Newly captured Africans taken as slaves!
This is another short story written by Chris some years ago and I am not sure if he ever posted it. I questioned him about this story and he tells me it is a purely a work of fiction and that he has never visited West Africa but has been to former slave-markets in Portugal, South Africa and other places.
His reason for writing it? Because of hs strong views on the evils of chattel slavery and its impact on real slaves throughout history. Slavery was no respecter of people regardless of race or creed and anyone could become a slave. However, Chris believes the nearest we can relate to slavery is through the relatively recent Atlantic Slave Trade and its impact on black people today. Having regard for the feelings of his black readers, he seldom mentions black slavery.
However, as a 'slave of colour" (SOC) it does resonate with me on a very personal level and although I have never visited any slave museum, Chris' words affect me.
I have Chris' permission to post this here.
Nathaniel (nate)
“THE MUSEUM VISIT”
This fictional, short story refers to historic African slavery. If the subject distresses you then you should read no further…… Chris
“The ideas and characters contained in this story are the writer’s and shouldn’t be used without permission. Please respect the integrity of the story and don’t do any rewrites, alterations or add pictures without his permission."
Perhaps it wasn’t the best move on my part to visit the museum. I’d gone there with the hope of discovering some hitherto unknown aspects of my family’s history and instead I am confronted by the museum and its exhibits. I am overwhelmed by the museum’s violent history and the sheer horror of the place.
The museum of which I speak is housed in a former slave-factory on the west coast of Africa. Today it is set-up as a museum and educational facility to enlighten current and future generations about that aspect of our black history which still disturbs and angers many people.
So, why am I here?
I am a black man, aged nineteen and until recently, I knew almost nothing about my family’s history. True, I knew I was the descendant of black Africans brought to these Caribbean islands and sold as slaves to labour on the white men’s plantations. But isn’t this true of most black people in our region of the world?
My parents wore the twin badges of their shame; namely that they are black and secondly, the colour of their skin declares them to be of slave descent. Whenever, they spoke of our family’s past, it was always in the vaguest of terms and never elaborated upon.
Consequently, I knew nothing of my family beyond those members still living and it was as though nobody existed before them. Any of my questions regarding our ancestors were actively discouraged and only ever superficially answered. I soon learned such questions were not welcomed and consequently, so much has remained unasked and unanswered.
It stayed this way until about two years ago when I and my fellow students, as part of my school studies, were assigned the tasks of researching and recording our families’ histories.
I received no support from my parents in this and indeed I was told to.
“Leave it alone! No good comes from digging up the past. Best leave things as they be!”
At first, this discouraged me, but as I listened to the progress reports of my class-mates, I became caught up in their enthusiasm and I resolved to research my own ancestral roots. I was convinced that there was a ‘skeleton in the family’s closet’ – perhaps a convict or worse – but I am modern in my outlook and I knew that I could cope with anything that I unearthed. How wrong I was in thinking that.
I spent many hours sitting at my computer and researching my family roots. Fortunately, our government has spent large sums of money in collecting and collating much information about our nation’s unhappy history of slavery.
These archives cover several centuries and record the names of all the white planters who lived on my Caribbean island home. It gives the names and acreages of each plantation as well as the number of slaves who worked them. And this proved to be a valuable resource for me in establishing who I am.
Painstakingly, I researched, often at night, when my parents were either watching television or were asleep. I respected their wish that I not pester them with questions which obviously distresses them. But my need to know my own roots overrode my concerns for their wish to
“Best leave things as they be.”
Gradually, I built up a dossier on my African ancestors and even though the records were sketchy, I did learn that I am the descendant of an African slave imported to these islands in the eighteen century from the Fortress of São Jorge da Mina built by the Portuguese in 1482 but commonly referred to as Elmina – ‘the mine’.
My need to ‘know’ more about my ancestral roots has brought me to West Africa and I’d come here despite my parents’ protestations. And in coming here, I’d used up my precious savings accumulated over several years of part-time work.
Do I regret coming? In one aspect I do. I’d built up a mental picture of my slave ancestors which I thought would prepare me for the horrors of Elmina. But I was wrong! Nothing can prepare you for the true inhumanity of this dreadful place.
As I walked through the factory, I was overwhelmed with a sense of profound sadness as I thought about the suffering endured over the centuries by those countless thousands of black men, women and children who’d paused here on their journeys from the African interior into slavery in the white man’s “New World”.
As I peered through the bars into tiny holding cells, I visualised the overcrowding and the seething mass of naked humanity who waited in despair – some times for months - for the arrival of a slave ship to carry them into cruel captivity in strange, unfamiliar lands.
I walked the narrow passageway from the cells and passed through the “Gate of No Return’ into the sunlight and humidity of an African day. The wretched slaves no doubt quaked at the sight that confronted them. Riding at anchor like a gigantic waterbird with folded wings would be the vessel waiting to carry them away from Mother Africa.
And on the sandy beach, sailors waited with red-hot branding irons and heavy iron shackles ready to process them into their new slavery before they were forced into canoes and ferried out to the waiting slave-ship.
Nothing prepared me for this. In my imagination, I saw a procession of ghostly figures streaming out through the “Gate of No Return” to the waiting ships riding at anchor just offshore.
Eventually, the oppressiveness of the slaves’ dungeons got the better of me and I sought relief in the courtyard and upper levels of the fortress where the white governor lived and reigned with his assistants.
I visited the small church – which was directly above the holding pens – where the white man worshiped his God and sang hymns of praise to His greater glory. I paused for a few minutes in the cool serenity of the chapel and as I sat solitary in a pew, I wondered if the white worshippers ever gave thought to the suffering, black humanity just a few feet below them as they prayed for God’s blessings on their endeavours. Somehow, I doubt they did.
As I sat in that church, I truly became aware of man’s inhumanity to his fellow man.
My final inspection was of the governor’s quarters on the top level of the fortress. I compared it spaciousness, its light and its airiness to the gloom and filth of the slave pens far below. The guide showed me the secret stairway which led directly down to the females slave pens from where the governors made their choices from among the imprisoned, young, African women. My mind recoiled in disgust as I thought about the cruel despoiling of Africa’s proud womanhood by these ‘civilised’ men.
It seemed to me that slavery brutalises its hapless victims while, at the same time, it taints its willing practitioners.
I was glad to leave Elmina but equally, I am glad that I’d visited. True it is depressing for me – a young, black man – to visit the scene of such monstrous crimes against people of my skin colour. I know there are those who say we mustn’t make judgements retrospectively; that historically we should judge things within the prevailing attitudes of the time in which they are set. While that might possibly be true of some things, I can’t see how such logic applies to slavery.
Less than two hundred years ago – and remember slavery wasn’t abolished in Brazil until the 1888 – white people were more God-fearing and Bible focused than we are today. They lived righteous, law abiding lives and yet many saw no evil in stealing black people from their ancestral homes in Africa and transporting them like cattle to the white slave-markets of the Americas. I refuse to believe they were all that different to us who live in this modern age. I can’t see how their consciences were all that different to my own. Surely they possessed a moral compass that helped them distinguish between right and wrong.
Despondently, I made my way back to my hotel where, to wash away the bitter memories of Elmina, I consumed more alcohol than I should. Certainly, this helped to numb the senses before I finally retired to my room to sleep.
To seek relief from the oppressive tropical humidity, I removed all my clothing and stretched out naked on my bed to sleep. But sleep was slow in coming and I lay awake thinking back over my visit to the Fortress of São Jorge da Mina and the fate of my distant ancestor who’d spent time there before being shipped to the Caribbean.
Through the open window of my room, I listened to the myriad sounds of the tropical night. The loud chirruping of insects joined with the trilling of night birds while within the room the rattling hum of the ceiling fan lulled me into a restless sleep.
I slept and I dreamt of 18th century Africa and of my ancestor, Danjuma living happily within his tribal village somewhere in the vast hinterland. I dreamt of his capture by the Arab slavers, of his long trek downriver to the coast and of his incarceration in Elmina. I dreamt of him being branded and placed in chains and of the unimaginable horrors of the months’ long voyage to the Caribbean. I dreamt of him being paraded before the buyers at the slave-market and of his sense of shame as he was sold.
I dreamt of the years of his servitude as he toiled under the whips of his master’s overseers.
I wondered if there were moments of happiness amid the grim realities of his life as a slave. I decided there must have been some for obviously he’d ‘jumped the broom’ and had a wife and children.
After all, I am the living evidence of this.
I wondered how old he was when, worn out from years of unremitting and unpaid for labour, he found sweet oblivion in a merciful death.
I pictured him buried in an unmarked grave somewhere on his master’s plantation; now long forgotten and never spoken of by his ashamed descendants.
Marvelous !!!!
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