Heritage Research Group Caribbean (HRGC)

Sauteurs Bay: Archaeology in a Disaster Zone

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 29 Dec 2022 17:27:00 +0000

As we wind down the end of 2022, a long-awaited report on Sauteurs Bay is finally ready. Hanna first started this manuscript back in 2018, but there was just more and more to add. There is more still, of course -- we hope to have osteological analysis completed on the site's human burials in 2023, as well as aDNA analysis and more excavations. But there's always more to do. It's been four years and 150 pages now, so time to just get it out there!

And one of the core issues addressed is quite urgent. The site (and the communities along Sauteurs Bay) have been suffering from extreme erosion every dry season for the past five years. Homes and businesses have been destroyed as well as one of Grenada's most important archaeological sites, as seen through a continuous stream of human skeletons ripped by the waves into the sea. The archaeological site dates as early as AD 300, but the burials falling into the sea mostly date between AD 900-1200. And of course, this is the village that was razed by French forces in 1650, during the eponymous massacre at le Morne des Sauteurs (Leapers’ Hill).

Unfortunately, the high-breaking waves are not merely climate change -- they are the result of an ill-conceived and poorly-planned government breakwater project that finished in early 2017. At first, the breakwater was hailed as a great success (even toured by the PM), and the town of Sauteurs itself was indeed saved from ongoing erosion. But there was no Environmental Impact Assessment done, nor were previous studies (like the RRACC) consulted. Had more thought been put into this thing, they would have known that the currents changed between the rainy and dry seasons -- and thus, come the next dry season, the swells would be concentrated and redirected towards Mt. Craven, a small beach community just west of town, causing catastrophic damage. But they didn't. And then they ignored it and sat on their hands whilst the destruction continued unabated.

The first part of this new report provides some documentation for the recent catastrophe and references the studies done. The second part synthesizes all past research on the archaeological site itself, including preliminary results from a community archaeology project (SCHAP) in early 2022. In the process, the report offers a case-study in the (mis-)management of Grenada’s rich heritage – with recommendations and lessons learned for the future.

This publication also marks the first in a new "Occasional Research Papers" series by the GNM Press. We hope that that future academic reports about Grenada can be published through the Museum in this way, on various topics related to the natural and cultural history of Grenada.

A pdf of the report is freely available on ResearchGate here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/365769739_Archaeological_Background_of_Sauteurs_Bay_Grenada_Site_GREN-P-5_Settlement_Burial_and_Disaster_in_the_Shadow_of_Leapers%27_Hill

A color hardcopy can also be printed at-cost ($11 USD) via the GNM Press account on most Amazon country websites (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de), e.g., https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BR9DKXKL

ISBN: 9798365816800

-JAH

A Plan for the Museum

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 25 Jun 2022 17:40:00 +0000

During this past election cycle, the Grenada National Museum (GNM) was occasionally mentioned in the media, often in conjunction with the National Library. While it is true that the current closure of the Museum risks another defunct institution, such an outcome is unlikely at this stage. For one, there is still a skeleton crew working there. Secondly, it still has a Board, and they want it reopened ASAP (as will the incoming Board).

The biggest risk right now is not permanent closure, but rather that the GNM will be reopened ASAP with little improvement and packed with random government offices. The Museum is falling apart. Reopening right away means ignoring all the things that need to be fixed – solely for reasons of perception and politics. That is not how the National Museum should be run. The roofs need replacing, many floors need fixing, the walls need patching and painting, the exhibits need updating — any of those things would require the Museum to (at least partially) close in the future, so it would have been better to get it all done while closed during the pandemic. Had my plans been implemented, that would have happened already.

Furthermore, no “National Museum” in the world has random government offices in the same building…. except Grenada. This was another frustration I had with the Board, which ultimately led to my dismissal. In the end, I felt like I had fought a hundred battles and lost every single one. If I could not change things, why was I even there?

So in an effort to make some of my work accessible to whoever runs the Museum in the future, I offer here the Development Plan that I pitched to the Board last year. Although revised and updated for this release, it’s still not perfect. But at present, this is the most comprehensive plan ever proposed for the GNM, and it took a lot of work to put together. It’s unfortunate that I could not implement it, but maybe someone else will (at the least, they wouldn’t have to start from scratch). The Grenada National Museum has such enormous potential, and this Plan is an attempt to both show that potential and provide a path to realizing it.

-JAH

View the GNM Development Plan here: http://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28439.04006

“Slave Pens” in Grenada? Finding Ancestry in the Historical Landscape

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 22 Nov 2021 21:15:00 +0000

Tours of estates like Dougaldston, St John, or River Antoine and Belmont, St Patrick today will reveal little to nothing of slavery unless one has knowledge of what took place here beyond the cocoa trees, sugar-cane fields, and old waterwheel technology that dates to the 18th and 19th centuries (Figures 1, 2). There were no family heirlooms to pass down, no shackles or whips that tell of the brutality, no memory of tears that tell of the suffering, no ruins of thatched houses that reveal the hearth of everyday (enslaved) lives, no drums beating out rhythms of melancholy melodies, no cultural artifacts that linger in museums, and no monuments that sing praises to heroic ancestors. It is a landscape and heritage barren of slavery except in the enduring nightmare of it all.

Figure 1. River Antoine estate in St Patrick still producing rum utilizing slavery-era technology in its waterwheel and aqueduct system (courtesy Grenada National Museum)

The current relic landscape, particularly the plantations, reveals little of its slave past. The most noticeable are the few remaining “estate houses” or ruins that may tell a tale of the slave-owning families who resided there, but most were actually built post-Emancipation, having little or no connection to slavery itself. The decaying windmill towers, copper pots, rusted waterwheels and crumbling aqueducts that fueled centuries of production of sugar seem almost out of place today and little connected to that dark past (Figure 2). That brutal, dehumanizing system of forced and torturous servitude that ended 187 years ago. For the majority of Grenadians, the descendants of the islands’ enslaved, there is nothing in these idyllic, picturesque landscapes that reminds of the suffering their ancestors endured during slavery and that impact their lives even today. It is as if slavery never existed at all, or simply vanished with the changing landscape!

Figure 2. Ruins of the abandoned (since 2004) waterwheel at Dunfermline Estate, St Andrew (photo by Angus Thompson, courtesy the Grenada National Trust)

But Grenadians have nonetheless found at least three dark corners tucked into the architectural landscape that they have deemed places of significance in the enslavement of their ancestors. On the Hermitage and Mount Rich Plantations in St Patrick and on Melville Street in St George’s, they have identified what have become known as “Slave Pens” where many believe that enslaved Africans were held there for either security, punishment, breeding, or any variety of nefarious purposes. The cavernous and dark nature of these spaces signify to many the depravity of slavery, and have made these places reverential to the memory of brutalized lives. They are akin to tombs of the unknown to countless ancestors who we know so little of beyond a singular name, if at all. The belief is so widespread that these places are highlighted in official travel guides and listed on heritage maps of the island. Visitors are encouraged to explore where enslaved Grenadians purportedly endured unimaginable suffering, the only such sites available from that brutal past.

There is, however, one problem with these places of remembrance (particularly those on the plantations): none actually date to pre-Emancipation times, let alone present evidence that they were ever used to house enslaved people for any reason.

Slave Pens in the History of Atlantic Slavery
Historically, the slave pen referred to a place for keeping captives confined, especially as a temporary holding facility for enslaved Africans on the West African coast in places like present-day Ghana, Sierra Leone (Figure 3), and Nigeria (Sayer 2021) while awaiting transportation to the Americas across the torturous Middle Passage. The use of the word “pen” is clearly illustrative of the regard and treatment meted out to those it imprisoned. These fenced and thatched sheds or “houses” were also known by the Spanish name barracoon (from Catalan for “hut” via Spanish barracón). It is interesting to note that the appearance in text of the word barracoon dates to circa 1840, but similar structures were widespread during the entire period of the Atlantic Slave Trade.

Figure 3. “Slave Barracoon” in Sierra Leone, West Africa, c1840s (courtesy The Illustrated London News, 14 April 1849, v.14:237)

In North America, a slave pen referred to a building where enslaved who ran away were confined following recapture, for sale or until transportation, the most infamous of which was in Alexandria, Virginia (as depicted in the movie 12 Years a Slave) (Figure 4). In Henry Bibb’s account as a slave in New Orleans, he describes the holding area as a “pen,” which can still be visited today (El-Shafei et al. nd).

Figure 4. The façade of the Alexandria, Virginia, slave pen 1861–1865 (courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art)

In the Caribbean, the early use of the term slave pen was reserved for places on islands like Curacao (by the Dutch) and the British Virgin Islands, which functioned as slave depots where captive Africans were publicly displayed for sale across the region. Though the term was not applied to specific buildings or institutions on plantations during slavery (but may have been used for confinement), several across the region have since been designated as such in attempts to (re)define the relic slave landscape. For example, as part of its Slave Route project, Guadeloupe identified as a place of memory, the “Slave Cell of Belmont Plantation.” According to the brochure, “This is a slave cell from the 18th century, which was used to lock up slaves who had been punished by the master of the estate…. Many plantations had a cell of this type…” (see Slave Cell of Belmont Plantation video and text). Another is at the Annaberg plantation on St John, USVI, where a “dungeon” cell still contains leg shackles and graffiti drawn by enslaved prisoners (Figure 5).

Figure 5. The “dungeon” on the Annaberg plantation, St John, USVI (courtesy B. Mistretta, 2017)

In St Lucia, there is a small stone building attached to the St Lucia Distillery in the Roseau valley and described as having been used as a “slave cell” or prison, one of three designated on the island (Island Resource Foundation 1974). This “slave cell,” which dates to the 18th Century, was “restored” and a sign provided information on its history, adding that it “needs to be preserved for posterity… as a witness to a particular form of human exploitation, …[and] should be declared a preserved national monument….” (see Oasis Marigot nd).

There have been less convincing cases as well. In South Quay, Port of Spain, Trinidad, there was an attempt to designate an old brick vault as a slave cell “to the utter amusement of the older heads of Port-of Spain.... Candlelight vigils began to take place there, processions of hundreds of people assembled in the vacant lot around this forlorn, abandoned structure” (Besson 2011).

Slave Prisons in Grenada
In Grenada, during slavery, the places of confinement were “Slave Yards” for the sale of newly arrived captives, and Public Cages for the incarceration of runaway enslaved or maroons. Slave Yards were located mainly along the Carenage and a few other places in St George’s, where enslaved were held for sale by slave factors or merchants after being unloaded from slave ships; captives were also sold directly off slave ships anchored on the Carenage (see Butterworth 1831). A 1799 newspaper advertisement listed “Lamolie’s House” as a place of sale of captive Africans, which would have been most likely in the present parking lot of the First Caribbean International Bank on Church Street; it also lists the “Store of Ker and Co in the Carenage” (Figure 6), as well as The Long Room (an auction house near Fort George).

Figure 6. Advertisement for captive Africans in the St George’s Chronicle and Grenada Gazette, 9 August 1799, showing where they were to be sold (courtesy American Antiquarian Society)

Enslaved were sometimes confined in the public jail (on Young Street in what is today known as the Drill Yard), which was primarily for free people (white and non-white), and “The persons confined in the gaol are debtors, criminals, delinquents under the Militia Act, and slaves taken in execution.” More often than not, enslaved were held in Public Cages usually located in the major towns. In 1824, Grenada had four cages (including one in Carriacou) where “…not only are runaways and disorderly slaves confined in these as in other colonies (where the cage is usually and fitly considered to be only a receptacle or lock-up place for the night), but delinquent slaves are sent thither for all sorts of misdemeanors, sometimes for confinement, and sometimes for corporal punishment. In the cage in George Town (sic) [in the Market Square], the slaves confined there have no yard to exercise in…” (Grenada 1832). Enslaved were also confined on plantations in stocks or locally built structures that were mostly of a temporary nature.

Grenada’s “Slave Pens”
Following the US Invasion of Grenada in 1983, the island went through a period of soul searching and re-imagining of its past. While some interest in heritage had begun during the Revolution, the growing tourism industry created a desire for historical narratives of the landscape. Thus, we see the emergence of supposed “slave pens” in the late 1980s as a way to connect the current descendants of enslaved peoples in Grenada with the enslaved landscape of their ancestors. It was the first time in generations that Grenadians had sought to make a physical connection with the enslavement of their ancestors. Few details were provided, except that enslaved were locked in these “pens” when they misbehaved, as a form of punishment. Others envisioned a holding cell, where “new arrivants were quarantined and broken” (Omowale 2007). Some have also been imagined as “breeding cells,” where select males and females were forced to procreate. It is not clear how these structures were “discovered” or the evidence for their use, but word soon spread, and they were accepted as a landmark to their community’s enslaved past, where none had existed before, and representative of the horrors of slavery.

The “slave pen” at Hermitage Estate, St Patrick is the most prominent of the “slave pens” in Grenada. A sign in the area identifies and requests that permission be sought before visiting (Figure 7). Today, it is one of several ruins on the plantation, including the estate house, outdoor kitchen, and remains of cocoa drying trays. The “slave pen” is located just beyond the outbuildings (Figure 8), particularly the kitchen, which is most likely what it was associated with (as a storeroom of some sort). Its proximity, directly in sight of the house, is a major reason in disqualifying it as a place of incarceration of enslaved persons. The existing ruins also date to 1917 (long after slavery), although the foundation goes back to at least the 1770s, when the plantation was owned by James Baillie of Baillie’s Bacolet.

Figure 7. Sign at the entrance insisting that permission should be had before entering the Hermitage Estate, St Patrick (the Author)

Figure 8. “Slave Pen” on the Hermitage Estate, St Patrick, showing the partially underground design (photo by Angus Thompson/courtesy the Grenada National Trust)

The “slave pen” at Mount Rich Estate is located directly below what was assuredly the kitchen (again supporting its use as a storeroom) (Figure 9). A historical photograph of the estate, showing the location of the “slave pen,” provides further evidence that it was associated with the outdoor kitchen above (Figure 10).

Figure 9. “Slave Pen” entrance (in red) on the Mount Rich Estate, St Patrick as part of the foundations of ruins of other buildings (the Author)

Figure 10. Cocoa pickers with tools on the Mount Rich Estate, St Patrick, c1890, showing building above the “slave pen” (in red) (courtesy Grenada National Museum)

Although the Kent family that built the Mount Rich house arrived during the collapse of the sugar industry in the 1860s, several of their properties have been mistakenly associated with colonial-era slavery. A 2014 commentary in an online Grenada newspaper correlated the so-called effects of the Mount Rich “slave pen” to the high rates of prison incarceration of current residents of the area: “Mount Rich people are victims of white and mulatto oppressors from slavery…. There are many more hidden slave pens in Mount Rich, close to the playing field and the planter’s great house... From the day the Africans were brought to Mount Rich as slaves to work on the Kent’s family estate, they resisted, and by so doing, they encountered harsh prison sentences. The slave pens were prisons built by the Kents to incarcerate slaves who disobeyed” (George 2014). Again, the Kents arrived after slavery had ended.

Lastly, the Melville Street “slave pen” is slightly different from the two plantation structures in that it is part of an old colonial building, probably dating to the late 18th or early 19th Century. Many of these buildings along Melville Street were used as commercial establishments on the lower or street-level floor, with the family living above. Thus, like the others, this “slave pen” was likely a storage area, quite similar to the basements for the other buildings along the street, often used for wines and other spirits that needed cooler temperatures to reduce spoilage. Its designation appears to have arose from an old tale by an elder resident of the town who remembered as a child being told stories of enslaved being kept there. It was also claimed that it connected to the sea through a tunnel and therefore afforded direct import from the slave ships to the “dungeon.” However, this contradicts the first-hand account of William Butterworth (1831), who recalled the Carenage as his first stop after the Middle Passage, as well as the aforementioned places of sale at Lamolie’s House, “Store of Ker and Co” and the Long Room. Evidence suggests, therefore, that any open “pens” would have been on the Carenage, where there was ample space and proximity to shipping.

Within the last few years, the Melville Street “slave pen” has become the focal point for the annual commemoration of Emancipation Day on 1st August, hence the painting that adorns the entrance (Figures 11 & 12). The torch-light parade through the streets of St George’s begins here, following the wreath laying ceremony in the basement dedicated to the memory of ancestors who endured slavery. There was even talk of affixing a plaque to the building, thus designating it a historical monument because of the belief that enslaved Africans once experienced undue horrors there.

(Note: A similar claim was recently made for ruins on a plantation in Carriacou, but the underground structure was in fact a (water) cistern, several of which can be found on the island where they were used to store water, as the island has no permanent freshwater).

Figure 11. Underground cellar identified as “slave pen” at The Police Barracks on Melville Street, St George’s (the Author)

Figure 12. Interpretative artwork at the entrance to the “Slave Pen” at The Police Barracks on Melville Street, St George’s (courtesy Roy Wroth)

If Not “Slave Pens,” Then What?
So if these structures are not “slave pens” as advertised, then what were they? Well, as suggested above, they were storage buildings, either associated with post-Emancipation plantation kitchens (in the case of Mount Rich and Hermitage) or cool, underground storage for merchandise (in the case of Melville Street).

But we can go even further in suggesting that the two structures on the plantations were most likely ice houses, as identified by Andrew Crosby (personal communication) and further researched by the author. As such, they would have been constructed in the mid to late-1800s to store ice imported from North America (through Frederic Tudor, well known as the “Ice King”) that was used to cool drinks and food (even make ice cream) in the absence of electricity for refrigeration (Figures 13 & 14) (see “Frederic Tudor,” Wikipedia).

Figure 13. Enslaved unloading ice in Cuba, 1832 (from A Pictorial Geography of the World by Samuel Griswold Goodrich, 1832)

Figure 14. Ice advertised for sale in The George’s Chronicle and Grenada Gazette, 12 February 1881, page 1

These two structures bear much resemblance to ice houses prevalent in the UK at that time (e.g., see Google Image search of ice houses in the UK). Some of these features include: proximity to the kitchen (as identified above), a conical roof, “igloo-style doorways for [limited] access,” and a significant portion of the building below ground for insulation (Figures 15,16,17). Both of the plantation structures were constructed of bricks and stones, but the one at Mount Rich is more complex because of its vents and internal demarcation that may have had something to do with drainage. The Mount Rich structure could also have been altered and repurposed, hence its current orientation. Imported ice was a costly luxury, so these ice houses would not have been prevalent in Grenada . It would be worthwhile to explore if any other plantations had similar structures and identify these historic ruins correctly.

Figure 15. The “igloo-like” entrance to the “slave pen” on the Hermitage Estate, St Patrick (the Author)

Figure 16. Looking through the entrance to the “slave pen” on the Hermitage Estate, St Patrick (the Author)

Figure 17. The interior of the “slave pen” on Mount Rich Estate, St Patrick (the Author)

An Ending with a Beginning
The goal of this analysis is not to denigrate the myth of Grenada’s “slave pens” (which is a genuine plea to find ancestry in the historical landscape), but to show that there is a great need to directly connect the people of Grenada with their true past while also correctly identifying the historical landscape. That past has to navigate through 185 years of slavery and then 187 years post-Emancipation that shaped both the physical and psychological landscape, yet which seem to tell very little of what we desire to know. As a way to address the situation, I believe that there should be a greater emphasis on historical archaeology to assist descendants of enslaved Africans to connect with their past in a way that provides knowledge of how the enslaved lived, celebrated, cared for their children, resisted, or whatever it is that can be revealed. It is a unique opportunity for archaeology to play an important role in facilitating the dialogue on slavery (as it has already done on a limited basis), and to help many Grenadians begin to construct an identity based on better knowledge of their past. Such knowledge will empower people and connect them to artifacts that they know were part of the lives of their ancestors, thus creating, for the first time, awareness of lives of enslaved that once laid buried deep in the earth. In speaking of the “slave pens,” I believe that archaeological exploration of them would also be valuable to helping answer historical questions.

Unfortunately, archaeology is the only way to identify material remains of our past but is little emphasized in Grenada. In 2016, archaeologists from the Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University conducted an impact assessment at what is now the La Poterie playing field and its immediate surroundings (Hauser and Hofman 2017). They found artifacts and house floors from enslaved Africans who once lived in the adjoining area east of the playing field, and reasoned that the area should be explored further to at least recover possible archaeological remains. Within a year, however, the field was expanded and no further work on the site occurred. Despite some press about the expansion of the field and the possible impact of the archaeological site, there was not much public outcry. Today, if that site is remembered at all, it is just another story, seemingly no different than any other tale, slave pens or otherwise.

As this example highlights, Grenada’s heritage is more at risk than ever—and it will remain so until archaeology is included in the impact assessments for pending construction. If we do not start valuing what we have, there will not be anything left for our descendants to find in the historical landscape. Do we want our future children to have to go to other islands to understand what their ancestors went through? Do we want to give them something more than Anansi stories? There is much to learn and not much time left, so instead of misinterpreting abandoned structures, we need to get involved, to raise our voices and take action to preserve Grenada’s disregarded heritage.

-John Angus Martin

References
Besson, Gerard. 2011. “Where Slaves Were Hung: Myth Becoming History,” Blog Post, 27 September (accessed 10 November 2021).

Butterworth, William. 1831. Three Years Adventures of a Minor in England, Africa and the West Indies, South Carolina and Georgia. Leeds, Thos. Inchbold.

El-Shafei, Dahlia, Kate Mason, and Kathryn O’Dwyer, editor, “Henry Bibb and The Slave Pens of New Orleans,” New Orleans Historical, Retrieved 21 November 2021.

“Frederic Tudor,” Wikipedia. Retrieved 21 November 2021.

George, Hudson. 2014. Mt Rich. Grenadian Connection.

“Grenada.” 1832. The Eight Report of the Committee of the Society for the Improvement of Prison Discipline, and for the Reformation of Juvenile Offenders, v.3:313

Hauser, Mark W. and Corinne L. Hofman. 2017. “Grenada 2017, Test Pits at the La Poterie Playing Field,” in Hofman et al., Field Report From the Work Carried Out at La Poterie, Grenada in January 2017. Leiden University.

Island Resource Foundation. 1974. “Environmental Survey and Status Report of Selected Caribbean Islands.” Final Draft Report-UNDP-Contract 133/73. USVI.

Martin, John Angus. 2007. A-Z of Grenada Heritage. Oxford: Macmillan Caribbean.

Oasis Marigot. Nd. “Old Slave Cells of St Lucia: A Reminder of the Past,” Retrieved 21 November 2021.

Omowale, David. 2007 “The Experience of the Slave Trade and Slavery: Slave Narratives and the Oral History of Grenada, Carriacou and Petite Martinique, Part 2,” Big Drum Nation online magazine.

Sayer, Faye. 2021. “Localizing the Narrative: The Representation of the Slave Trade and Enslavement Within Nigerian Museums,” Journal of African Diaspora Archaeology and Heritage, DOI: 10.1080/21619441.2021.1963034.

“The Slave Cell of Belmont Plantation, Guadeloupe,” Slavery and Remembrance: A Guide to Sites, Museums and Memory. Retrieved 21 November 2021 at video and text.

An Aspirational Vision for Grenada’s Heritage

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 13:03:00 +0000

The rear courtyard of the National Museum is a hive of activity. In the rooms on the ground floor, small workshops turn out everything from pottery to covings, light fixtures to souvenirs. Each workshop employs a couple of people, creating castings, throwing clay, and carving stone and wood. Here on the table are a tray of ceramic lamp fittings, decorated with characteristic Saladoid curves and whorls copied from a reference library of archaeological reports. Once they have been fired, they will go to a hotel on Morne Rouge— a custom-designed order for refurbished rooms.

In the workshop next door, two young artists put the finishing touches on a large mosaic panel. A government minister points out to a small group of foreign investors how the mosaic takes its inspiration from ancient Amerindian and contemporary African culture. One of the artists is a local teacher, and the plaque is destined to hang in his school in the north of the island.

Upstairs, above the courtyard, the rooms are full of school students making things out of clay and wire, papier-mache and cloth. This week they have begun work on costumes for Carnival—one group is making new Shortknee tunics and masks; it is their turn to join in the Mas as new dancers. Another group is creating posters on large pieces of paper that describe the Shortknee Mas—these will be sent to the school in Mt. Royal on Carriacou, whose students will send back a description of their own Shakespeare Mas.

Their teacher is talking with a visiting anthropologist, who cannot make notes fast enough. The anthropologist’s students are enthusiastically helping to make new Shortknee “crowns”—a detail that has not been seen on the costumes since the 1960s and is being revived (Taylor 2009).

Back at the hotel on Grand Anse, a group of visitors from Guyana are clustered around a table set up in the lobby. Two potters demonstrate their skills, throwing and decorating replica ceramics—companions to those on sale in the hotel gift shop. A young archaeology student from Grenada talks confidently and knowledgeably about the ancient ceramics and how his group gives tours around the heritage of Mt. Rich—and, yes indeed, madam, we have a tour tomorrow. Would you like to sign up? (MYCEDO 2019).

And at the far end of the beach, just such a community excavation is taking place. Amid the music drifting from the bars, and under the curious gaze of visitors and locals alike, a huddle of local school children and diaspora kids from Peckham on a summer exchange program (Government of Grenada 2010), working alongside visiting archaeologists, are excavating the ghostly remains of a wooden boat in the sand by a new hotel development.

“Was it abandoned here by pirates, slavers, or privateers?” the crowd asks.

“None of these,” says the young woman leading the community archaeology team—it’s the remains of a fishing boat from the 1700s, perhaps damaged in a storm (Martin 2013:281). “My family used to be fishing folk in this part of the island,” she says, “this is part of my heritage, and now it’s part of my MA research.”

Next to the excavation trench, an old man with a grizzled gray beard and long dreadlocks paints a picture on a small board perched on a rickety easel. With quiet precision he paints the boat not ruined and buried in twenty-first- century sand, but being hauled up the beach, battered but still afloat, its crew saved from the eighteenth-century storm. His style is uncomplicated and “naive” (Mason 2005), but there is a real sense of place and time in the picture.

“I’ll pay you twenty dollars for it,” a visitor says.

“Thirty!” Another bids.

The old man laughs. “This is for the museum,” he says. “You’ll have to paint your own!”

Such thought experiments are, in their own way, a kind of creative game; they are, of necessity, aspirational and idealized—perhaps even fanciful. But they are based in observations of things happening already on the island, as well as elsewhere, such as recorded by Brulotte (2012) and others (e.g., Hofman and Haviser 2015).

Critically, however, this thought process allows us to see the future as unfixed and undetermined and to ask the crucial question: what if? What if we tried creative heritage projects on Grenada that were both ambitious in scale and interconnected across public, private, individual, and collective divides? What if we actively brought together heritage, art, sculpture, and archaeology—with entrepreneurship, training, and tourism? What if we broadened our remit and went beyond museums and schools, onto the beach, or into the hotels? What if we thought about archaeology, material culture, education, jobs, and government on Grenada in an entirely different way? What if my colleagues on the island were to read this chapter and themselves think: what if?

As the references indicate, while the individual elements in this narrative are all based on real elements situated within the broader archaeological and heritage setting of Grenada, this thought experiment allows us to “relax our conceptual hold” (Rowland 1976:48), and take the artifacts and data of archaeological research, and—using imagination and playfulness, performance, and enchantment—re-examine, re-present, and re-consider them within a narrative of professional practice (Perry 2018:218). Such a reconsideration suggests connections between elements—between visiting anthropological students and school craft projects, between carnival and revival of cultural practice, between artists and community heritage groups, between touristic development and marine archaeology. Currently, these individual elements are conceptualized as separate and discrete—but: what if?

-- Guest Post by John Swogger

This was an excerpt from “Genuine Reproductions: Ethics, Practicalities, and Problems in Creating a Replica of a Zemi from Carriacou, Grenada, West Indies,” by John G. Swogger, published in the forthcoming book Real, Recent, or Replica: Precolumbian Caribbean Heritage as Art, Commodity, and Inspiration (Joanna Ostapkowicz and Jonathan A. Hanna, eds.), in print this month through the University of Alabama Press.

The "RRR" volume focuses on the antiquities market in the Caribbean, highlighting case-studies on everything from looted artifacts to modern “neo-Amerindian” recreations across the region. Two chapters look at Grenada, so being that April is Heritage Month in Grenada, we thought it would be appropriate to reprint this excerpt (with permission from the author and UAP). We hope you found it as inspiring as we did!

The images included were from a series of comics Swogger produced for us during the 2018 Heritage Month. The entire series can be found on the Grenada Heritage Comics Facebook Page.

References

Brulotte, Ronda L.
2012 Between Art and Artifact: Archaeological Replicas and Cultural Production in Oaxaca, Mexico. University of Texas Press, Austin.

Hofman, Corinne L., and Jay B. Haviser (editors)
2015 Managing Our Past into the Future: Archaeological Heritage Management in the Dutch Caribbean. Taboui 3, Sidestone Press, Leiden.

Government of Grenada, Official Website
2010 PM Thomas Makes Direct Appeals to Overseas Nationals to Invest at Home. www.gov.gd, accessed February 26, 2010.

Martin, John Angus
2013 Island Caribs and French Settlers in Grenada. Grenada National Museum Press, St. George’s.

Mason, Peter
2005 “Canute Calliste” (obituary). The Guardian (newspaper). November 25 2005, www.theguardian.com, accessed February 26, 2019.

MYCEDO
Mt. Rich Carib Stone Interpretation Center, http://www.mycedo.org, accessed February 26, 2019.

Perry, Sara
2018 Why Are Heritage Interpreters Voiceless at the Trowel’s Edge? A Plea for Rewriting the Archaeological Workflow. Advances in Archaeological Practice 6(3):212–227.

Rowland, Kurt F.
1976 Visual Education and Beyond. Ginn, London.

Taylor, Caldwell
2009 The Story of the Shortknee Part 1/2. https://spicemasgrenada.com/2010/06/08/the-story-of-the-shortknee-part-1-2/, accessed June 8, 2020

John G. Swogger is an archaeologist and illustrator based in Wales, UK. His blog can be found at https://johngswogger.wordpress.com/

Marking an ‘X’: Exploring the History of Grenada’s Surnames

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 26 Aug 2020 23:05:00 +0000

Despite the widespread belief that most Grenadian surnames today are derived from plantation/slave owners, many former enslaved men actually used their first (and only) names to create their family names.
This is the case for a plurality of both English and French-derived surnames today.
That means your surname may contain a clue to the name of your last enslaved male ancestor.
A smaller percentage of Grenadian surnames, both English and French, are derived from plantation owners, and this often indicates a blood connection.
Maybe we can see these surnames as more a creation of the newly freed Grenadians to establish identity, rather than something imposed upon them, as was the case in other countries.

Malcolm X, the son of Grenadian Louise Langdon Norton Little (1895/6-1989), made famous the identity struggles of Black people in the diaspora when he replaced his family name of Little (or what has also been termed his “slave name”) with an ‘X’ to signify his lost or robbed African identity as a result of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the legacy of slavery. It is a cry voiced by many descendants of enslaved Africans in the Caribbean who feel a sense of loss, a sense of disconnect, not knowing their African name, their African identity.

In the 1970s, following the emergence of Rastafari and the Black Power Movement, several Grenadians adopted African names (like Akee, Kamau and Owusu) in an attempt to reclaim that perceived lost identity, adorned with their dashiki and a big Afro, even carrying around beautifully carved afro-combs to enhance that identity. The recent developments in DNA technology have provided some solace in creating a “direct” biological connection to the peoples of West Africa, but the connections to ancestral birthplaces remain elusive at best. Yet, many continue to search their ancestry for any links that would take them closer to finding that lost identity.

For Grenadians (and others from the Caribbean), doing genealogical research is difficult to say the least. Luck is the most operative word here: luck in locating pertinent records, luck that the records have not been eaten by time, luck that you can read the handwriting, etc. It is often easier for Grenadians in the diaspora because many of our records are available in the US, UK and other places. Grenada has outsourced the preservation of its history to others! For those making that difficult search because of the dearth of records, archives, and access to whatever might be available, I would like to share my thoughts on a very important aspect of that search from my years of experience in my own family search and as a historian and archivist working among those historical records. I am referring specifically to the origin and history of the surnames of Grenadians, which I hope will aid you in your search and overall understanding of Grenadian genealogy.

Slave Registers and Surnames

It is often repeated that most Grenadians (and West Indians) today have family names that were unwittingly received from their enslaved ancestors’ masters/owners, hence the reference to family names as “slave names” and Malcolm X’s use of an “X” to illustrate that. However, that is only true for a minority of Grenadian surnames (although it could be argued that all names of enslaved Africans are “slave names”).

There is little on enslaved names and naming practices, which makes it rather difficult to trace Black ancestry beyond the limited official records like the Civil List (which begins in 1866) and selected church records, especially the Anglican Church (see Handler & Jacoby 1996). However, a look at the names of plantation owners (Legacies of British Slave-ownership) and the Slave Registers (Former British Colonial Dependencies…) makes clear that many of those names do not survive in Grenada as surnames, and when they do, there is an actual blood connection. In fact, the plurality of Grenadian family names today, and the most popular ones at least, are derived from the first names of the last enslaved male ancestors. This does not seem to be the case across the region (for example, in Trinidad, St. Lucia and Belize, enslaved were given last names on the Slave Registers; or in Curacao where former enslaved received surnames based on the first names of the wives of their white slave owners, hence the preponderance of female surnames). But for Grenada, an examination of family names today will reveal the preponderance of male first names. This in itself is not unusual, as many European cultures and patrilineal societies worldwide have used this naming practice for centuries (think of many names in the Bible – Solomon, son of David; Joseph, son of Jacob, etc.). What is unique about it here is how it came about in Grenada.

Records of the names of enslaved Grenadians are readily available and give a good idea of the names that were given to enslaved peoples in Grenada. As a matter of fact, there are complete lists of the enslaved in Grenada between 1817 and 1834 as part of the Slave Registry Act passed to inhibit the continued illegal importation of captive Africans (Former British Colonial Dependencies…). Other lists are also available in legal deeds from the sale of plantations, which included enslaved as part of the property (Register of Records, 1764-1931).

These lists provide a clear picture of the rendered/official names of the last generation or two of enslaved Grenadians. Comparing the list of surnames today with the Slave Registers reveal an obvious connection: a majority of the family names today were derived from the actual names held by the last enslaved males. They did not have actual surnames, so the Slave Registers recorded the patriarch’s first name. Table 1 provides a list of the 20 most common family names today and compares them to the prevalence of these names to their counterpart in the Slave Registers.

Table 1. The 20 Most Common Grenadian Surnames Today and Their Prevalence in the Slave Registers

Rank in Grenada	Rank in Carriacou	Surname	Current Incidence	# in the 1834 Slave Register	Comments
1	3	Charles	3870	115
2	1	Joseph	2807	138
3	9	Thomas	2787	92
4	17	Williams	2312	150	“s” added to William
5	4	Alexander	2255	83
6	42	Lewis	1839	5*
7	4	John	1743	149
8	54	Phillip	1660	19	The French Philip is #94
9	2	Noel	1638	46
10	33	Mitchell	1558	33
11	68	Francis	1456	8*
12	12	George	1310	111
13	41	James	1165	69
14	64	Baptiste	1138	38	French-derived name
15	150	Edwards	915	78	“s” added to Edward
16	33	Peters	826	44	“s” added to Peter
17	97	Paul	823	22
18	33	Sylvester	786	23	Sylvest/Sylvestre/Sylvester
19	14	Roberts	758	83	“s” added to Robert
20	166	Frederick	751	52

*Lewis and Francis on the Slave Registers are far below expected numbers to their popularity today.

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

The Survival of African Names

One easy test of the theory is to examine the unique example of the few surviving African names. African day-names and others, especially from the Akan, have survived slavery like few other African cultural memories. This may have been due to the large numbers of Akans (from the historical Gold Coast region) brought to Grenada, from whom we have other cultural survivals like Anansi the trickster spider and a handful of Twi words (Martin 2007).

These few African names as first names can be seen on the Slave Registers, but only the male names have survived because they became surnames in Grenada and Carriacou today: Cuffie (<Kofi), Quamina (<Kwami), Quashie (<Kwesi), and Cudjoe (<Kojo). The female names like Cumba, Accou, Acra, Ama, Yabba and Amba have totally disappeared, as have the ethnic appendages like Ebo/Ibo, Chamba, Moco, and Congo (see Table 2). The retention of these few African names possibly suggests that the enslaved may have had some agency in naming their offspring, but that would be difficult to prove as much of the evidence is anecdotal. It is believed that the enslaved, especially those born in Grenada, were named by their grandmothers and godparents (Handler & Jacoby 1996).

Table 2. Historical Male African First Names as Surnames Today and Their Prevalence in the 1834 Slave Register

Rank	Surname	Current Incidence	# in the 1834 Slave Register	Comments
213	Quashie	96	7	Ranks #18 in Carriacou
305	Cudjoe	63	8	Ranks #31 in Carriacou
309	Cuffie	62	10	Not present in Carriacou
537	Quamina	28	6	Ranks #111 in Carriacou

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

Another good example from the Slave Registers is when changes in names had to be explained from one year to the next. For example, the Register for 1834 provided comments for names of three families on the “Breteche and Lance La Roche Estates” in Carriacou owned by E. B. Dallas. A patriarch named Rodney (no last name) was listed as being born in Africa around 1787/88, and was about 46 years in 1834; he is described as having “country [tribal] marks on his breast” (see image below). The children, who had been recorded on previous Registers with only one name, were now recorded with the family name Rodney: Mary Charlotte Rodney (15 yrs), Damfreson Rodney (12 yrs), Noel Rodney (10 yrs), Arline/Alexline Rodney (7½ yrs) and Johnny Rodney (4 yrs), with the comment “Surname taken on father’s marriage.” His wife (the mother of the children) is not identified because she may have been on another plantation, or was not associated with the name Rodney. (It is interesting to speculate that the Rodney family of Beauséjour, Carriacou today could be descendants of Rodney from 1834.) Other families identified on the same page include Henry and Joseph.

Pages from the 1834 Slave Register for “Breteche and Lance La Roche Estates” in Carriacou listing enslaved, with references to members of the Rodney, Joseph and Henry families highlighted (courtesy of Ancestry.co.uk)

There are almost 7,000 unique surnames in Grenada, Carriacou and Petite Martinique. Most of them are historical Grenadian families that date to the immediate post-Emancipation period when the majority of Grenadians adopted surnames. There were a few enslaved who had two names, mostly compound names (and primarily French-derived), but compound names were also used to differentiate those with similar names on the same plantation (examples: Jean Paul, Jean Pierre, Louis Pierre & Louis Charles; Julien & Julien 1^st, Charles & Charles 2^nd, Harriet 1^st & Harriet London). Some of these compound names may account for why we do not see surnames like Jean and Louis today. For Grenada, I examined almost 1000 surnames and their incidences of occurrence, 200 for Carriacou, and 40 for Petite Martinique (see the Forebears directory). English, Scottish, and other names of the British Isles dominate as the British were the last and longest colonial rulers of Grenada.

Continuity of British Surnames

Although male first names dominate the English-derived (including British, Scottish, Irish) Grenadian names (see Table 1 above), some British surnames that derive directly from British families are quite evident as well. Most of these indicate blood connections, as in the offspring of white men and Black/mixed women (free and enslaved), who thus carried their name, often even identified in last wills and testaments (see Table 3).

Table 3. English-Derived Surnames from British Slave Owners

Rank	Surname	Current Incidence	Listed on 1834 Slave Register	Comments
5	Alexander	2255	Yes	Ranks #4 in Carriacou
62	Campbell	308	Yes	Ranks #166 in Carriacou
97	Ferguson	216	No	Not present
114	Whiteman	178	No	Not present
119	Munro	180	No	Ranks #198 in Carriacou
125	Cummings	175	No	Ranks #49 in Carriacou
235	Young	86	No	Not present
530	Hankey	29	No	Not present

Sources: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/search/
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

Names of some Grenadian surnames stem from British surnames because of some other connection to a plantation and the family. One example is the Mills family of Carriacou, who took their name from the Mill family that owned Grand Bay Estate into the early 1900s; there were no registered enslaved with the name of Mill or Mills. The Carriacou family added an “s” as was the case with several adopted male first names like Williams, Peters, Edwards, Richards, and Andrews. It is unclear why this happened instead of taking the patriarchs’ name.

The many Scottish names of Carriacou and Petite Martinique are also as a result of racial mixing between the Scots and Blacks (free and enslaved), with names like McLawrence, McFarlane, and McGillivary (see Table 4). One of the most popular family names on Petite Martinique is Bethel, a Welsh-derived name.

Table 4. English-Derived Surnames in Carriacou & Petite Martinique

Rank	Surname	Current Incidence	Listed on Slave Registers	Comments
11	McLawrence	90	No	Ranks #197 in Grenada
18	Stewart	69	Yes (2)	Ranks #85 in Grenada
20	Boatswain	67	No	Ranks #207 in Grenada
22	McFarlane	65	No	Ranks #274 in Grenada
29	McIntosh	55	No	Ranks #910 in Grenada
33	Matheson	50	No	Ranks #323 in Grenada

1	Bethel	198	No	Ranks #73 in Grenada
4	Blair	42	Yes (2)	Ranks #259 in Grenada
12	Tillock	21	No	Ranks #470 in Grenada

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

French Surnames

Though Grenada was a French colony between 1649 and 1763, French-derived names are still quite common centuries on. Several of these surnames of French origin are French male first names that were converted to surnames, similar to their British counterparts (see Table 5). The plurality of French-derived family names, however, were present since the mid- to late 18^th century and held by persons of French and African ancestry or mixed race (see Table 6). Most of these French family surnames do not appear on Slave Registers, but rather by owners of enslaved, they being the descendants of “interracial relationships” (free and enslaved).

Table 5. The 15 Most Common French-Derived Surnames Today and Their Prevalence in the 1834 Slave Register

Rank	Surname	Current Incidence	# on the 1834 Slave Register	Comments
9	Noel	1638	46	Ranks #18 in Carriacou
14	Baptiste	1138	38	Ranks #31 in Carriacou
24	Antoine	691	46	Ranks #135 in Carriacou
30	Calliste	556	12	Ranks #111 in Carriacou
31	Pierre	538	45	Ranks #166 in Carriacou
32	Julien	536	30 (+Julienne)	Ranks #45 in Carriacou
37	Modeste	475	46	Ranks #47 in Carriacou
44	St. Louis	371	19
59	St. Bernard	315	No	Ranks #198 in Carriacou
70	Francois	272	40
88	Pascal	230	29	Ranks #150 in Carriacou
92	Clement	222	8
94	Philip	220	52 (+John Philip)
98	Cadore	214	No	Ranks #198 in Carriacou
99	Hosten	213	No	Ranks #135 in Carriacou

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

Table 6. Popular Historical French Surnames and Their Prevalence in the 1834 Slave Register

Rank	Surname	Current Incidence	# on the 1834 Slave Register	Comments
115	De Coteau	189	No	Ranks #85 in Carriacou
118	Langaine	182	No	Not present
125	La Touche	175	No	Not present
129	Stanislaus	172	Yes (11)	Ranks #47 in Carriacou
182	Bedeau	109	No	Ranks #20 in Carriacou

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

Final Thoughts

Lastly, due to migration since the mid-1800s, several names unique to neighboring islands have been brought to Grenada, some becoming well established. But it is still possible to differentiate exclusively Grenadian names from those of neighboring Caribbean islands. Table 7 presents a short list of some of these names originally exclusive to Grenada, but now can be found in Trinidad, the US and UK due to migration of Grenadians since the 18^th century. Surnames like Chantimel have disappeared, while names like Horsford and Ackie, coming from Antigua (where they are common), or Quarless, Dowden, Chandler, and Dottin from Barbados, have enriched Grenada’s family history and cultural identity.

Table 7. Unique Surnames to Grenada

Rank	Surname	Possibly Derived From	Listed on the 1834 Slave Register	Comments
59	Belfon	Pierre Aman Belfon	No
191	Braveboy	1st name of enslaved	Yes
209	Brizan	Brisant	Yes	Place name
98/243	Cadore/Cadoo	Unknown	Yes	Ranks #198 in Carriacou
115	De Coteau	Clozier Decoteau	No	Ranks #85 in Carriacou
163	De Roche	La Roche	No	Ranks #85 in Carriacou
108	Hillaire	St. Hillaire	Yes
867	La Grenade	Grenade	No	Name of the island
194	Lalgie	East-Indian derived	No
125	La Touche	La Touche-Limouzinière de Mareuil	No
207	Lendore	Unknown	No	Ranks #13 in Carriacou
218	Marryshow	Maricheau	No
57/749	Morain/Moraine	Unknown	No
413	Viechweg	John Viechweg (Belair, 1800)	No

Sources: https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

So in conclusion, Grenadian surnames are not purely baggage from our enslaved ancestors. Slavery is the reason for the lack of surnames in the first place, but the ones we have bear the names of our ancestors, much as surnames are supposed to. As such, these surnames may lead to Grenadians today finding their enslaved ancestors on Slave Registers and other lists if aware of the village (and thus plantation) where your family originated. As a final example, the name Braveboy shows up on Slave Registers for the Carriere Estate in St. Andrew. Knowing that the Braveboy family has roots in that area (and the name is quite distinctive) leads to the conclusion that the young man identified as Braveboy was probably the patriarch of the Braveboy clan, a family name that is unique to Grenada.

Page from the Slave Register for 1834 listing enslaved males on the Carriere Estate, St. Andrew, with the name Braveboy highlighted

-JAM

References

For the names of enslaved Grenadians see “Former British Colonial Dependencies, Slave Registers, 1813-1834” at https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1129/

For the names of mostly British slave owners in Grenada see “Legacies of British Slave-Ownership” at https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/maps/caribbean/grenada

For current surnames of Grenadians see “Most Common Last Names in Grenada,” Forebears at https://forebears.io/grenada/surnames.

“Most Common Last Names of Carriacou,” Forebears at https://forebears.io/grenada/carriacou#surnames

Most Common Last Names of Petite Martinique,” Forebears at https://forebears.io/grenada/petite-martinique#surnames

Handler, Jerome S. and JoAnn Jacoby. 1996. “Slave Names and Naming in Barbados, 1650-1830,” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, 53, (Oct):685-728.

Martin, John Angus. 2007. A-Z of Grenada. Oxford: Macmillan Caribbean.

A Brawl Between Chantimelle and Sauteurs -- Carnival in Early 20th Century Grenada

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 11 Aug 2020 13:34:00 +0000

We’ve been working on several upcoming blog posts, but given that it’s been a while since we last posted —and that today is “Carnival Tuesday” (cancelled or not!)—here is a link to one of our favorite references on the subject: Frederic Fenger’s “Black Mardi Gras” article in Harper’s Magazine (1916).

https://archive.org/details/harpersnew134various/page/722/mode/2up

Note that the writing is completely pejorative and condescending — he was a white American guy sailing across the Lesser Antilles in his own small boat which he also chronicles. The article starts out with him loafing at the whaling station on Isle de Caille, when one of the whalers gets a light signal from Sauteurs to come over. What ensues is one of the earliest, most detailed descriptions available on carnival in Grenada.

As is clear to any Grenadian, the piece is entirely about what we generally call Shortknee Mas, but this version is similar to Carriacou's Shakespeare Mas (without the Julius Caesar stuff), given the protective gear and Kalinda fighting. It's way bloodier than anything we see today (thank goodness). And everyone gets in on the fight -- including a hilarious moment when a Barbadian policeman stops the fight, only to pick up a rock and fire it back towards the Chantimelle intruders!

But aside from the few tidbits in the article itself, the most interesting thing is really the photographs. For this reason, we are so pleased that Internet Archive has uploaded a high-res scan. Enjoy!

-JAH and JAM

Le Bourg du Grand Marquis

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 12 Jun 2020 11:32:00 +0000

What do the ruins in this village tell us about Grenada's history?

The name “Marquis” was quite common in 17th century France (also used as a title for nobility), and several colonists of the La Grenade colony carried the name. For instance, “Fort Marquis” in Beausejour (yes, Beausejour) was named after its commander Lieutenant Le Marquis (later convicted for assisting a rebellion with one Major Le Fort). It was also the name given to an indigenous “Captain” on the eastern side of the island who presumably lived in the area of Marquis, St. Andrew today.¹ The remains of his village were mostly destroyed when the French town of Grand Marquis was built, but there are still some remnants left. Indeed, unbeknownst to most people, the pre-Columbian site at Grand Marquis is one of only a handful that date before ~AD 500 in Grenada.

Figure 1: Some artifacts from the Grand Marquis site (GREN-A-2, Hanna 2019)

The Earliest Human Presence

In 1992 (and again in 1994), archaeologist Anne Cody surveyed along the Little St. Andrew’s River behind the ruins of the old French church in Marquis (Cody Holdren 1998).² She recovered diagnostic Saladoid-Barrancoid pottery (AD 100-750) as well as later period artifacts; she also noted historical references to Amerindians in the area at the time of French settlement after 1649.

In 2018 and 2019, Hanna confirmed the location of the site and took several surface collections and soil samples. As Cody had noted, the recovered artifacts included a wide breadth of pottery including white-on-red (WOR), zone-incised-crosshatching (ZIC), "scratched" wares, circular and coffee-bean eye adornos, and a small fragment of unworked amethyst (Figure 1). Historic bottles and ceramics were also found, mostly on the southern side of the river. Many of the ceramics had large inclusions, but given the amethyst, WOR, and ZIC, it appears likely that the site began during the late Saladoid-Barrancoid period (~AD 500-750), albeit with a strong Troumassan component later (~AD750-900). Unfortunately, two samples submitted for radiocarbon dating were actually hornblende (not charcoal), leaving the site's chronology less grounded. So at present, the estimated period of occupation is AD 500-900.

Historical Footnotes

While the limited archaeological work has not borne evidence of occupation after ~AD 900, there is ethnohistoric evidence, as noted above, that Amerindians were present in the area at the time of French settlement. This is also suggested on the earliest known map of Grenada, drawn by François Blondel in 1667, which places two house symbols near the name “Grand Anse du Marquis” (Figure 2). Since no French settlers were in that area at the time, the house symbols represent Amerindian villages (Hofman et al. 2019).

Figure 2: Clip of Blondel’s 1667 Map of Grenada; the house symbols represent Amerindian villages

In late 1650, the village of “Captain Marquis” was attacked by then Governor Jean Le Comte. The Amerindians had fled, so the French “only found the carbets that they burnt, and then ruined everything,” (Anonymous [Benigne Bresson] 1975:17). In 1654, Le Comte again attacked a village in “Fond du Marquis” (ostensibly the same village, rebuilt). This time, “eighty savages were massacred…and the carbets and the huts were set on fire; everything that could not be carried was broken and destroyed,” (Anonymous [Benigne Bresson] 1975:41–42). Ironically, after the victory, Le Comte decided to row back to Fort Marquis (again, Beausejour) via the northern route, around Fort d’Esnambuc (atop le Morne aux Sauteurs). He hit a storm, crashed on some rocks, and drowned along with eight others.³

Figure 3: Map of Grand Marquis by Jean-Baptiste Le Romain (1748)

The Marquis Church Ruins

It is possible that a nearby site at Marquis River (also identified by Cody but not well-studied) is the historic-era Amerindian site rather than Grand Marquis (although the Blondel map shows two villages). Either way, within the next 50 years, French settlers had established the town of Grand Marquis atop the earlier Amerindian sites, which then became a major port town in the eponymous Parish of Grand Marquis (now St. Andrew) (Martin 2013). On the 1748 Romain map above (Figure 3), it is clear that the early town was focused along the main road. There were several churches, but the one marked “B” is the one still partially standing (Figure 4). This is clear after we georectify the map onto a modern satellite image (Figure 5). The GPS point taken at the church altar is exactly where the “nouvelle eglise” stood – the new church in 1748, much larger than the others.

Figure 4: Old church wall and altar in Marquis (Hanna 2018)

Interestingly, the church image on the 1748 map is not just a symbol but an actual layout of the church. It matches the size and orientation of the remains today, including a semi-circular back wall (perhaps an apse, although the structure has not been mapped). It is unclear why the new church was built so far from everything else, but the town was expanding by then. Additionally, the lagoon behind the town indicates the area was prone to flooding. Indeed, although it was eventually filled in, the area is very flat and still prone to flooding today (hence the Bumpy Corner nearby perhaps?).

Figure 5: Romain 1748 map georectified onto a modern satellite map (modern roads and rivers highlighted, as well as nearby archaeological sites)

Fédon’s Rebellion

Before dawn on March 3, 1795, Julien Fédon and a gang of other French planters descended on the town of La Baye (Grenville), dragged the men from their beds, and hacked them up with cutlasses in the streets. They then torched the town and several British plantations on their way to other conquests, triggering Fédon’s Rebellion.

It is sometimes said that the March 3 attack was actually on Marquis (not La Baye, 3 miles to the north). Some authors have even suggested the name had changed from Marquis to Grenville and then the town moved after it was burned down, but they are mistaken. Primary sources from the time (i.e., eye-witness accounts from 1795) use the name “La Baye,” which confirms it was present-day Grenville (e.g., see Hay 1823). This makes complete sense, too, since Marquis was a major French town (i.e., sympathetic to Fédon). La Baye, on the other hand, had been recently renamed Grenville and was expanding under the British.⁴ Nonetheless, Fédon did set up the strategic outpost at Post Royal overlooking the Marquis coastline, and he was supposedly injured when this outpost was eventually captured by the British in March 1796, during their final push to crush the "brigands".

So our church was not burned down at the start of Fédon’s Rebellion. Instead, Father Devas (1974) writes that Grenville simply outgrew Marquis under British rule and so the church was not maintained. By 1800, the main town in the parish had become Grenville, and the church had reportedly fallen into ruin. Devas also notes that stones from the old church were used to line the road in the 1930s (something that could perhaps be confirmed archaeologically one day).

Figure 6: The gravestone of Ophilia Matheson

Devas’ scenario also aligns with the graves around the church ruins-- some inside the church walls. They are difficult to decipher, but one headstone for Ophilia Matheson says either 1800/1808 or 1900/1908. If 1800/1808, her burial inside the old church confirms Devas’ claim that it was in ruins by 1800. Either way, the cemetery continued to be used well after the church was abandoned.

The archaeological site, the historical Amerindian village, and the ruins of the French town of Grand Marquis illustrate the long history of this small village on Grenada’s Atlantic coast. The village was also known for its traditional handicraft industry where the screw pine (Pandanus utilis) was used to weave hats, bags, table mats, purses and other useful products, especially for the tourism industry. Today, a few fishing boats can be seen along the beach or fishermen pulling net or seine for a catch of the day. This diverse history has potential for public education, bringing pride to the people of the area. We hope it can be preserved for Grenada’s future historians and archaeologists!

-JAH and JAM

Acknowledgements

Hanna’s survey of Grand Marquis was assisted by Marlene and Joel Harford, Brittany Mistretta, and Isabelle Wadai in 2018, and Amanda Dombach, Andre Adolphus, and Marlon Garraway in 2019.

(Adapted from JAM’s books Island Caribs and French Settlers in Grenada and A-Z of Grenada Heritage, 2^nd edition forthcoming)

Footnotes

1 The title of “captain” is usually interpreted as “chief”, although it is debatable whether any Amerindian groups (even “Taino”) were actually organized as chiefdoms. “Captain Marquis” was probably either a war leader, whose only influence over others came during wartime, or the patriarch of the village (which for a matrilocal society might mean he was the eldest brother in the family). The French also labeled him a “Savage Galibi” — not "Caraïbe" — (Anonymous [Benigne Bresson] 1975), but that is another post for another day! (For now, see Hanna 2019)^↩

2 Note this is just for informational purposes, since we want to protect these sites from further destruction. Please do not visit this site and collect artifacts-- it is illegal to plunder artifacts from Amerindian sites in Grenada (and this one appears to be a very light deposit!). Artifacts removed without proper recording can never be linked back to their place of origin (they are "unprovenienced"). ^↩

3 Le Comte’s death led to the dispute over governorship for which Le Marquis was tried for sedition. LeFort managed to commit suicide (by poisoning) before the trial.^↩

4 As with the parish name, Marquis was renamed "St. Andrew" by the British, but the name never took (unlike the parish name, of course).^↩

References

Anonymous [Benigne Bresson]
1975 Histoire de l’isle de Grenade En Amérique 1649-1659. Edited by John Angus Martin and Jacques Petitjean Roget. Translated by Jacques Petitjean Roget. Presses de l’Université de Montréal, (unpublished 2015 English translation on file at the Grenada National Museum). Original available at: http://classiques.uqac.ca/contemporains/petitjean_roget_jacques/histoire_de_grenade/histoire_de_grenade.html

Cody Holdren, Ann K.
1998 Raiders and Traders: Caraïbe Social and Political Networks at the Time of European Contact and Colonization in the Eastern Caribbean. PhD. Dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles.

Devas, Raymund P.
1974 A History of the Island of Grenada, 1498-1796, with Some Notes and Comments on Carriacou and Events of Later Years. Carenage Press, St. George, Grenada.

Hanna, Jonathan A.
2019 Camáhogne’s Chronology: The Radiocarbon Settlement Sequence on Grenada, West Indies. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 55:101075. DOI:10.1016/j.jaa.2019.101075.

Hay, John
1823 A Narrative of the Insurrection in the Island of Grenada: Which Took Place in 1795. Printed for J. Ridgeway. Available at: http://archive.org/details/anarrativeinsur00haygoog

Hofman, Corinne L., Menno L. P. Hoogland, Arie Boomert, and John Angus Martin
2019 Colonial Encounters in the Southern Lesser Antilles: Indigenous Resistance, Material Transformations, and Diversity in an Ever-Globalizing World. In Material Encounters and Indigenous Transformations in the Early Colonial Americas, edited by Corinne Hofman and Floris Keehnen, v.9:pp. 359–384. The Early Americas: History and Culture. Brill, Leiden, Netherlands. DOI: 10.1163/9789004273689_017

Martin, John Angus
2013 Island Caribs and French Settlers in Grenada: 1498 - 1763. Grenada National Museum Press, St George’s, Grenada. https://www.amazon.com/Island-Caribs-French-Settlers-Grenada/dp/1490472002/

le Romain, Jean-Baptiste
1748 Plan du port de Caliveni, du Cul-de-sac à Vache, de la rivière du chemin et de la presqu’île du fort Jeudi situés dans la partie méridionale de l’île de la Grenade, l’une des Antilles ou Caraïbes. Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris. Available at: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b530623232.

Carriacou: “Land of Reefs” or “Land of Ramiers”?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 03 May 2020 19:22:00 +0000

Figure 1: Du Chaffault’s Plan de la Petite Ance, 1751. This bay, known today as Tyrrel Bay, was referenced by Father DuTertre in 1656
(courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France)

The name Carriacou has intrigued us all, especially because its origin, like Camáhogne for Grenada, is indigenous and remains one of several islands that have retained or reverted to their original names (or some version of it, including Bequia, Tobago, Jamaica, Cuba and Haiti).

Carriacou is, in fact, the Anglicized spelling of the Carib/Kalinago name for the island, which was recorded by Father Jean-Baptiste DuTertre as Kayryouacou in 1656 when he sailed past the island on his way to Grenada and observed:

“The most beautiful of all the little isles is Kayrioüacou, where I stopped long enough to note its peculiarities. It is a very beautiful and good isle, capable of supporting a colony: it is about eight or nine leagues in circumference, and on a line of land to the north (sic) it has a very beautiful bay, almost semicircular, and on the northern end of this bay there is a great rock [bluff] which protects one of the most beautiful harbors that I have seen in the islands” (DuTerte 1667, I:41-42; translation from Devas 1974:178-179; see Figure 1).

DuTertre adds that “Fairly close to the harbor is a pond of chomache water, that is to say, half salt, which cannot come from anything else than a river or a spring of fresh water that loses itself in the saltwater close to the sea-shore. The color of this water is as red as blood, and even the crabs there take on this color; but the bottom of the pond is white sand covered with red slime, which makes me believe that this water passes over some deposit of ochre.” This is likely the mangroves of Tyrrel Bay, now part of the Sandy Island Oyster Bed Marine Protected Area.

Figure 2: Google Maps satellite image of Carriacou, showing the island surrounded by reefs, especially on the eastern coast

Though it has recently been reported (since the 1980s) and widely accepted that Carriacou means “Land of Reefs” or “Land Surrounded by Reefs” as the island is in fact surrounded by many reefs, especially on the eastern windward coast, there is no historical reference to it as such (see Figure 2). Neither DuTertre, nor Jean Baptiste Labat a half century later, provided a meaning for the name, if they knew it at all. And indeed, all the Grenadines are surrounded by reefs. A paper by Hanna and Giovas (2019) on Amerindian settlement patterns in the Grenadines found that reefs were a common denominator for site selection, including sites on Carriacou, which favored the windward side (where all the reefs are). Moreover the Kalinago word for “reef” in Breton’s dictionary is chébi (Breton 1999 [1665]:68).

However, Guadeloupean historian Thierry L’Etang (2007) who has researched the indigenous names of the islands, provides a possible meaning of the name Carriacou as Ile Ramier or “Ramier (Pigeon) Island,” based on kairi (“isle”) and ouacoúcoua (“ramier pigeon”),” with reference to the prevalence of the ramier pigeon on the island.

DuTretre did record the presence of a conspicuous bird, a “kind of pheasant, which had a confused sort of call, louder and more tiresome than that of several fowls together, that have just laid.” He continues:

“…we kept on hearing a great noise made by some big birds which were continually crying out caracara caracara. With our local people there, these birds pass as pheasants: M. de Rochefort says the French call them Poulle-pintardes and Faisans, which would be hardly remarkable, were it not that, in reproducing an illustration, he has depicted not this ‘pheasant’ at all, but the Poule-pintarde, which is a bird belonging to the sea coast of Africa, and is as rare in the islands as it is in France.

The real (Carriacou) pheasant is a very beautiful bird, as big as a young cock, but standing higher, on legs like a peacock’s. and its beak and head resemble those of a corbeau. All feathers on its neck and breast are a beautiful shining blue, also like a peacock’s. The whole of its back is browny grey, and the feathers of its rather short tail are black. When the bird becomes tame it makes itself master of the situation, chasing away turkey-hens and domestic fowls with its beak, and sometimes killing them. It does the same with dogs, pecking at them and making them yelp.... Those who have eaten it assure me that the flesh is as good as that of the pheasant of France.” (Translated by Devas 1974:179-180).

The bird was in fact a Guinea-fowl, brought from west Africa (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Birds depicted in Rochefort’s Histoire naturelle et morale des Iles
Antilles de l’Amerique, referencing the poule-pintarde and Le faisan

It is interesting to note that Sparrow Bay on Carriacou’s northwest coast was known as Baye des Ramiers and located in the Quartier des Ramiers under the French (see Figures 4 and 5). Glover Island, off Grenada’s southern coast, was also originally named Ile des Ramiers by the French for the presence of the ramier or red-necked pigeon (Columba squamosa). Coincidently, the bird depicted on Grenada’s current coat-of-arms is the ramier pigeon, though the Grenada dove (Leptotila wellsi) replaced it as the national bird with its designation in 1991 in an attempt to protect this endemic bird.

L’Etang also mentions “deer” as an alternative meaning, which he dismissed. However, it is worth noting that the names do not necessarily have to make sense to us (nor accurately describe the place in question). Nonetheless, Christina Giovas (2017) studied the fauna found in the prehistoric levels of Sabazan and Grand Bay, two of Carriacou’s biggest Amerindian sites. Both contained brocket deer (Mazama americana), a type common in South America and Trinidad, and white-tailed deer (Odocoileus sp.), also found in South America and Curacao, although neither are found in the Antilles today. Indeed, Giovas concluded that, based on the small size of the assemblages and the fact that they were mostly worked (carved in some way), among other things, suggests certain parts of the animals were brought/exchanged into the islands (rather than entire live animals). Other islands have reported worked deer bone as well, including Trinidad, Aruba, Islas Los Roques, and Grenada — all in the southern Caribbean and close to the mainland.

Figure 4: A map of Carriacou based on data from the 1750 census (JAM)

Figure 5: A map of Carriacou based on data from the 1762 census (JAM)

Finally, a quick perusal of similar-sounding words in Breton’s (1999 [1665]) dictionary reveals two other candidates: caïricouaáli (to be torn, to tear apart) and carou-carou, which Breton says means “grenade”. The lowercase “g” here suggests not the island of Grenada but the word Breton uses elsewhere for “turtle eggs.”

But given the historical references to ramiers, perhaps L'Etang is on to something with Ile des Ramiers, many of which can be seen in backyards and fields across the island.

-JAM and JAH

(Adapted from JAM’s books Island Caribs and French Settlers in Grenada and A-Z of Grenada Heritage 2nd edition, forthcoming)

References

Breton, Raymond

1999 Dictionnaire Caraïbe-Français [1665]. Edited by Marina Besada Paisa and Jean Bernabé. Paris: Karthala: Editions de l’IRD.

Devas, Ratmund P.

1974 A History of the Island of Grenada, 1698-1796, With Some Notes and Comments on Carriacou and Events of Later Years. St. George’s, Grenada: Carenage Press.

Du Tertre, Jean-Baptiste

1667 Histoire generale des Antilles habitées par les François. Vol. I. Collège de la Sainte Trinité de la Compagnie de Jésus: Chez Thomas Iolly.

L’Etang, Thierry

2007 “Du nom indigène des îles de l’archipel des Antilles.” Montray Kréyol. https://www.montraykreyol.org/article/du-nom-indigene-des-iles-de-larchipel-des-antilles (accessed April 30, 2020).

Giovas,Christina M.

2017 “Continental Connections and Insular Distributions: Deer Bone Artifacts of the Precolumbian West Indies—A Review and Synthesis With New Records.” Latin American Antiquity 29 (1): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/laq.2017.57.

Hanna, Jonathan A., and Christina M. Giovas

2019 “An Islandscape IFD: Using the Ideal Free Distribution to Predict Pre-Columbian Settlements from Grenada to St. Vincent, Eastern Caribbean.” Environmental Archaeology.
https://doi.org/10.1080/14614103.2019.1689895.

The Grenadines Will Always Be Grenadian! (Because of Their Name)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 28 Apr 2020 20:10:00 +0000

The southern Caribbean and northern South America, with Grenada and the Grenadines, 1760

The Grenadines, from Bequia to Carriacou, were once entirely owned and administered by Grenada, hence their original name Granada y Granadillos (<AmSp Granada + illos: “little Grenadas”). A few of the approximately 125 small islands, islets, and rocks were first settled by the French in the mid-1700s, the last islands to be colonized by Europeans, most likely due to their small size, arid landscape, and the absence of yearlong streams. Today, Carriacou, Petite Martinique, Ronde, and some 30 small islets are dependencies of Grenada. The rest are now part of St. Vincent.

Map of the southern Caribbean by Johannes van Keulen, 1684, showing the Grenadines’ early association with Grenada (note, the top is facing west; Grenada is colored red).

In 1784, the Grenadines were officially partitioned on the recommendation of Lieutenant Governor Valentine Morris of St. Vincent who believed that the islands, especially those closer to his island, would be better served administratively and for security reasons if transferred to St. Vincent. Following the outbreak of the War of American Independence, Governor Morris had become weary that if Grenada was returned to the French while St. Vincent remained British, then the French would be too close at Bequia and thus threaten British St. Vincent. Although Grenada remained a British possession (barring a brief French takeover from 1779-1783), a buffer was created where all islands south and inclusive of Carriacou remained with Grenada, while Union Island and all islands north of Carriacou transferred to St Vincent.

In 1784, Edward Matthew was appointed as “Governor-in-Chief in and over our Island of Grenada, and the Islands commonly called the Grenadines to the southward of the Island of Carriacou, and including that Island and lying between the same, and the said Island of Grenada.” It is interesting to note that, because of the size of Carriacou, the total area given to both countries was almost the same. The local story that the line separating Carriacou from St. Vincent goes through Gun Point, Carriacou (meaning it is technically owned by St. Vincent) is not supported by the available evidence. However, there might be something else to that tale that has since been lost.

Grenada and the Grenadines by JN Bellin, 1765

St. Vincent subsequently included the Grenadines in its official name, “St. Vincent and the Grenadines.” Grenada, though known historically as Grenada and the Grenadines, is officially the state of Grenada. A similar name change to incorporate the two other members of the tri-island state was rejected in a national referendum in 2016, but hopefully, Grenada’s official name will one day include Carriacou and Petite Martinique. Regardless, because of their name, the Grenadines will always be associated with Grenada!

(Adapted from my books Island Caribs and French Settlers in Grenada and A-Z of Grenada Heritage)

-JAM

Post #1: A Blog for HRGC

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 26 Apr 2020 01:13:00 +0000

A "Zemi" from the St. John's River Site (GREN-G-8) that has never been published or featured anywhere

All of us in HRGC are academics, so we do a lot of writing. And yet, a lot of this writing never goes anywhere-- it ends up as outtakes or shortened footnotes. Like this zemi from the St. John's River site (above), so much work never sees the light of day. There are also lots of common questions people often ask that would not normally go in academic writing (e.g., it's "St. George's Town" but "St. George Parish"-- we'll get to that later).

So we thought a blog would be a good place to deposit these sundry scraps of knowledge. Hope you enjoy!

-JAH

Test Post

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 25 Apr 2020 20:46:00 +0000

Test Post -- first one...