Dear Editor,
This year marks the centenary of the final termination of Indentureship contracts, affecting thousands of Indians in the Caribbean and elsewhere. As far as I know, no organisation in Guyana has held any event to commemorate this historic act. It is not too late.
Next year marks the 180th anniversary of the first arrival into the Caribbean of indentured African labourers. After the Abolition of the Slave Trade in 1807, the Royal Navy (West Africa Squadron) was tasked with capturing foreign slave ships, many destined for Cuba and Brazil. The freed Africans were subsequently deposited in Sierra Leone or St Helena. Thousands of these Africans were then recruited as indentured labourers and shipped to British Guiana, Jamaica, Trinidad, St Kitts and elsewhere. Between 1842 and 1867, 4,347 freed Africans, collected from St Helena, were sent to the plantations in Jamaica, many of them children. The last 11 freed Africans sent as ‘coolies’ to Jamaica in May 1867 were on board a ship called the Ganges. Ships like the Ganges, the Scoresby and the Themis, ferrying Indian indentured labourers to the Caribbean would stop over at St Helena, collect freed Africans, sail on for over 5,000 miles, and deposit the lot into indentureship in Jamaica, Trinidad, British Guiana and elsewhere. These thousands of black ‘coolies’ deserve to be remembered as boat brothers and boat sisters. Archival materials exist, which can be used to name them and to construct their lives.
Yours faithfully,
Emeritus Professor
David Dabydeen
(University of Warwick)
