By Makeda Mikael
Twelve million Africans were taken across the Atlantic, leaving six million in a watery grave dying on the Middle Passage.
The records are not yet tallied of those who died from overwork, suicide, shot running away, killed from beatings, lynchings and murderous hateful attacks by their drunken owners.
On this 40th celebration of political independence, as we struggle against economic colonialism from which our people have never quite been freed, we must come to terms also with the injustices meted out to our ancestors over the 400 years of slavery and colonialism. Although the past is considered history and we are being urged to move on, what about our ancestors, how do we take them with us? We cannot leave them behind, unknown to us, unknown by our children, and our children’s children.
How can we honour our ancestors with remembrances if we do not know the details of what they went through over 400 years — a very long time? What do we remember except what happened to us in the last hundred years since we have learned to read and write, and from oral history? And those days were dark, as we struggled in poverty and dared not enrich ourselves; and those first years of freedom were considered the first days of light they say, in spite of the lynching, and the raw killing with impunity, hunger and abject poverty. And before that darkness!
The plantation lifespan for an African slave in the tobacco, cotton and sugar-cane fields was seven years — it was more cost effective as in 1751 one English planter in Antigua wrote, “to work slaves to the utmost, and by the little fare and hard useage, to wear them out before they become useless and unable to do service, and then to buy new ones to fill up their places.”
It will take ages for our people to become whole again as a new people, the extreme end of the gnome factor, a people who must step by step retrace their beginnings in a strange land and all that followed.
The time has come to bury our dead, bury our ancestors by bringing them to life in the consciousness of children, and their children. We must begin to mark the existence of our ancestors by creating locations of unmarked graves, holy places, where the memories of our ancestors can grow; establishing physical places on the islands, and the continents of North and South America. Our ancestors deserve their own open-air spaces, which can be visited by our children and their children like the Jews hold fast to their memories at the Wailing Wall.
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Writer a thought provoking article. The following passage needs to be shouted more in our push for reparations.
“The plantation lifespan for an African slave in the tobacco, cotton and sugar-cane fields was seven years — it was more cost effective as in 1751 one English planter in Antigua wrote, “to work slaves to the utmost, and by the little fare and hard useage, to wear them out before they become useless and unable to do service, and then to buy new ones to fill up their places.”
The closing part of your article, powerful, I am with you 100 percent
Reparations need to start with our own people and from Africa. We should have stood against the foreigners and fought them off. Instead, they sold us off as slaves to foreigners. Africa needs to pay us reparations first before any other country.
100’s of years later, our own people selling us out and our lands from under us. We haven’t learned a damned thing from our history and continue to repeat the same bullshit centuries later.
Our own people only looking at their betterment at the cost of us. I am ashamed of my own heritage.
You are being unfair. Recall over 3 decades ago someone put that same statement to me and I had to remind them of how the Europeans worked. They would essentially go to one tribe and put a gun to their head. Either work with me or I will help your enemy. They played us against each other a practice that continues today. Note also that Jews during the nazi reign also turned each other in, how come we are able to see many of them were also victims but not our own? The fact is Africa lost due to colonization it did not gain wealth as Europe did. Nope its wealth was stolen
That’s your sad excuse why we didn’t stand up against a common enemy?
Fast forward they doing the same thing to us today. Instead of learning from the past, the same ignorance going on today and certain individuals (you can even call them tribes) only looking out for themselves just like back then.
Notes From A Native Son Of The Rock! “The Afrocentric method is a form of cultural criticism that examines etymological uses of words and terms in order to know the source of the author’s location. This allows us to intersect ideas with actions and actions with ideas on the basis of what is pejorative and ineffective and what is creative and transformative at the political and economic levels.” – Dr. Molefi Asante, Afrocentricity, The Theory of Social Change!
Mi Gud Fren Tenman, Always give Praise and Thanks for enlightenment. It is never too late for some. Be aware of “The Danger of a Single Story.” – Madame Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie!
This mere voice has written ad nauseum of the wanton desecration of spaces on The Rock, particularly Lady Nugent’s and Eve’s Garden!
You may wish to revisit the many comments of FTS who has charted The Power Relationships for those too young to know or remember! Who and what were the Power Relationships engaged in the desecration!
Hopefully you are teaching the Quartet the mathematical, strategic and critical thinking necessary to playing “Warri!”
“It is impossible to talk about the single story without talking about Power There is an Igbo word “nkali.” It’s a noun that loosely translates to “to be greater than another” Like our economic and political worlds, stories too are defined by the principle of nkali. How they are told, who tells them, when they’re told, how many stories are told, are really dependent on power.” Chimamanda Adichie!
The Queen of Sheba should be able to begin or end the Story with either Eve’s Garden or Lady Nugent’s Burial Ground in Antigua and you would have not only the Historical Referent Points but “an entirely different story!”
You are now in a position to resurrect Hogs Hole and throw out the Archangel Mikael with Blessings to Ten! The recent short sojourn notwithstanding Covid and Curfew exposed the neglected education where with FTS political, economic, socio-cultural, and Tabor’s technical, legal and environmental knowledge “Everything can be explained to the people, on the single condition that you want them to understand.” – Dr. Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth!
Excellent article, but with all due respect, would somebody tell me who this lady in front of a fancy assed jet plane? What is her background. Is she somebody important or another wannabee? She is an aging woman, so she must have been before my time. I simply don’t know who she is?????? Thanks.
This so enlightening to read,it stretches your imagination, even so much more when we are living in a time where our leaders seems to forget our past,our ancestors voyage hence the reason we are here, our lands that they give there blood for is being sold like it has no worth to us the descendants,we are frankly being sold right back into our past and its very sad after all they have been through to get us this far
Who the heck is the writer of these articles? WHO is she? Somebody must know her.
@Kari: Perhaps you are too young and innocent to know this.Makeda was one of the first female Rastas I knew in Antigua.Back then she was known by another name.
She sure don’t look like no Rasta now. What happened?
Great article Makeda. It was so beautiful I had to read it twice. It seems as if there are a few people on ANR who want to know who Makeda-Mikael is. I would suggest to ANR that they do a little biography of you to satisfy their readers.
Notes From A Native Son Of The Rock! “The Afrocentric method seeks to uncover the masks behind the rethoric of power, privilege, and position in order to establish how principal myths create place. The method enthrones critical reflection that reveals the perception of monolithic power as nothing but the projection of a cadre of adventurers.” – Dr. Molefi Asante, Afrocentricity, The Theory of Social Change!
Mi Gud Fren Charles, “Truth, Justice and The Antigua and Barbuda Way! Surely you must be aware of the Power Brokers who easily looked the other way, as top advisors and budding entrepreneurs, when Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent’s Burial Ground were not only desecrated but erased forever from Antigua and Barbuda Historical Referent Points in Time and Space! There can be no truth and reconciliation without repentance by European Buccaneers and African Antiguan and Barbudan Politicos and Privateers!
Hopefully many of our youth will read the article as a teachable moment and learning opportunity as we approach the 40th, but The Queen of Sheba owes it to the Nation to speak to power relationships and the desecration of Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent’s!
“The danger is that very often the people reach the stage of social consciousness before reaching the national phase. A bourgeoisie that has only nationalism to feed the people fails in it’s mission and inevitably gets tangled up in a series of trials and tribulations.” – Dr. Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth!
Therein lies the problem with our society, persons are more concerned with who the messenger is than the actual message.
Would the message be of lesser value if it was not written by someone of means, someone of timbre? Makes one wonder if some are only concerned with status and not substance, people with that thought process can be easily led astray by the charlatan Kevin Smith’s of this world.
She is a knowledgeable and educated black woman who is concerned about the youth, our History, and our future, that is all that matters in the end.
Clement, then tell us her history, as many of the younger people have no idea who she is. What do you mean by a “person of means”? Her article is great…not problem…very thought provoking, BUT who is she???? She may be a good person. I hope so. Has she ever done anything for Antigua??? Seriously asking. She has an unusual name. Is she Syrian? (I have nothig against Syrians, just trying to know something about the good lady.) Who she be?
She is from ST. KITTS 🇰🇳 and owns lands by the airport. Don’t know what she has given back to society.
Makeda Mikael is fanning #The #Flame of our Ancestors stories keeping them burning in our thoughts, by using them as a #forkstick to stir the embers causing the fire for true and real freedom, emancipation to burn brightly in our fight and guide us forward as true INDEPENDENTS and not subservients.
It would be great, if Makeda Mikael would Executive Produce these stories as a series of Documentaries, Docudramas, movies etc, to be as teaching/educational materials for kindergartners to Doctors.
thank you
Dear all who have been touched by our absent memories of a past still unknown. I prefer to reach by my writing rather than by name. However my presence by that aircraft was on the job.
I was brought up on the Middle Passage and Plantation life by having a sister of history who chose that era of study. As I grow older my consciousness of our unfinished business from the past haunts my pen. And I am black African. I hope that is enough for now.
Thank you. How you get so rich?
Batty’s Hope by not kissing Gaston batty like you’re doing.
Misinformation
1 We are our ancestors, if you cannot figure out why, you have not looked back far enough.
2 He who wins the war writes the story, the slavery story and the middle passage is an obvious lie like the Columbus story.
3 There was no boat that could move that many people in that era. ALL LIES.
4 When the lion tells the story it would sound different to the deer that survived the attack.
We are our ancestors …….
Notes From A Native Son Of The Rock! “The Afrocentric method seeks to uncover the masks behind the rethoric of power, privilege, and position in order to establish how principal myths create place. The method enthrones critical reflection that reveals the perception of monolithic power as nothing but the projection of a cadre of adventurers.” – Dr. Molefi Asante, Afrocentricity, The Theory of Social Change!
Mi Gud Fren Charles, “Truth, Justice and The Antigua and Barbuda Way! Surely you must be aware of the Power Brokers who easily looked the other way, as top advisors and budding entrepreneurs, when Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent’s Burial Ground were not only desecrated but erased forever from Antigua and Barbuda Historical Referent Points in Time and Space! There can be no truth and reconciliation without repentance by European Buccaneers and African Antiguan and Barbudan Politicos and Privateers!
Hopefully many of our youth will read the article as a teachable moment and learning opportunity as we approach the 40th, but The Queen of Sheba owes it to the Nation to speak to power relationships and the desecration of Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent’s!
“The danger is that very often the people reach the stage of social consciousness before reaching the national phase. A bourgeoisie that has only nationalism to feed the people fails in it’s mission and inevitably gets tangled up in a series of trials and tribulations.” – Dr. Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth!
@John French II…One ‘#Sure #shat’ way, to get to the bottom of this, is to “kick een” the Church’s of that #Time, BACK DOH, the same place where The Bastards of the day were baptized, by the Overseers of those precious documents, the Priests and…
A…ask for REPARATIONS from the churches too, just like the Universities!
B…have them give up those meticulously kept records of births, marriages and deaths!
After that, the church can deal with their own #Hell for their hand, the Spanish Inqusition(s) etc, and the bloodshed caused!
MELCHESIDEC you have me confused with your point number 3 i.e., there was no boat that could move that many people in that era. ALL LIES. Just as a point of clarification, there were many boats operating during the Middle Passage that moved slaves from Africa to the Caribbean over a period of many years. The great number of bodies that were moved is therefore not a LIE.
Charles Tabor you are free to believe that narrative.
Logically there is no other source to support that argument other than their narrative.
I chose not to beLIEve that narrative, it does not make sense.
If the Africans were at the bottom of the boat where did they store water for the journey?
Sustenance was stored Where?
What type of sails would it take to move a vessel with that weight, to make it profitable?
Who prepared the food for the cargo considering how they treated the Africans on the plantation?
So I am to believe all those persons just submitted to a hand full of crew o the vessel and just stand online down at the bottom of the vessel willingly?
Then they would bring them on deck periodically for fresh air exercise? Really Charles Tabor?
No sah it is a LIE
MELCHESIDEC now I am in shock at your total unawareness of that period of history. By the way, the slaves were not on a cruise ship and they were packed like sardines and in chains. Imagine one of your favourite hymns “How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds” was written on a slave ship. The next time you sing that song picture the horrors. Think of the irony.
Charles Tabor since I was not there I must rely on common sense to determine what I accept as truth.
And some how you believe that the Africans succumbed for 400 users? And that make sense to you? No sah, all LIES Charles.
Please search for size and type of vessels for that period. And while you are it , who did the navigating? Remember Christopher got lost.
THAT MIDDLE PASSAGE IS THEIR STORY, IT IS UNBlieVABLE. THE ONES WHO TOLD THE STORY HAS NO CREDIBILITY.
MELCHESIDEC I rest my case. Anyway, I am sure you can find out how to reach me. I am willing to lend you a few books to read. I must say again, I am in complete shock regarding your total ignorance about our history. It was good of Makeda to ignite this discussion.
Notes From A Native Son Of The Rock!
“Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it
is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit in with the core belief.” ― Dr. Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks!
Ah Mi Gud Fren Charles! This is so Sad! Very Sad! A case of “Neglected Education” and completely bamboozled by the Eurocentric teachings of Archbishop Malki! “An endless task, the cataloguing of reality. We accumulate facts, we discuss them, but with every line that is written, with every statement that is made, one has the feeling of incompleteness.” ― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks!
How sad that no one, “natta wan pan de wrak,” including the Queen of Sheba has taken up the cause of Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent Burial Ground! Why have they, not only been desecrated but erased forever from Antigua and Barbuda Historical Referent Points in Time and Space!
Given that this was a very profitable business, the Europeans detailed and accounted for every penny that was spent on their “human trafficking” in today’s legal entanglements! They left a ship’s registry that ADOMS and ABPA would be envious of!
Charles as one of A&B’s most outspoken and most read Legal Luminary, you are well aware that the Socratic method of discussion holds little sway except amongst youthful exuberance untainted by social media, the quick bytes and clicks which are the financial backbone of this Sector! This mere voice in the wilderness offers the youth an interactive Journey back in Time and Space: The Atlantic Slave Trade in Two Minutes! 315 years! 20,528 voyages! Millions of lives!
“This interactive, designed and built by Slate’s Andrew Kahn, gives you a sense of the scale of the trans-Atlantic slave trade across time, as well as the flow of transport and eventual destinations. The dots—which represent individual slave ships—also correspond to the size of each voyage. The larger the dot, the more enslaved people on board. And if you pause the map and click on a dot, you’ll learn about the ship’s flag—was it British? Portuguese? French?—its origin point, its destination, and its history in the slave trade. The interactive animates more than 20,000 voyages cataloged in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database. (We excluded voyages for which there is incomplete or vague information in the database.) The graph at the bottom accumulates statistics based on the raw data used in the interactive and, again, only represents a portion of the actual slave trade—about one-half of the number of enslaved Africans who actually were transported away from the continent.”
Hopefully the good editors at ANR in the interest of research and education will permit the URL below:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/09/atlantic-slave-trade-history-animated-interactive.html
Let us leave the last word to one of the most prolific, profitable, privateer slave trader who later found salvation and “Amazing Grace”, (which is sung lustily throughout the African Diaspora) as high priest and clergyman in the Anglican Church of England, the one and only Captain John Newton, then led by British George 111 who was a descendant of the German Royal House of Hanover! Elizabeth II is of the German House of the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha line! It was changed because of the First World war to the House of Windsor to give it a British name! And we continue to award Knights of the Roundtable and Grand Dames, even after all of our trials and tribulations and now independence of 40 years!
Oh Gad! Hab Merci Pan We!
Nuff Said!
Notes From A Native Son Of The Rock!
“Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it
is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit in with the core belief.” ― Dr. Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks!
Ah Mi Gud Fren Charles! This is so Sad! Very Sad! A case of “Neglected Education” and completely bamboozled by the Eurocentric teachings of Archbishop Malki! “An endless task, the cataloguing of reality. We accumulate facts, we discuss them, but with every line that is written, with every statement that is made, one has the feeling of incompleteness.” ― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks!
How sad that no one, “natta wan pan de wrak,” including the Queen of Sheba has taken up the cause of Eve’s Garden and Lady Nugent Burial Ground! Why have they, not only been desecrated but erased forever from Antigua and Barbuda Historical Referent Points in Time and Space!
Given that this was a very profitable business, the Europeans detailed and accounted for every penny that was spent on their “human trafficking” in today’s legal entanglements! They left a ship’s registry that ADOMS and ABPA would be envious of!
Charles as one of A&B’s most outspoken and most read Legal Luminary, you are well aware that the Socratic method of discussion holds little sway except amongst youthful exuberance untainted by social media, the quick bytes and clicks which are the financial backbone of this Sector! This mere voice in the wilderness offers the youth an interactive Journey back in Time and Space: The Atlantic Slave Trade in Two Minutes! 315 years! 20,528 voyages! Millions of lives!
“This interactive, designed and built by Slate’s Andrew Kahn, gives you a sense of the scale of the trans-Atlantic slave trade across time, as well as the flow of transport and eventual destinations. The dots—which represent individual slave ships—also correspond to the size of each voyage. The larger the dot, the more enslaved people on board. And if you pause the map and click on a dot, you’ll learn about the ship’s flag—was it British? Portuguese? French?—its origin point, its destination, and its history in the slave trade. The interactive animates more than 20,000 voyages cataloged in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database. (We excluded voyages for which there is incomplete or vague information in the database.) The graph at the bottom accumulates statistics based on the raw data used in the interactive and, again, only represents a portion of the actual slave trade—about one-half of the number of enslaved Africans who actually were transported away from the continent.”
Hopefully the good editors at ANR in the interest of research and education will permit the URL below:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/09/atlantic-slave-trade-history-animated-interactive.html
Let us leave the last word to one of the most prolific, profitable, privateer slave trader who later found salvation and “Amazing Grace”, (which is sung lustily throughout the African Diaspora) as high priest and clergyman in the Anglican Church of England, the one and only Captain John Newton, then led by British George 111 who was a descendant of the German Royal House of Hanover! Elizabeth II is of the German House of the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha line! It was changed because of the First World war to the House of Windsor to give it a British name! And we continue to award Knights of the Roundtable and Grand Dames, even after all of our trials and tribulations and now independence of 40 years!
Oh Gad! Hab Merci Pan We!
Nuff Said!
Wow! John French II whoever you are your contribution to this discussion is priceless. The URL you provided will certainly provide invaluable information to the naysayers and those who are simply ignorant of our history. I hope that MELCHESIDEC will immerse herself in all the information provided there. I am always impressed with your quotes from our intellectuals Molefi Kete Asante and Franz Fanon. Your focus on the issue of Afrocentrism is fundamental to our understanding of our history. It is this afrocentric focus that is necessary for us to overcome the centuries of eurocentric brainwashing that we have been exposed to in our education system. I would recommend that MELCHESIDEC begin to read the works of Asante and Fanon and if she should contact me she can become exposed to all the works of J. A. Rogers.
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