Migration is Changing Trinidad’s Identity

Interview with Gerard Besson

Cultural researcher, historian, blogger, writer, and founder/director of Paria Publishing Company Ltd

by Trinidad Guardian Reporter Shereen Ali, September 1, 2016

Intro:

In this land of many peoples and people of many ancestries, how do people see their ethnic heritage? How do they practice it, ignore it, or celebrate it?

On the occasion of our 54th year of independence from Britain, Guardian feature writer Shereen Ali spoke to T&T citizens of different backgrounds to ask how they see issues such as ethnicity, race and in some cases, their own uniquely diverse heritages. People, in their own words, helped paint a picture of an ever-changing, complex twin-island nation of many different ancestral influences.

Last week we heard from people of First Peoples ancestry. Yesterday and today, we hear from people who have European ancestry as part of their heritage. Today's contributions are from historian Gerard Besson, who describes himself as a mix of French Creole and African.

When you have to fill in a form asking you your race, what do you put?

I put “mixed”.

How do you see your ethnic roots & heritage? Is it important to how you define yourself, or is it irrelevant, an accident of birth?
I see myself as Afro-French Creole. It is important because it gives me a sense of identity. I see myself as being a part of the French/African-Creole, patois-speaking Catholic people of long ago.

But I think heritage goes beyond ethnicity. It goes to identifying yourself in terms of being a Trinidadian. And not only a Trinidadian, but for me, someone who was born and grew up in Port-of-Spain.

Do you celebrate your ethnic heritage, ignore it as irrelevant, or have mixed feelings about it?
I acknowledge and embrace my heritages. For example, in 1970 I empathised with Geddes Granger; I was only in my 20s at the time, but I understood deeply what the Black Power movement was about, and I empathised with it. It expressed itself in my work at the time. I didn’t ignore it.

And then on the other hand, at another time in my life, I went to France to see the village that my family had come from in the first place. It was a nice feeling to do that as well. So I think that I have celebrated both aspects of my heritages at some point in my life.

I also celebrate my ethnic heritages in the work I do as a historian. For instance, when I took an interest in the African part of my heritage I spent a few years researching the Rada people and Shango in Trinidad. I went to Haiti and to Brazil. I found great similarities.

Do you know about the beliefs and lifestyles of T&T people of different ethnic heritages from your own?

Yes. I’ve spent much time reading, researching and writing about people here. Dr Bridget Brereton and I, for instance, published a book in 1989 called “The Book of Trinidad”, really an anthology of different people’s writings and observations about T&T over the years. That book will give you a fairly good historical perspective.

And then, in a different kind of way, I recently published a historical novel on Trinidad called “Roume de Saint Laurent … a Memoir”. Roume is interesting because he was the person who was responsible to a considerable degree for the creation of a document called Cedula for Population. He was especially visionary for his time.

The significant thing about the Cedula for Population is that it enshrined the rights and the privileges of free black and coloured people in Trinidad. So that, yes, about 1,200 French European people came to Trinidad as a result of the Cedula, but 11,000 free black and coloured people also came! They were all French-speaking.

That document has been described by Professor Carl Campbell as the first Constitution of Trinidad. Because it spelt out the terms and conditions, in law, for people coming to living here. And it acted as precedent for many of the laws that came into existence subsequently. So much so that there is a distinguished jurist right now in Trinidad, retired, who is studying this particular document with a view to seeing how it has affected the evolution of jurisprudence in Trinidad.

I tell the story of Roume de Saint Laurent and his affairs and his adventures, but what I also do is publish the entire Cedula of Population, so people can get an understanding of the foundation of Trinidad. You see, people do not understand these foundational elements of our society.

Do you think race is important in T&T?

Race touches everything that we do.

T&T is a segmented society with a lot of overlaps, because of miscegenation over time — well, not a very long time when compared to Jamaica or Barbados, because both these islands are much older than Trinidad in terms of their colonial settlement. Tobago has a different history, its colonial experience is as old as Barbados.

Trinidad’s society came into existence suddenly. Before 1783 and the Cedula for Population, if can you imagine, the population was about 126 Europeans, a few hundred people of African descent, who were not really slaves because there was no industry, and a handful of Amerindians — tribal people.

From then on, with the advent of the Cedula and plantation slavery the population expanded.

Free blacks and coloured people as well as white French people brought slaves together with their own societal landscapes and political and religious views to Trinidad; as compared to Barbados and the older islands where the society developed over a long period, even though it was a period of slavery, their societies matured more slowly.

In Trinidad everything seems to have happened almost overnight. It went from a few dozen people in 1780s, to 50 years later, more than 50,000 people. So Trinidad began in a strange, unique way in itself.

Race in Trinidad is a very loaded topic. It morphs into politics very easily. And this is so, because of the movement for Independence, how that came about and who did it, and under which group it happened.

Because for a very long time, for some 200 and something years, Europeans controlled the economic landscape of Trinidad, and these white people were both local and foreign.

The local ones were in agriculture, mostly cocoa, and government service, and the foreign ones were in sugar, business and government. That is how it was. It was a society that was not as segregated as say Barbados, but still segregated in terms of class as well as race.

The black population, as it advanced, went into teaching, the Civil Service, law and medicine, and later gradually into other professions.

So those two groups, the local white group and the coloured, Afro group, controlled Trinidad completely.

They posessed a Creole identity. The Indians, who had arrived in 1845 to 1917 were largely confined to the countryside. For most of the 19^th century, they often needed a pass to leave the estates – even if their indentureship was over.

All this changed after the world wars. After Independence, the children of the dominant groups began to go away to make a better life and a great many never came back. This was the French Creole people, mixed-race people, and people of African descent.

Trinidad has experienced in the last 50 or 60 years a demographic upheaval that no other island in the Caribbean has had, in that in the non-Indian population — this is in the Afro, mixed and other groups — say 500,000 or 600,000 people, over a third of that segment have gone away. And at the same time, about that same number of people have come from the other islands. That has been a blow to the identity that was formed from the 1780s to Independence.

No other island in the Caribbean has had the experience of hundreds of thousands of people going to it at the same time that so many people have left. The result of that is this:

The creole population, the product of the late 18^th century and 19^th century society, has had a huge dislocation caused by emigration and immigration.

This has produced a great disturbance within the cohesion of that group. A lessening of a Trinidadian identity. Now that is a serious issue. I notice that recently some social scientists are beginning to comment on it.

Now, insofar as the Indian side of the population is concerned, it has been argued that there were some events that made Indian people feel more intensely “Indian”, and less intensely “Trinidadian”, such as the black power movement of the 70s, being in political opposition, after Independence, for such a long time, what thirty years; the work of the various Indian religious orders whether it is in the context of Hinduism or Islam. The  appearance of Bollywood as well as the increase in business and wealth. There were many things that happened in the last 40—50 years in the Indian community that have made Indians feel more Indian, in a sense; while, in a contrary sort of a way, also more Trinidadian.

With the dislocation in the creole society taking place and with a deepening in the Indian society of an identity, the division has become more sharp and more obvious.

So there has been a dislocation in the society instead of the predominant races finding common ground with the sharing of identity. And this is what we see played out in politics. Because you don't see it played out in daily life, you don't see it played out in love affairs, you don't see it played out in business and work, it is played out in politics, where political parties go after their imagined constituencies.

So with Independence and the movement of people, the loss of a significant part of the Creole population, has meant that Trinidad has lost a lot of its Creole soul, and acquired, on the other hand, an increased Caribbean reality.

And you see it in the disappearance of certain cultural forms. Carnival is not as it was. The music — calypso — hardly exists anymore. You have to go in search of it in the tents. It has been replaced by other musical forms. Patois is no longer heard — and you have to bear in mind that up until the 1940s and 50s, a large amount of people in both Indian Trinidad and certainly Creole Trinidad — spoke this language.

Another important factor that has also impacted on identity was the end of the agricultural sector.

People see the agricultural sector from the perspective of today. And they only see Indian people – the world of the cane farmer.

In truth, the agricultural sector in the past was enormous. It included a lot of black and French Creole and mixed people. It existed for some 200 years.

But the ending of the agricultural sector was one of the things that undermined notions of identity which were built through the 19^th century and into the first half of the 20^th century.

One of the effects of the loss of the agricultural sector is a more compassionless society. Because when you have hundreds of thousands of people, whether they are Indian people, white people, mixed people or African people, who are devoted to the bringing up of livestock, who are devoted to gardening, market gardening, vegetable planting, to cocoa and coffee and so on, you have people who have a lot of love — for their animals and for their plants. You have to love your donkey!

So when you move hundreds of thousands of people out of that world of compassion, you create an increasingly compassionless society.

I think the agricultural sector died from the 1950s. The model that was introduced by Sir Arthur Lewis, the famous Nobel Prize-winning economist, in Trinidad, and through Dr Williams, saw a nation that would be modern and industrialised. It was a form of social engineering. A lot of these little islands in the Caribbean moved away from agriculture and went into tourism. It was considered modern, it was thought the thing to do. I do not believe it was the right thing.

So the combination of the end of the agricultural economy, the end of the railways (in itself a vast societal network of people who operated them), and then the displacement of so many people, in the emigration and immigration phenomena, created a dissonance and a collapse, a loss of identity.

You see, it was not only a brain drain; it was also a deep cultural drain. A lot of the identity of the 19^th century to the first half of the 20^th century began to fall away.

And what that culture has been replaced with is something imported through television, through cinema, and through the importation of black American culture. And you see it expressed in dance music and gangland activity and so on.

So what has happened is that the society on the whole, as a result of the Independence movement, has suffered more than it has gained.

The Indian segment of the society, however, because of the isolation, of being 30-40 years in opposition, and being apart from the Creole society, because of their extended family support, the pursuit of independence though economic means, the pursuit of education (there are more Indians with tertiary education, a startling number of them young women, than anybody else), has produced a society within the society that owns an economy that is very, very large. Whereas the other side of the society does not possess an economy; there is no big Afro business there – it depends on the State.

So these are the differences in the society that create the movements and the tensions and the feel of the place.

Prof Selwyn Ryan wrote in one of his articles some time ago that for 150 years, the elements of the white society and elements of the black and coloured society dominated Trinidad, possessed a hegemony over Trinidad, and this hegemony is now decreasing at a rate. He startled a lot of people with that, but what he said was true. Immigration and emigration have changed the landscape of Trinidad. All this has had a deleterious effect on the identity-forming mechanisms of the society.

Notions of identity as a Trinidadian or a Trinbagonian are increasingly becoming something more important than just merely how you vote at election time.

I think that there's a generation of people who are growing up, not necessarily young young people, but people in their 30s or 40s, who are increasingly beginning to come to an understanding about their own identity in the concept of a Trinidad & Tobago.

Do you think different ethnicities have different values?

I think different people have different values. This is not a matter of ethnicity. I think the human race is possessed of the same yardstick where it comes to morals, ethics, values. I think they all possess the same thing. So it’s not ethnic.

People express these values differently depending on how they have been socialised.

How long have you/your family had roots here (best estimate)?
Both my mother and father’s antecedents have lived here for more than 200 years. They named Besson Street in east Port-of-Spain after my family – my father’s ancestor came to Trinidad in 1787. Boissiere Village is named for my mother’s people.

What do you like and dislike about T&T culture?

I like most things about our cultures, except the recent introduction of extremely loud music.

Also, in order to analyse important issues such as the impact of immigration and emigration, you have to have information available. And the Central Statistical Office in Trinidad is one of the places from where you do not get statistics (laughs).

I am 74 years old. And what I have seen in my adult life is an enormous change in Trinidad. I mean, when you take something like the Red House – 30, 40, 50 years ago or more, leaving a significant building like the Red House in a dilapidated state would have been a big uproar. Same thing with President’s House. Now, increasingly, there are fewer and fewer people who care about those iconic sites, because they don’t mean much to them.

William Wilberforce

The African presence in North and South America and the Caribbean defines the character of the New World. Without it, the western hemisphere would merely be an extension of Europe. The African presence of the New World commenced with slavery, which was seen by many cultures - not only Europeans - as an economic necessity at various times. In the case of the Americas, slavery provided cheap and abundant labour for the plantations. It did not run counter to the beliefs and ideas of people both in Africa, the Middle East or Europe. Slavery, serfdom and servitude had been known the world over for countless generations.

By 1800, however, slavery had become expensive and wasteful in the eyes of European thinkers and economic planners. Also, beliefs and convictions of people had changed. The ideas that had evolved towards the end of the 18th century, from the 1760s onward, called the "enlightenment", brought with them the philosophical concept of the rights of man. The enlightenment helped to provoke the French Revolution in 1789 and the beliefs that brought about the evangelical revival  that changed the attitudes of countless thousands of Europeans.

By 1800, there were many influential and powerful people who felt that African slavery was fundamentally wrong and morally indefensible. Perhaps more significantly, there were many others who regarded it as an economic waste. Another voice, that of self-interest, was the voice of planters and merchants in the West Indies. They held a monopoly of trade, and set themselves to destroy it. The days of African slavery, at least in the New World, were numbered. Sad to say, slavery, in particular and the enslaving of women and children, continues in Africa and some Asian and Muslim countries to this day.

Let us look, however, at the efforts of some of the men who fought against slavery because they thought it morally wrong.

When William Wilberforce, one of those who fought hardest against African slavery in the colonies, was a boy of about 6 or 7 years, one of the first blows against African slavery was struck by a man named Grenville Sharp. He was in the house of his brother William Sharp, a doctor in London, one day in the year 1765, when a slave called Jonathan Strong came in, asking for help. Jonathan had been so badly treated by his owner David Lisle, who had brought him from Barbados, that he had become lame and unfit for work. His master turned him out.

Dr. Sharp helped Jonathan and found a job for him after he had recovered from his wounds and had caught himself. Unfortunately, one day Lisle came on Jonathan, saw that he was fit for work, hired two men to kidnap him and proceeded to sell him for £30 to a Jamaican by the name of John Kerr.

The Sharp brothers managed to have Jonathan set free, but only with great difficulty. The entire affair seemed so unfair to Grenville Sharp that he set to study the law himself. Lawyers told him that he was wasting his time and that Jonathan was in fact the property of his master. But Grenville would not accept that. He was determined to find out for himself. After three years of work and study, he wrote and published a book claiming that it was against the law for anyone in England to remain enslaved. In 1772, he was given the opportunity to prove his point. Another slave, James Somerset, had fallen ill and had been turned away by his master. With the help of the Sharps, Somerset got better, and as soon as he was well and back on his feet, his master claimed him. Sharp took the matter to court and on June 22, 1772, Chief Justice Mansfield ruled that as soon as any slave sets foot on English soil he becomes free. By this decision, the 10,000 Negro slaves who were in England at that time all became free men and women.

In the wake of this victory, a religious sect, the Quakers, formed a anti-slavery society, which was jointed by Clarkson Sharp, Ramsay and others, and they began to tell people in England how wicked the slave trade and plantations worked by slave labour were. There were terrible accounts to relate of the suffering and loss of life on the long sea voyage from the coast of West Africa to the West Indies and of the harsh and brutal punishments of the plantations.

By and large, it was a cruel age, when men had little pity for each other. The poor of Europe had few rights, lived in great want and experienced profound distress. The sailors in the British navy were subject to terrible floggings, and a man could be hung for stealing a loaf of bread.

Yet, there was a wind of change in the air. The preaching of John and Charles Wesley and of John Whitfield [WHO WERE THEY?] had touched the hearts of many people, both rich and poor. Others were beginning to think about ideas like liberty and the common brotherhood of man.

However, there were those who did not think that the West Indian planters should be the only ones to have the right to sell sugar in Britain, and who wanted to build up the East Indian trade. Political avarice, heinous as it is, served in the abolition movement of the day.

By this time, William Wilberforce, who now had a seat in the English parliament, joined the anti-slavery society and became its leader. William was slightly built and frail in body, and had been so delicate as a child that his parents had often been anxious about him. He was near-sighted, stooped a little and was no good at out-of-door games. He was nonetheless possessed of a gentle, bright spirit and was such a mimic that he could keep a group laughing at the way he made jokes and poked fun at others.

Above all, William had great courage, a very quick mind and was a fine orator. One who heard him speak to a large crowd of people on a bleak and windy day in the open air, said that he saw "what seemed a mere shrimp mount upon the table, but as I listened, he grew and grew until the shrimp became a whale".

In the 1780s, the antislavery society grew in numbers. Public meetings were held all over England and support increased. In 1791, Wilberforce introduced a bill in the House of Commons to abolish the slave trade, saying "As we have been great in crime, let us be early in repentance". The bill did not pass. England then went to war with Napoleon. Delay followed delay until at last the great day dame. Sixteen long years after Wilberforce had moved the first bill, in 1807, the English parliament voted to abolish the slave trade. As members cheered, William Wilberforce was seen with tears streaming down his face. 

Saving Trinidad's David Copperfields

130 years of St. Dominic's Children's Home

Port of Spain, particularly east Port of Spain, 130 years ago, was a crucible for destitute people who came from all over the island to the city seeking opportunities. Three decades after the abolition of slavery, the children of the ex-slaves had now had children themselves. Unemployment was high, wages were miserable, and many could not care for their offspring as they should have.

Abandonment and homelessness was the fate of many small infants and youngsters, who were the children of the poorest of the poor. They could be seen everywhere in the streets, begging, loitering, without any education or care, without love. Many were naked, and the more industrious ones took to stealing. In their abandonment, they shared the fate with thousands of children in Europe, children of parents whom the Industrial Revolution had left behind, who suffered from illness, bitter cold, hunger and thirst, and desperation in their loneliness. In some cases, their parents were imprisoned for debt, or were simply too sick or destitute to bother with their kids. Charles Dickens' "David Copperfield" is an example of what abandoned children in London had to endure, and Port of Spain knew many of those little David Copperfields, both boys and girls.

One man, the parish priest of Rosary Church, could not bear seeing the misery of the street children on a daily basis. His church was literally surrounded by this misery, and at any point in time, one could find two or three little ones huddled in the church's portals, holding out their tiny, dirty hands for alms. Father Mariano Forestier decided to found a home for those children, intent on not only saving their souls, but also their miserable little bodies from starvation. Mr. Leroy came to his assistance, and together with other friends, the priest bought a small property on the summit of the "Morne" in Belmont, overlooking Port of Spain.

As soon as the sale was finalised, three children were picked off the streets and given into the care of Father Forestier's children's home. Who knows who their parents were, and why they had to roam the streets of the city all by themselves? Maybe they were orphans, maybe they weren't. But those three out of many had at least found a home now, a home where kind ladies took care of them, begged for them, clothed, bathed, and fed them on a daily basis. Soon, they were joined by other children, and by the end of 1871, their number had risen to eleven.

Five years later, Father Forestier got the Dominican sisters, who had established themselves in Cocorite in 1868, to take on those little charges. Christmas of 1876 saw 66 pairs of big eyes glow expectantly - maybe this year Father Christmas would not forget them?

The old building was bursting at its seams with so many children. The Dominican Sisters recruited everybody to help with the extension to the home. In their annals, it is recorded that the boys and girls carried all the water, stones and cement up to the Morne for the builders to get to work! The little ones had little buckets, and the older ones took a brick or two, and all trundled back and forth to see their new living quarters grow.

"Wood, slates and bricks too had to be carried up," writes Olga Mavrogordato in her book "Voices in the Street". "Some had boxes and baskets, others had old pans, old plates and jugs, and they counted the number of their journeys during the morning."

The parish priest of Maraval, Padre Alvarez, also mobilised his parishioners. More than 250 people came to help! From 7 o'clock in the morning until 3 o'clock in the afternoon, women, children and men worked on the extension of the children's home. Of course, the work was not completed in one day, and many of the inhabitants of Belmont, as well as the Societies of St. Anthony and the Holy Trinity, all came and lent a helping hand, levelling, digging, carrying water and materials, or simply cooking food and distributing some lunches for everybody.

Three years later, the extension as well as the chapel and a house for the sisters was equally completed. At the end 1879, Father Forestier gave over the home to the Archbishop of Port of Spain, which was at that time Most Rev. L.J. Gonin O.P.

Over the years, more building work was done and the wooden buildings of the children's home gave way to concrete houses. Also, the number of children increased steadily. A government grant provided the financial backbone of the home, but it also depends ongoingly on the goodwill of charitable people.

One of the distinct features is the home's bakery. There, the older children learnt how to bake their own bread - and how much better it tastes if you make it yourself! It was important for these parentless children to learn a trade, so that later, when they become old enough to leave the home, they would be able to make a living. Not only baking, but also cabinet making and shoe making and tailoring was taught in the classes. The children's home also produced a very attained band, and oftentimes, members of this band are accepted by the Police and Regiment bands.

Father Mariano Forestier died in 1901. "The little cottage on the Morne which sheltered those first three little children whom Father Forestier received, became a large home, comprising ten buildings, where lived more than 400 children."

And for those who have never seen this historical and social monument, go and visit the St. Dominic's Home for Children in Belmont!

Wages in Trinidad and Tobago

In history, wages are an important aspect of the evaluation of human time. A look on the development of wages in Trinidad and Tobago after emancipation.

With emancipation, the question of mass paid labour arose in Trinidad and Tobago for the first time. Before that, the system of slavery prevented the 'worker' from getting paid in cash, and the 'employer' from having to obtain this cash.

In 1834, after the abolition of slavery, the problem of wages for people who work arose for the first time in Trinidad and Tobago on a large scale. And it involved problems for everybody: the ex-slaves, now called 'apprentices' for a period of six years, had the problem of finding someone who they would like to work for and who could pay them, and the ex-masters had the problem of finding people who would work for them and of finding the ready cash to pay them with. To grasp the problem from today's perspective is not easy: one must not forget that in those days, neither the planters nor the mass of ex-slaves had ever encountered anything other than the economic system of slavery in their lifetime! Neither of them had any experience whatsoever in organising a system of employment.

The biggest problem for both sides, employer and employees, was cash flow. Like in any agricultural economy depending on crops at a certain time of year, credit is an important aspect. There simply is no steady flow of cash that the employer could pay out to his workers regularly. The workers, on the other hand, depend on being regularly paid. Even for the most well-meaning planter, this problem posed itself massively after 1834.

The other big problem was one of communication. Both planters and ex-slaves did not have the vocabulary to negotiate and bargain,, which often led quickly to work on the plantation coming on a standstill. Tobago was particularly hit; not being able to pay enough in cash, the Tobago planters frequently offered share-cropping to the workers. The island's plantation economy went into a steady decline after emancipation, and at the turn of the 20th century, the bankrupt colony was annexed to Trinidad.

In Trinidad, the situation was slightly different in that the main effect of emancipation was that the wages rose considerably, approx. 58% between 1838 and 1842. The reason was mainly that the ex-slaves were better at negotiating their terms. Wanting to improve upon their lot during slavery, they refused to enter into contracts whereas they would be paid by the hour or the day, instead, they opted to be paid by the task. This went very much against the mentality of the planter: like any farmer anywhere in the world, it is normal to work from sunrise to sunset, with lengthy breaks for breakfast, lunch and an afternoon snack. On the other hand, with labour in short supply and the wages being high, the workers often were able to obtain enough money to get by not working every day. The situation quickly went into 'loggerheads', which resulted in the introduction of the system of indentureship and the importation of thousands of Indian workers, 143,939 between 1845 and 1917, to be exact.

This changed the wage situation considerably. While in 1838, the wage for a 'task' ranged between 40 and 65 cents, a hundred years later, in 1938, the weekly wage for unskilled labour in sugar was a mere 35 cents per day! For the East Indian indentured workers, wages in the 1850s averaged 30 to 40 cents per day, and up to the 1870s, the wage per task was between 20 to 25 cents. As more and more Indians came to Trinidad, wages sunk as low as 72 cents per week, even though the Immigration Amendment Ordinance of 1872 had fixed it at $ 1.25. As a compensation, the Indians were offered lodgings, rations and clothing from the employer he was indentured to.

Undoubtedly, the indentureship system in Trinidad played massively into the hands of the employers. The effects of falling wages was not only felt in the working class, but increasingly also in the rising middle class. The reform movements of the late 19th century, which stemmed from the black and coloured intelligentsia, were a direct result of that. The influx of labour had saved the sugar economy, cocoa was on the rise - now many voices started to make themselves heard with a view to distribute the resulting wealth socially more just.

With the introduction of the sugar beet, sugar prices fell rapidly towards the turn of the 19th century. The result was that wages on the estates in Trinidad were lowered massively - as much as 60%. In the mid-1890s, about 30% of the workers on the estates earned as little as six pence per day, to much to die, to little to live. The result was that people began to despise agricultural work and flee the country. By the 1870s, Port of Spain started to be the magnet for unemployed, idle and disillusioned people, who were shacking up in the eastern part of the town, or lived in various states of vagrancy.

Cocoa came as the salvation for many towards the turn of the 20th century. Unlike sugar, cocoa cultivation was profitable even when only applied to a small acreage. Many of the rural Indians in particular were able to make the transition from employment in the sugar industry to making a more comfortable living with a small cocoa plantation. Wages on a cocoa plantation were low, between 25 to 35 cents for women per day, and 35 to 50 cents for men - the usual unfair disparity being apparent.

Besides the agricultural sector, the business sector - import, export, transport and distribution - and the manufacturing sector were also expanding at a rate in 19th century Trinidad. These two sectors, along with the oil sector, needed employees. But even with the increasing demand in the various non-agricultural sectors, wages remained low - $3 to $5 per week were normal. Clerical personnel and the civil service earned wages of £120 - £150 per annum - that didn't go very far and upwardly mobile people often indebted themselves more than they could handle.

The only solution for the employed to press for higher wages was political representation. This they were officially denied under Crown Colony rule. However, 'subversive' organisations like the Trinidad Workingman's Association were formed by Trinidadians of various ethnic backgrounds. After the First World War, when local people came back as heroes and often highly decorated for action in foreign countries, a new self-view of workers started to pervade the country, and in almost twenty years of protests, demonstrations and often bloody confrontations with the authorities, the wage situation was gradually improved

Emancipation Day

An Eyewitness’ Account of Emancipation Day

1st August, 1834

given by Lieutenant Colonel Capadose, a British Army Official, while stationed in Trinidad.

Published by Capadose in 1845 in the book ‘Sixteen Years in the West Indies’

“I was present, with the late Colonel Hardy, at the Government House (or Office) at Port of Spain, Trinidad, on the memorable 1st August, 1834, when, as the first step to freedom, the quondam slaves of all British Dominions, were denominated apprentices - the Governor and Council were all assembled to listen to a representation, or rather an interrogatory, of a number of negroes, regarding their supposed, unlimited, emancipation - these people appeared to be a deputation from a few French Eststes; and were for the most part very old men, old women, and children, the only young man among them was their spokesman, who was probably selected, because he spoke the French language well - it was he who addressed the Governor, with the question, whether the King had not granted them (that is all slaves) unqualified liberty, from that date? That they understood so, and yet their managers and overseers insisted on their working, as ususal, that Morning on the estates.

I must here explain that French gentlemen, managers and overseers, accompanied these negroes to the Government House, H.E., the Governor, Sir George Hill, followed by the Members of Council, the Judges and other official Gentlemen, had repaired to the balcony of the Council chamber to enquire into the cause of such an assmblage as then filled the Court Yard, below the building. In anwer to the above question, be mildly observed that His Majesty had indeed been most graciously pleased to grant them Freedom, that they were consequently no longer slaves, bu free British subjects from that day forth - yet, His Majesty had decreed that they were still to reside on the estate and serve, under certain enactments for their benefit, as before; in capacity of apprentices during six years, after which they would, in 1840, be free to go wherever they pleased - scarcely had His Excellency pronounced “Six years,” than the negroes, old women and men, vociferated “pas de six ans, point de six ans” (not six years, no six years) - hardly would they allow His Excellency to be heard in conclusion, so loud did they repeat “pas de six ans.” etc.

The Governor however continued speaking to them, in their own language, with the greates affability, and concluded by exhorting them, to return quitly home, like good foks, and resume their avocations under employers who, doubtless would treta them kindly, and indeed the new laws ensured them good tetamnet; they nevertheless stood immoveable, and would not retire; the Governor then left the baalcony, and lest he might not have been properly understood by the multitude below, he directed one of the Secretaries, or Government Officers, present, to take his place, and explain more fully what he had said, which was done, but with no better success, the same vociferations being repeated at the words “six years” “pas de six ans!” etc.

At this time two gentlemen entered the council chamber, military officers, Captain Hay, and Captain Mackenzie, just arrivced from England, on appointment, as Special Magistrates, to see the act for the apprenticeship carried into effect. One of these magistrates was accordingly directed by His Excellency to replace the previous speaker, at the balcony, and explain to the infatuated people below, their error; which the magistrate did in the most clear and intelligible manner; read, and explained to them, the printed act, that he held in his hand; exhorted them to wirhdraw peaceably and without delay, or it would become his painful duty to use compultsion; but no, the foolish people were deaf to his remonstrances and ever and anon vociferated “Pas de six ans, nous ne voulons pas de six ans, nous sommes libres, le Roi nous a donné la liberte!” “No six years, we do not want six years, we are free, the King has given us liberty!” at different pauses, or cessation of noise, the young spokesman represented in good French, and with eloquent and respectful tone, that they had toiled all their lives, had enriched their masters by the sweat of their brow, that the King was surely too good to exact of them six years more of servitude, that their masters might take advantage, so as to work them, during that period, to death, or so immoderately, that they could not live long after service - at this, the magistrate assured them that he and his colleagues would take expecial care to prevent such abuse, that the act provided for so many hours moderate labour per day, and such and such allowance of food etc., and that it would be impossible for anyone to ill-treat them - again he most earneslty exhorted them to withdraw, but in vain, they would not - torrents of rain fell, but had apparently no effect on those people, they remained immoveable, vociferating “Pas de six ans” etc. - the Members of Council, and some other gentlemen present, then lost all patience, and forcibly advised the Governor to declare Martial Law - the Militia was under arms in various parts of the town, and artillery drawn out at different points, an insurrection being apprehended, though no symptom of it appeared beyond the pobsinancy of foolish old people in the government courtyard, headed by a single young man, and none of them had even a stick in their hands - nevertheless gentlemen (civilians) about the Governor, were vehement in their demands for Martial Law - His Excellency appeared perplexed, and at length requested the opinion of Colonel Hardy, who had till then remained a tranquil spectator but on being asked whether he deemed it advisable to declare Martial Law, he replied, decidedly not.

“Martial Law!” exclaimed he, “against whom? - I see only old men, women, and children, poor ignorant people, who come to ask a question, and know no better -” or words to that effect. The chief Judge, and to the best of my recollection, the Attorney General, also, coincided in opinion with the Colonel, that there wa necessity for Martial Law, that the police could disperse the obstinate people.

It is to be remarked, that had Martial Law been proclaimed, Colonel Hardy would have been invested with the chief command, would have commanded the Militia, together with the regular force throughout the colony, whilst the Governor’s authority, in a great measure, if not entirely, would have been suspended - yet it was generally believed that had the Colonel advised it, Martial Law would certainly habe been declared in Trinidad. Towards the close of the evening, that is about sunset, the police were called in to act, and by persuasion more than force, caused the obstinate apprentices to ritre; soon after which, Colonel Hardy took me with him, in his gig, to St. James Barracks, on our way we saw bodies of militia, cannon planted at the entry of the streets, with militia artillery-men and lighted matches, as if prepared for a fierce encounter; and as the gig rolled on, a number of girls danced about in the streets, singing French arriettes of, probably, their own composition on the goodness of King William in ganting them freedom - whcih Colonal Hardy observed “looked mightily like insurrection.”

The two or three succeeding days more negroes flocked to town and would not return to their masters, so that the magistrates were compelled to exert the power vested in them, and make some examples by having corporal punishment inflicted on a few of the strong and regractory men, which had the desired effect, and the apprentices returned to the Estates and re-commenced work.

At Naparima the apprentices on some Estates were still more refractory, and several examples were made, which restored order, and all proceeded quitely afterwards.

For about a week to ten days after Aug. 1st, 1834, the inhabitants (many of them) were very apprehensive of insurrection and revolt; the French were the most alarmed. A lady, who had been driven from St. Domingo at the early part of teh French Revolution, told me that the troubles in that Island, commenced by deputations of old persons coming forward in the first instance; and, that consequently, when she heard of the assemblage before the Government House, she dreaded lest similar horrors to those formely perpetrated at St. Domingo were on the eve of being committed in Trinidad.”

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