Lamentations (Happy)

Happ.  He taught me how to make a frame from scratch...to sit and listen and where necessary gently even humorously bring in the history of a thing to the learning...to accept those younger than me...to respect those older and wiser than me.  He taught me to walk up and look...to laugh softly but in freedom.  He taught me that sometimes You must swim, and keep swimming and to remember where I came from.  He taught me how to tell a story...how to hold space for, ready that African/Native-point of emphasis; the learning-moment-of-say.  He taught me how to take curiosity of life and how to give it back.  Thank you grandfather.  Love and Peace.


Yes Jerusalem is lonely.

Pictures Speak 172,000 Words (click image for hi-rez)

Tina Said Until...

Pictures Speak 172,000 Words (click on image for hi-rez)

Fought As Well As They Could

"In 1730, for instance, newspaper accounts and a letter written by a Royal African Company agent at Cape Coast Castle all reported that the Africans rose and killed all but three of the sailors on board the Boston ship William.  No mention was made of the fate of the Africans, and although the vessel was later reported to have run aground at Anomabu, there is no reason to believe the victorious Africans did not either jump overboard or take the William's boats, ultimately getting ashore and reclaiming their freedom.  In January of 1747, a Rhode Island ship underwent a revolt off of Cape Coast Castle, and the entire crew was killed except for two mates who jumped overboard and swam ashore.  Taking its information about this revolt from a letter, one Boston newspaper wrote that "what became of the Vessel and Negroes afterwards the Letter does not mention."  Even though this incident occurred in a busy slaving shore, and it is not at all unreasonable to presume that at least some of the Africans succeeded in escaping inland.

…the possibility of revolt also helped earn Africans a grudging respect from those whose business it was to enslave them.  As one sailor was compelled to write of a revolt in 1790, after more than one hundred slaves had taken possession of a French slaver as it was at anchor off the African coast, "I could not but admire the courage of a fine young black, who, though his partner in irons lay dead at his feet, would not surrender, but fought with his billet of wood until a ball finished his existence.  The others fought as well as they could, but what could they do against firearms?"

 ~Eric Robert Taylor, If We Must Die (p. 135-6).

What could they do? ...they could fly away home & knew it.    Awo.

A man called "No. 3" and a woman called "No. 4"

"Norris kept a captain's log for his ovyage in the Unity from Liverpool to Whydah, to Jamaica, and back to Liverpool between n1769 and 1771.  A week after weighing anchor at Whydah and setting sail to cross the Atlantic, Norris noted that "the Slaves made an Insurrection, which was soon quelled with ye Loss [of] two Women."  Two weeks later the enslaved rose again, the women once more in the lead and therefore singled out for special punishment; Norris "gave ye women concerned 24 lashes each."  Three days later they made a third effort after several "got of their Handcuffs," but Norris and crew managed to get them back into their irons.  And the following morning they tried for a fourth time: "the Slaves attempted to force up ye Gratings in the Night, with a design to murder ye whites or drown themselves."  He added that they "confessed their intentions and that ye women as well as ye men were determin'd if disappointed of cutting off ye whites, to jump over board but in case of being prevented by their Irons were resolved as their last attempt to burnt the ship."  So great was their determination that in the event of failure they planned a mass suicide by drowning or self-incineration.  "Their obstinacy," wrote Norris, "put me under ye Necessity of shooting ye Ringleader."  But even this did not end the matter.  A man Norris called "No. 3" and a woman he called "No. 4," both of whom had been on the ship a long time, continued to resist and died in fits of madness.  "They had frequently attempted to drown themselves, since their Views were disappointed in ye Insurrection."

~Marcus Rediker, The Slave Ship (p. 32).

The FOR REAL Don't Stop, Can't Stop, Won't Stop.  (BA homing impulse.) Awo.