The same day I saw the Rev. Mr. J. S. Beadslee, one of our
missionaries, who wished me to accompany him forty miles into the
interior of the country.
On May the 18th, I attended the Baptist Missionary meeting, in Queen
Street Chapel; the house was crowded. Several ministers spoke of the
importance of sending the gospel to Africa; they complimented the
congregation on their liberality the last year, having given one
hundred pounds sterling; they hoped this year they would give five
hundred pounds, as there were five thousand members at the present
time. There was but one colored minister on the platform. It is
generally the policy of these missionaries to have the sanction of
colored ministers, to all their assessments and taxes. The colored
people give more readily, and are less suspicious of imposition, if
one from themselves recommends the measure; this the missionaries
understand very well, and know how to take advantage of it. On the 22d
and 23d of June, the colored Baptists held their missionary meeting,
the number of ministers colored and mulattoes was 18, the colored
magistrates were present. The resolutions that were offered were
unanimously accepted, and every thing was done in love and harmony.
After taking up a contribution they concluded with song and prayer, and
returned home saying jocosely, "they would turn macroon hunters."
Mack is the name of a small coin in circulation at Jamaica. I called,
on my return, at the market and counted the different stalls. For
vegetables and poultry 196, all numbered and under cover; beside 70
on the ground; these are all attended by colored women. The market is
conveniently arranged, as they can close the gates and leave all safe.
There are nineteen stalls for fresh fish, eighteen for pork, thirty for
beef, eighteen for turtle. These are all regular built markets, and are
kept by colored men and women. These are all in one place. Others also
may be found, as with us, all over the city. Thus it may be hoped they
are not the stupid set of beings they have been called; here _surely we
see industry_; they are enterprising and quick in their perceptions,
determined to possess themselves, and to possess property besides, and
quite able to take care of themselves. They wished to know why I was so
inquisitive about them, I told them we had heard in America that you
are lazy, and that emancipation has been of no benefit to you; I wish
to inform myself of the truth respecting you, and give a true account
on my return. Am I right? More than two hundred people were around me
listening to what I said.
They thanked me heartily, I gave them some tracts, and told them if
it so pleased God I would come back to them and bring them some more
books, and try what could be done with some of the poor children to
make them better. I then left them and went to the East Market, where
there are many of all nations. The Jews and Spanish looked at me very
black. The colored people gathered around me, I gave them little books
and tracts, and told them I hoped to see them again.
There are in this street upwards of a thousand young women and
children, living in sin of every kind. From thence I went to the jail,
where there were seventeen men, but no women. There were in the House
of Correction three hundred culprits; they are taken from there, to
work on plantations. I went to the Admiral's house, where the emigrants
find a shelter until they can find employment, then they work and pay
for their passage. Many leave their homes and come to Jamaica under the
impression that they are to have their passage free, and on reaching
the Island are to be found, until they can provide for themselves.
How the mistake originated, I am not able to say, but on arriving here,
strangers poor and unacclimated, find the debt for passage money hard
and unexpected. It is remarkable that whether fresh from Africa, or
from other Islands from the South or from New England, they all feel
deceived on this point. I called on many Americans and found them poor
and discontented,--rueing the day they left their country, where,
notwithstanding many obstacles, their parents lived and died, which
they helped to conquer with their toil and blood; now shall their
children stray abroad and starve in foreign lands.
There is in Jamaica an institution, established in 1836, called the
Mico Institution. It is named after its founder, Madame Mico, who left
a large sum of money to purchase, (or rather to ransom, the one being
a Christian act, the other a sin against the Holy Ghost, who expressly
forbids such traffic.) Madame Mico left this money to ransom the
English who were in bondage to the Algerines; if there was any left,
it was to be devoted to the instruction of the colored people in the
British Isles.
Beside the Mico establishment, there are in Jamaica twenty-seven church
missionary schools, where children are taught gratis. Whole number
taught, 952. London Missionary Society Schools, sixteen; the number
taught not ascertained. National Schools, thirty-eight. There are also
the Wesleyan, Presbyterian and Moravian Schools; it is supposed there
are private schools, where three or four thousand are educated in the
city of Kingston, and twice the number in the street without the means
of instruction. All the children and adults taught in the above named
schools, are taxed £1 a year, except the English Church School, this is
the most liberal. The Rev. Mr. Horton, a Baptist minister in Kingston,
told me he had sent ninety children away from the Baptist school
because they did not bring their money. It is sufficient to say they
had it not to bring!
Most of the people of Jamaica are emancipated slaves, many of them are
old, worn out and degraded. Those who are able to work, have yet many
obstacles to contend with, and very little to encourage them; every
advantage is taken of their ignorance; the same spirit of cruelty is
opposed to them as held them for centuries in bondage; even religious
teaching is bartered for their hard earnings, while they are allowed
but thirty-three cents a day, and are told if they will not work for
that they shall not work at all; an extraordinary price is asked of
them for every thing they may wish to purchase, even their Bibles
are sold to them at a large advance on the first purchase. Where are
their apologists, if they are found wanting in the strict morals that
Christians ought to practice? Who kindly says, forgive them when they
err? "Forgive them, this is the bitter fruit of slavery." Who has
integrity sufficient to hold the balance when these poor people are to
be weighed? Yet their present state is blissful, compared with slavery.
Many of the farmers bring their produce twenty or thirty miles. Some
have horses or ponys, but most of them bring, their burdens on their
head. As I returned from St. Andrews's Mountain, where I had been sent
for by a Mr. Rose, I was overtaken by a respectable looking man on
horseback; we rode about ten miles in company. The story he told me
of the wrongs he and his wife had endured while in slavery, are too
horrible to narrate. My heart sickens when I think of it. He asked
me many questions, such as where I came from? why I came to that
Isle? where had I lived, &c? I told him I was sent for by one of the
missionaries to help him in his school. Indeed, said he, our color
need the instruction. I asked him why the colored people did not hire
for themselves? We would be very glad to, he replied, but our money is
taken from us so fast we cannot. Sometimes they say we must all bring
£1; to raise this, we have to sell at a loss or to borrow, so that we
have nothing left for ourselves; the Macroon hunters take all--this is
a nickname they give the missionaries and the class-leaders--a cutting
sarcasm this!
Arrived at a tavern, about a mile from Kingston, I bade the man
adieu, and stopped for my guide. The inn-keeper kindly invited me in;
he asked me several questions, and I asked him as many. How do the
people get along, said I, since the emancipation? The negroes, he
replied, will have the Island in spite of the d----. Do not you see
how they live, and how much they can bear? We cannot do so. This man
was an Englishman, with a large family of mulatto children. I returned
with my mind fully made up what to do. Spent three weeks at the
Mico establishment, and three with my colored friends from America.
We thought something ought to be done for the poor girls that were
destitute; they consulted with their friends, called a meeting and
formed a society of forty; each agreed to pay three dollars a year and
collect, and provide a house, while I came back to America to raise the
money for all needful articles for the school. Here I met Mr. Ingraham
for the first time; he had come from the mountains, and his health
had rapidly declined; wishing to get his family home before the Lord
took him away, he embarked for Baltimore, in the Orb, and I sailed for
Philadelphia, July 20th, 1841, twenty-one days from Jamaica, in good
health. I found there, Fitz W. Sargent's family, from Gloucester, who I
lived with when a little girl; they received me very kindly, and gave
donations of books and money for that object.
I met the Anti Slavery Society at Mrs. Lucretia Motts, who took great
interest in the cause. I visited among the friends, and spent my time
very pleasantly. August 5th, I started for New York; arrived safely,
and staid with an old friend; ascertained that Mr. Ingraham's family
were at Newark, at Theodore Wells. He died four days after his arrival.
I was invited to Mrs. Ingraham's (his cousin's widow) to spend a week.
There I met with much encouragement to labor in the cause. Missionaries
were coming and going, and all seemed to be interested in my object.
Saturday evening I went to the bath room, where I left my neck ribbon:
returning after it, I had the misfortune to fall through an open
trap door, down fifteen feet, on hard coal. I had no light with me.
I dislocated my left shoulder, and was generally very much bruised;
my screams brought the girl to my assistance, and by the help of God
she brought me out of the cellar; it was some time before a surgeon
could be procured; at last Dr. Jossleyn came to my relief, he set my
shoulder. I was obliged to remain at Mrs. Ingraham's three weeks; as
soon as I was able I left there for Boston. I intended to have gone by
the western boat, but by mistake got on board Captain Comstock's, and
was exposed on deck all night in a damp east wind, and when I arrived
at the landing I could not assist myself; a sailor who saw and pitied
my situation, kindly took care of me and my baggage, and on my arrival
in Boston procured a carriage for me. If it had not been for his
kindness I know not how I should have got along.
As soon as I was able I commenced my task of collecting funds for my
Free Labor School in Jamaica. I collected in Boston and vicinity, in
New York and Philadelphia, but not sufficient to make up the required
sum, and I was obliged to take fifty dollars from my own purse,
thinking that when I returned to Jamaica they would refund the money
to me. April 15th, embarked on board the Brig Norma, of New York, for
Jamaica. I arrived at Kingston May 6th, and found every thing different
from what it was when I left; the people were in a state of agitation,
several were hanged, and the insurrection was so great that it was
found necessary to increase the army to quell it. Several had been
hanged. On the very day I arrived a man was hanged for shooting a man
as he passed through the street. Such was the state of things that it
was not safe to be there.
A few young people met to celebrate their freedom on an open plain,
where they hold their market; their former masters and mistresses
envious of their happiness, conspired against them and thought to put
them down by violence. This only served to increase their numbers;
but the oppressors were powerful and succeeded in accomplishing their
revenge, although many of them were relations. There was a rule among
the slave holders, to take care of the children they have by their
slaves; they select them out and place them in asylums. Those who
lived with their white fathers were allowed great power over their
slave mothers and her slave children; my heart was often grieved to see
their conduct to their poor old grand parents. Those over twenty-one
were freed in 1834, all under twenty-one, were to serve their masters
till twenty-one. It is well known that at that time, the children alike
with others, received twenty-five dollars a head for their relatives.
Were I to tell all my eyes have seen among that people it would not
be credited. It is well known that those that were freed, knowing
their children were still in bondage, were not satisfied. In the year
1838, general freedom throughout the British Islands gave the death
blow to the power of the master, and mothers received with joy their
emancipated children; they no longer looked the picture of despair,
fearing to see their mulatto son or daughter, beating or abusing their
younger brothers and sisters of a darker skin. On this occasion there
was an outrage committed by those who were in power. What little the
poor colored people had gathered during their four years of freedom,
was destroyed by violence; their fences were broken down, and their
horses and hogs taken from them. Most of the mulattoes and masters
are educated, many of them are very poor, some are very rich; the
property is left to the oldest daughter, she divides it with her
brothers and sisters; since slavery ended many of them have married;
those who are poor, and mean to live in sin, make for New Orleans and
other slave States; many of the planters left the Island when slavery
was abolished. In June, 1841, a number of people arrived from Sierra
Leone at Jamaica; these were Maroons who were banished from the Island.
They were some of the original natives who inhabited the mountains,
and were determined to destroy the whites. These Maroons would secrete
themselves in trees, and arrest the whites as they passed along, they
would pretend to guide them, when they would beat and abuse them as
the whites did their slaves; the English finding themselves defeated
in all their plans to subdue them, proposed to take them by craft.
They made a feast in a large tavern in Kingston, and invited them to
come; after they had eaten, they were invited on board three ships
of war, that were all ready to set sail for Sierra Leone; they were
many of them infants in their mother's arms, they were well taken care
of by the English and instructed; they were removed about the year
1796--they are bright and intelligent, I saw and conversed with them;
when they heard of the abolition of slavery, they sent a petition to
Queen Victoria that they might return to Jamaica, which was granted.
Several of them were very old when they returned; they were men and
women when they left the Island, they had not forgot the injuries they
had received from the hands of man, nor the mercies of God to them,
nor his judgments to their enemies. Their numbers were few but their
power was great; they say the Island, of right, belongs to them. Had
their been a vessel in readiness I should have come back immediately,
it seemed useless to attempt to establish a Manual Labor School, as
the government was so unsettled that I could not be protected. Some of
my former friends were gone as teachers to Africa, and some to other
parts of the Island. I called on the American Consul to consult with
him, he said that although such a school was much wanted, yet every
thing seemed so unsettled that I had no courage to proceed. I told
him there was so much excitement that I wished to leave the Island
as soon as he could find me a passage, it seemed useless to spend
my time there. As soon as it was known that I intended to return, a
movement was made to induce me to remain. I was persuaded to try the
experiment for three months, not thinking their motive was bad. Before
I left the United States, I got all that was needed, within fifty
dollars. The fifty dollars I supplied from my own purse, expecting
they would pay me. It cost me ten dollars for freight, and twenty-five
for passage money; these people that I had hoped to serve, were much
taken up with the things I had brought, they thought that I had money
and I was continually surrounded; the thought of color was no where
exhibited, much notice was taken of me. I was invited to breakfast in
one place, and to dine in another, &c. A society was organized, made
up of men and women of authority. A constitution was drafted by my
consent, by those who were appointed to meet at my rooms. Between the
time of the adjournment they altered it to suit themselves. At the
time appointed we came together with a spirit apparently becoming any
body of Christians; most of them were members of Christian churches;
the meeting was opened with reading the Scriptures and prayer. Then
said the leader, since our dear sister has left her native land and
her friends to come to us, we welcome her with our hearts and hands.
She will dwell among us, and we will take care of her--Brethren think
of it!, after which he sat down, and the constitution was called for.
The Preamble held out all the flattery that a fool could desire; after
which they commenced the articles, supposing that they could do as
they thought best. The fourth article unveiled their design. As we
have designed to take care of our sister, _we the undersigned will take
charge of all she has brought_; the vote was called, every person rose
in a moment except myself: every eye was upon me; one asked me why I
did not vote, I made no answer--they put the vote again and again, I
remained seated; well said the President, we can do nothing without her
vote; they remained some time silent, and then broke up the meeting.
The next day the Deacon called to see what the state of my mind was,
and some of the women proposed that we should have another meeting.
I told them no, I should do no more for them. As soon as they found
they could not get the things in the way they intended, they started
to plunder me; but I detected their design, and was on my guard, I
disposed of the articles, and made ready to leave when an opportunity
presented. A more skilful plan than this Satan never designed, but the
power of God was above it. It is not surprising that this people are
full of deceit and lies, this is the fruits of slavery, it makes master
and slaves knaves. It is the rule where slavery exists to swell the
churches with numbers, and hold out such doctrines, as _obedience to
tyrants_, is a duty to God. I went with a Baptist woman to the house of
a minister of the Church of England, to have her grandchild christened
before it died; she told me if she did not have it christened, it would
rise up in judgment against her. This poor deluded creature was a
class leader in the Baptist Church, and such is the condition of most
of the people: they seemed blinded to every thing but money. They are
great for trade, and are united in their determination for procuring
property, of which they have amassed a vast amount. Notwithstanding I
had made over various articles to one of the American Missionaries, a
Mr. J. S. Beadslee, of Clarendon Mountains, I also gave to others where
they were needed, which receipts and letters I have in my possession.
Notwithstanding all this, they made another attempt to rob me, and as a
passage could not be obtained for me to return home, I was obliged to
go to the Mico establishment again for safety, such was the outrage.
Houses were broken open and robbed every night. I came very near being
shot: there was a certain place where we placed ourselves the first
of the evening. A friend came to bring us some refreshments, I had
just left the window when a gun was fired through it, by one that
often sat with us; this was common in the time of slavery. Previous to
vessels arriving, passages were engaged. I disposed of my articles and
furniture at a very small profit. On the 1st of August, Capt. A. Miner
arrived, and advertised for passengers. The American Consul procured me
a passage, and on the 18th of August myself and nine other passengers
embarked for New York.
I might have diversified my book with more extended descriptions of
Jamaica, with its tropical climate and productions, and contrasted
it with Northern Russia. I hope my readers will not think that I was
unmoved by all the wonders and beauties of nature, that were presented
to me in various climes. Before giving an account of the voyage from
Jamaica, it may prove interesting to some readers, to have a brief
description of the country. With her liberty secured to her, may she
now rise in prosperity, morality and religion, and become a happy
people whose God is the Lord.
WEST INDIES.
A denomination under which is comprehended a large chain of islands,
extending in a curve from the Florida shore on the northern peninsula
of America, to the Gulf of Venezuela on the southern. These islands
belong to five European powers, viz: Great Britain, Spain, France,
Holland, and Denmark. An inhabitant of New England can form no idea
of the climate and the productions of these islands. Many of the
particulars that are here mentioned, are peculiar to them all.
The climate in all the West India Islands is nearly the same, allowing
for those accidental differences which the several situations and
qualities of the lands themselves produce; as they lie within the
tropic of Cancer, and the sun is often almost at the meridian over
their heads, they are continually subjected to a heat that would be
intolerable but for the trade winds, which are so refreshing as to
enable the inhabitants to attend to their various occupations, even
under a noonday sun; as the night advances, a breeze begins to be
perceived, which blows smartly from the land, as it were from the
centre towards the sea, to all points of the compass at once. The
rains make the only distinction of seasons on these islands. The trees
are green the year round; they have no cold or frost; our heaviest
rains are but dews comparatively; with them floods of water are poured
from the clouds. About May, the periodical rains from the South may
be expected. Then the tropical summer, in all its splendor, makes
its appearance. The nights are calm and serene, the moon shines more
brightly than in New England, as do the planets and the beautiful
galaxy. From the middle of August to the end of September the heat is
most oppressive, the sea breeze is interrupted, and calms warn the
inhabitants of the periodical rains, which fall in torrents about the
first of October.