BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – WHAT does one do when one feels trapped by circumstances which appear to be burdensome, unfair and unbearable? When one is aware that the consequences of resistance to those circumstances could be harrowing or even fatal, does one surrender and become docile, or does the determination to be free overcome all lingering fears?
This was the situation our forbears had to contemplate on the plantation in the days of slavery and similar choices do confront this generation in present day situations.
On Tuesday night (Nov. 8, 2011), ‘Resistance to Enslavement’ was the topic of the first in a Lecture Series sponsored by the UNESCO Slave Route Project under the theme of “Reconciling the Past to move into the Future with confidence”.
The lecturer was National Archivist, Mrs. Victoria O’Flaherty, who spoke to a wide cross section of the society in a nearly full hall at the University of the West Indies Open Campus at the Gardens, Basseterre.
Bearing in mind the theme of the series was - “Reconciling the Past to move into the Future with confidence” - and recalling the remarks of the Chairperson of the Committee, Mr. Lloyd Lazar, that “the lectures are based on the concept of improving one’s level of self-confidence and eliminating any complexes”, one understood that the lecture was not to be received as “history for history’s sake”.
What could one learn of the character of our forefathers and their methods of resistance that have remained in our attitudes and approaches to crushing problems surrounding us today?
"Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it." says Burke - a quote often repeated by historians and lovers of history. This was therefore to be a learning experience.
National Archivist and Lecturer, Mrs. Victoria O’Flaherty, reported that from her research she found that contrary to the opinion of many noteworthy authors, our forbears, as slaves, were not to be regarded as a docile set of people, incapable of intelligent thinking and who passively accepted slavery.
On the contrary, she showed that slavery was never accepted as a social institution by the slaves and their continuous resistance to it made them active participants in the abolition of the Slave Trade and forgers of their eventual emancipation. The abolitionist movement was only part of it.
“Resistance to enslavement in some form was endemic throughout the period and it expressed itself in various ways, shapes and forms, some of which are even difficult to imagine as actual resistance. These all contributed to the destruction of the slave system,” explained Mrs. O’Flaherty.
Master and slave were natural enemies. Fear was the underlying emotion pervading plantation life; lack of freedom generated hatred and even endangered the society in which they lived; submissiveness was relative to what the slaves felt they could get away with.
Punishments for resistance, protest or rebellion were brutal.
Floggings, isolation, mutilation, cutting off of limbs, starving and hanging were often the consequences slaves had to face if caught in any form of resistance…yet the resistance continued simply taking a different form.
Interestingly many of the forms of resistance are not much different from those of today even though we now regard ourselves as being “free”. Freedom, we have come to realise nowadays, is a state of the mind.
‘Pretending to be sick, striking(refusing to work), leaving work undone or doing it poorly, stealing and “holding out” were some of the forms of resistance the audience could easily equate to present day resistance.
Stealing, either to outwit the master, or to change a dreary diet, was also regarded as a form of resistance.
Abortions or infant killings were sometimes done to deprive the Master of further enslavement opportunities or as a form of resistance to subjecting offspring to deplorable conditions as existed then.
There were attempts to modify one’s existence like planting a garden or renting out one’s services even though part of the payment would have to be given to the master.
Though not emphasized at the lecture, the Church played a major role in helping slaves to modify their existence on the mental level. Apart from giving them a sense of value of themselves, the introduction of hope through the belief that there was a better life coming in heaven made an impact as evidenced from the singing of spirituals such as “Lord, I’m coming home,” and “Steal away”.
Extreme resistance such as running away was fairly common, despite the extremely brutal punishments. Whenever it is felt that the grass is greener on the other side, this will occur. Today it is called emigration or brain drain.
What was also interesting was the attempt of slaves to negotiate and use bargaining powers. They could make a request to be sold to a different owner (much like changing jobs today).
In these many ways, resistance to enslavement continued. It began with slaves jumping overboard in the Middle Passage and even persisted in post Emancipation plantation times.
A good example is the 1935 Buckley’s riots in St. Kitts which spread to neighbouring islands.
This leaves one to conclude that the resistance to enslavement was really resistance to conditions existing at that time, and the fact that such resistance continues in the post emancipation period does prove that point.
Even today, conditions that are regarded as burdensome and unfair such VAT, hikes in utility rates and scarcity of money due to recession-like conditions could also trigger resistance as was seen in pre-emancipation times.
It is only through a feeling of independence brought about by the “decolonization of the African mind” – as stated by Sir Probyn, will we feel empowered to become true ‘masters of our destiny’ and not ‘victims of our circumstances’.
The wisdom of such a conclusion can be culled from Timothy Callender’s humourous short story, ‘Grandfather Willie meets Mr. Hitler’. The character, a village war hero, learnt much from his war exploits. He said:
“A man got to believe he free to be free. If he free and he don’t know he free, he ain’t free. And if he ain’t free and he think he free, he free. Yuh could tell a free man that he ain’t free, and yuh can tell a man that ain’t free that he free. Yuh could give somebody freedom, or take away somebody freedom, and sometimes they can’t tell the difference. Freedom for a man, or freedom for a nation, is not like mango – yuh can’t pick it offa a tree. Looka, freedom is Independence, see? Whether it is for a man or a nation.”
