On the 30th of August, 1833, the Emancipation Act passed the
House of Lords. It was declared that all children under six
years old should be free on the 1st of August, 1834; that all
other slaves should be registered as apprenticed laborers and be
compelled to labor for their owners for a few years--the time
was shortened soon after. Antigua alone has the honor of having
said, “We will have no apprentices; all shall be free.”
Meanwhile in all the islands dismal prophecies were made by
the planters of rapine and ruin and negro risings; but the
missionaries were busy teaching the poor blacks how to receive
the coming boon of freedom. The eve of that momentous day, the
1st of August, was kept by the slave population of Antigua as
a watch-night in church and chapel. They had been advised to
await the midnight hour on their knees with prayers and hymns of
gratitude. So, at the first stroke of midnight in the island of
Antigua, all fell upon their knees, and nothing was heard but
the slow booming of the cathedral bell, save here and there an
hysteric sob from some overwrought slave-girl. The final stroke
sounded through the clear air, and still the immense crowd kept
silence, as tho they could not realize that they had become
free. Then a strange thing happened: One awful peal of thunder
rattled and crashed from pole to pole, and flash upon flash of
lightning seemed to put out the feeble lights of cathedral,
church and chapel.
God had spoken! The kneeling crowds sprang to their feet with a
shout of joy; they laughed, they cried, they tossed brown arms
abroad, and embraced one another in wild and passionate emotion;
then they remembered God once more and prayed aloud.--EDWARD
GILLIATT, “Heroes of Modern Crusades.”
(1150)