fact. But in each of them the screen went blank just as the plot started getting good.
That's precisely how writers find themselves in the throes of writing a book. Once I heard the story of Mississippi in Africa, I had to know how it ended. How could anyone hear that a group of slaves had emigrated from a Mississippi plantation, decades before the Civil War, to a place in Liberia called Mississippi in Africa, and not want to know what had become of them?
The plot was launched in the 1830s, when an antebellum Mississippi cotton planter and Revolutionary War veteran named Isaac Ross decreed in his will that after his daughter’s death his slaves should be freed and his plantation, called Prospect Hill, should be sold, with the proceeds used to pay the way for the freed slaves to a colony established for the purpose on the coast of West Africa, in what is now the nation of Liberia. A very weird story. I can't say, unequivocally, why Ross did what he did; you can decide for yourself by reading the book. But perhaps not surprisingly, some of his heirs were averse to the idea of selling the plantation, freeing the slaves, and paying their way “back to Africa,” in the vernacular of the times, though most of the slaves had been in America for many generations, and no doubt knew as much about the African continent as a person in Des Moines named O’Reilly knows about Ireland.
After a bitter, decade-long contest of Ross’s and his daughter’s wills by his grandson, Isaac Ross Wade, during which a slave uprising led to the burning of the Prospect Hill mansion, the death of a young girl, and the lynching of a group of slaves, approximately 300 of the slaves did immigrate to Liberia, beginning around 1845, to a parallel universe called Mississippi in Africa. A few of the slaves were not given the option to immigrate, for unknown reasons, and one family was freed outright and allowed to move to a free state in the U.S. What ultimately happened to the ones who were freed outright is still unknown; I hoped my book would spark some revelation about them, but so far, no go.
Because there were many conflicting versions of the story, I set out to find descendants of all the relevant groups in the U.S. and in Liberia. The immigrants from Prospect Hill were the largest group to settle in Liberia, a nation established by the American Colonization Society, which was comprised of abolitionists and slave holders who had different, yet strangely complementary reasons for wanting to export freed slaves. The book Mississippi in Africa was the result of my research; this note was prompted by a reader’s email inquiring about the people I interviewed and got to know during the course of my research.
During that research, which began in the late 1990s, I interviewed Isaac Ross’s descendants in Mississippi, most of whom were proud of his legacy of having freed his slaves (and who, in a curious twist, turned out to be both black and white); I interviewed descendants of the heirs who had contested the will, who had a decidedly different take on the story, and descendants of the slaves who had chosen to remain in Mississippi, enslaved, and, finally, of descendants of the freed slaves who had immigrated to Mississippi in Africa.
In Liberia, which was at the time mired in a bloody civil war, I found that the immigrants had largely assumed the role formerly assigned to their masters, occupying the top tier of Liberian society, and that while some had been benevolent toward those less fortunate than them, others had oppressed and even enslaved members of the indigenous population. That disparity contributed directly to the nation’s two civil wars, from 1989 to 1996 and from 1999 to 2003, illustrating that Dixie isn’t the only place where old times are not forgotten.
The Prospect Hill story became more remarkable the deeper I probed, and along the way I met a remarkable cast of characters who shed light not only on its outcome but on the complex racial dynamics and cultural legacy of Ross’s actions. As readers of the book may recall, among those characters were three young men, the Railey brothers, native Liberians whose ancestors had come from Mississippi, who were, in 2001, when I arrived, trapped in a war zone. The Railey brothers made sure I was safe while I was in Liberia, and we remained in touch for many years. I still occasionally correspond with one of them, Augustus.
http://alanhuffman.blogspot.com/2011/09/mississippi-in-africa-update.html
xoxodede
Superstar
Mississippi in Africa: The Saga of the Slaves of Prospect Hill Plantation
'This is surreal': descendants of slaves and slaveowners meet on US plantation
'This is surreal': descendants of slaves and slaveowners meet on US plantation
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Mississippi in Africa update
http://alanhuffman.blogspot.com/2011/09/mississippi-in-africa-update.html
Mr. Ross was one of the founders of the Mississippi Colonization Society - so it makes sense. I hate that they had wills like that -- go or be re-enslaved.
This whole case is a mess. Isaac Ross's grandson needed his ass beat.
Isaac Ross died in 1836 and his daughter 1838 --and they should have been allowed to leave then. But, the 123 out of 160 he enslaved at that particular plantation who chose to go --- weren't allowed to leave until 1848 due to his grandson contesting the will. Even after they got there the 100K they were promised via his will wasn't given to them. Nor was the proceeds from the sale of those 37 who chose to stay in the US/re-enslaved for the building of the university.
I don't like to quote books cause that joint takes too much time. I previously said that I can name families who were Americo-Liberian or Salone creole that traveled back and forth between Africa, West Indies and the United states but by our grandparents generations contact started to die out. similar to the Blydens.The Below gentleman was born Guyanese, Raised as a creole died categorized as an African American now with African American descendants. So as I said @xoxodede you cannot tell us our history or what they experienced or didn't experience.
On January 25, 1946, noted educator Orishatukeh Faduma died.
Born in the South American country of Guyana to freed slaves from West Africa, Faduma settled in Sierra Leone while he was still in elementary school. Educated there by missionaries, Faduma was baptized with the name William James Davies.
Through his years of teaching and study in Europe, Africa and America, Faduma became known as a linguist, educator, author and minister. Interested in political issues and social causes, he was a proponent of African heritage and culture evidenced in his work with the Dress Reform Society, which advocated wearing traditional African garb rather than western jackets for comfort in the African climate, and by adopting the name Orishatukeh Faduma.
From 1895 to 1912, Faduma was pastor and principal at Peabody Academy in Troy, a school for black children founded by the American Missionary Society.
He returned to Sierra Leone and taught for a few years before coming back to North Carolina where he was a professor of Latin, English Literature and Modern History at Lincoln Academy in Kings Mountain.
He finished his career at the Virginia Theological Seminary and College in Lynchburg, Virginia.
Meanwhile Mr. Faduma made application to the American Missionary Association and was sent with his wife to succeed white missionaries in Troy, N. C, being the first Negro principal with Negro teachers in the Troy field.
His direct African American "descendant" interesting that he wants to be a rapper and not a scholar, AA excellence
xoxodede
Superstar
The Below gentleman was born Guyanese, Raised as a creole died categorized as an African American now with African American descendants. So as I said @xoxodede you cannot tell us our history or what they experienced or didn't experience.
On January 25, 1946, noted educator Orishatukeh Faduma died.
Born in the South American country of Guyana to freed slaves from West Africa, Faduma settled in Sierra Leone while he was still in elementary school. Educated there by missionaries, Faduma was baptized with the name William James Davies.
Through his years of teaching and study in Europe, Africa and America, Faduma became known as a linguist, educator, author and minister. Interested in political issues and social causes, he was a proponent of African heritage and culture evidenced in his work with the Dress Reform Society, which advocated wearing traditional African garb rather than western jackets for comfort in the African climate, and by adopting the name Orishatukeh Faduma.
From 1895 to 1912, Faduma was pastor and principal at Peabody Academy in Troy, a school for black children founded by the American Missionary Society.
He returned to Sierra Leone and taught for a few years before coming back to North Carolina where he was a professor of Latin, English Literature and Modern History at Lincoln Academy in Kings Mountain.
He finished his career at the Virginia Theological Seminary and College in Lynchburg, Virginia.
Meanwhile Mr. Faduma made application to the American Missionary Association and was sent with his wife to succeed white missionaries in Troy, N. C, being the first Negro principal with Negro teachers in the Troy field.
His direct African American "descendant" interesting that he wants to be a rapper and not a scholar, AA excellence
So not trying to tell y'all's history - I'm just saying it's not mine or Black Americans (DOS). Also, this is about clearing up the myth that Black Americans (DOS) who were emancipated in 1865 going to Liberia and causing havoc.
Orishatukeh Faduma was born about 10 years before slavery in the US ended. He also migrated here and went to Yale in 1891 - when the majority of Black American (DOS) couldn't attend Freedman schools to learn the basic reading and writing due to helping their Sharecropping families. They were just getting out of Reconstruction and entered in to Jim Crow/Black Codes/lynching in the South. While all that was happening, Mr. Faduma was a Yale. He became a naturalized citizen in 1902.
I'm applaud him for his accomplishments and all he gave to his community. He was very privileged and blessed to do all of that during those times.
No you got to stop c00ning and eating Wendy's it aint good for you.I'm not saying we are the same, I'm saying if you're going to say DOS.
Your definition isn't the same as everyone's. So because the dude went to Yale, you think a black man married to a black woman in the south didn't experience racism, segregation, Jim crow, or witness lynching? what type of crack head logic is that?
My reason in posting his story was to show that creoles or Americo-Liberians were always going back and forth between countries (As I've always said) their numbers are not significant enough to show impact, as well as assimilation.
You keep saying your history as a Black American, what you're not understanding is that YOUR history is YOUR history not everyone's.
that's as dumb as saying "welp the slaves Harriet Tubman help escaped weren't slaves because they were free in the north"
xoxodede
Superstar
I'm not saying we are the same, I'm saying if you're going to say DOS.
Your definition isn't the same as everyone's. So because the dude went to Yale, you think a black man married to a black woman in the south didn't experience racism, segregation, Jim crow, or witness lynching? what type of crack head logic is that?
My reason in posting his story was to show that creoles or Americo-Liberians were always going back and forth between countries (As I've always said) their numbers are not significant enough to show impact, as well as assimilation.
You keep saying your history as a Black American, what you're not understanding is that YOUR history is YOUR history not everyone's.
that's as dumb as saying "welp the slaves Harriet Tubman help escaped weren't slaves because they were free in the north"
You know I don't use the word C00N' - but that I could never be
I'm sure he did - but he still was an immigrant and NOT a Black American. We already have discussed the differences in treatment during Jim Crow between the two.
"welp the slaves Harriet Tubman help escaped weren't slaves because they were free in the north"
Huh? The slaves who escaped to the North were not enslaving other Blacks and they werent going to Liberia.
what you're not understanding is that YOUR history is YOUR history not everyone's.
That's what I'm trying to tell you!
The Below gentleman was born Guyanese, Raised as a creole died categorized as an African American now with African American descendants. So as I said @xoxodede you cannot tell us our history or what they experienced or didn't experience.
Cool... But the thing is... We're saying that its NOT OUR history. And him being Guyanese proves our point.
Secure Da Bag
Veteran
A question. Are Americo-Liberians [considered] DoS? And if so, are we saying that: not all DoS from America are Aframs?
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I know that's not YOUR history. The point is you cannot speak for the 1000's of blacks who are considered AA today. We were not alive during that time to assess how and when freeborn or slaves from the carribean, creole or AmericoLiberian assimilated into AA society over the different periods of American history.
That is my point. Speak for yourself and your families. There are plenty of americo- liberians and creoles who have assimilated into AA identity . those labels are "african created" if they're in america there's no point in calling themselves Americo-liberian when many would just say my family is originally from Kentucky, VA or South Carolina.- cause that's where their ancestors where from.
It was already determined that creoles in Louisiana are AA right (many of them mulatto, some of them free) but don't share the same history as black american DOS from the southern MD, VA, SC, NC,GA.
Why would a person whos freed ancestors came from Trinidad, Jamaica, Cuba in 1850 and moved to Baltimore, NY, Philadelphia be any different?
Afterall They are still African American descendants of slaves, existed during Jim crow, segregation, and civil rights era.
That doesn't make sense. Lmfao.
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Ex. If I'm Americo Liberian my ancestor was from South Carolina and I moved to the United States in 1920
I'm not calling myself Americo Liberian- I'm African American cause I'm back home. People ask me where my family is from I'm saying South Carolina
^^^^^ there are actually alot of Americo Liberians that thought like that back then and still today.
You know I don't use the word C00N' - but that I could never be
I'm sure he did - but he still was an immigrant and NOT a Black American. We already have discussed the differences in treatment during Jim Crow between the two.
"welp the slaves Harriet Tubman help escaped weren't slaves because they were free in the north"
Huh? The slaves who escaped to the North were not enslaving other Blacks and they werent going to Liberia.
what you're not understanding is that YOUR history is YOUR history not everyone's.
That's what I'm trying to tell you!
Wtf are you arguing we already said those people who say look at what AA did to Liberia don't know shyt about liberian history.
So what is there to argue