Afua Cooper is a Visiting Scholar at the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History, Harvard University, and the Principal Investigator for A Black People’s History of Canada, Dalhousie University.
On January 15, 1792, 1,196 women, men and children sailed from Halifax harbour on a flotilla of 15 ships bound for Freetown, Sierra Leone. As we mark the 230th anniversary of the departure of these emigrants, known as the Black Loyalists, one asks the questions: Why did these people literally flee from Canada for West Africa? Why is it we know so little about this story? And how does the Black Loyalist exodus resonate with today’s fight for racial justice?
At the close of the American Revolutionary War, the British transported upward of 3000 people from New York harbour to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick – mainly freed Black people who had joined the British army during the war. They were promised freedom, full rights as British subjects, land, and provisions for up to three years.
However, soon upon arrival, the Black Loyalists quickly discovered that the British colonial officials in the Maritimes reneged on the promises made in New York and elsewhere. For one, land was not forthcoming, and when it was given it proved insufficient in supporting their families. The handing out of provisions was likewise done in a mean fashion. Black Loyalists in Digby, for example, received only three months of provisions, and they had to perform road work to get it. Geographic segregation became the norm, and social and political equality was denied. For example, Black people could not vote or serve on juries. Further, whites unleashed a reign of terror on the Black communities in Shelburne and Birchtown, including when mobs attacked and destroyed homes, churches and businesses, and beat and abused the frightened Black people who had to hide out in the woods and swamps. White surveillance of the Black community in Shelburne, for example, manifested in a bylaw banning diverse forms of Black entertainment, called “Negro Frolicks.” Black people were susceptible to kidnapping and being sold as slaves to the West Indies or the U.S.; sometimes they were re-enslaved within the Maritimes itself.
The Black Loyalists fought back. Thomas Peters, who rose to the rank of sergeant in the Black Pioneers, an all-Black unit that fought during the war, assumed leadership of much of the Black community in Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. Peters sent petition after petition to the colonial governors of the two provinces, outlining the grievances and frustration of his community. But these governors ignored to the cries of the Loyalists.
After nine years of unfulfilled promises, economic and social marginalization, and political disempowerment, Peters sailed to London, England, to plead the cause of the Black Loyalists to the British government and seek restitution. While there he met officers of the newly formed Sierra Leone Company (SLC). The SLC was founding a British colony in Sierra Leone and needed settlers. Peters and the SLC agreed that the Black Loyalists would become some of those settlers. The SLC promised that in Sierra Leone, the Black Loyalists would be accorded full rights in every respect as British subjects and get upward of 30 acres of land per family. The British government also agreed to pay their way.
Pushed out by colonial neglect, indifference and vicious anti-Black racism, in the end one-third of the Black Loyalist community left New Brunswick and Nova Scotia for Sierra Leone.
Their departure is a stinging indictment of Canadian anti-Black racism, and I believe it accounts for this extraordinary story not forming part of the Canadian school curriculum. Close to 1,200 Black persons fled racism and broken promises in Canada and took to the high seas in search of freedom and equality in the land of their ancestors. This story resonates with the present-day quest of the Canadian Black community in search of racial and social justice.
Part of the reason that we do not know more about this story is that Black history is still not perceived as part of Canadian history. Because of this, the Black historical experience continues to be marginal to the telling of Canadian history. The Black Loyalist flight from Canada was an inglorious episode, which runs opposite to the received narrative of Canada as a land of freedom, a haven, and a refuge for Black people. This story indicts Canadian racism, and I believe this is part of the reason for its exclusion from the Canadian school curriculum.
The Black Loyalists’ exodus also resonates with the struggles of Black Canadians today. The quest for belonging, the desire for inclusion, and the demand for respect is a hallmark of the current Black struggle. The insistence of Black Canadians for their humanity echoes across time and space. Two hundred and thirty years ago, it was the struggle for basic rights of liberty, security and belonging that motivated the Black Loyalists to flee Canada. We ought to honour and commemorate their resistance and resilience.
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