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The Merikins (1812)

The Merikins were African-American refugees of the War of 1812 – freed black slaves who fought for the British against the USA in the Corps of Colonial Marines. freed black slaves were recruited by the British during the American Revolution. There was a similar policy and six companies of freed black slaves were recruited into a Corps of Colonial Marines along the Atlantic coast, from Chesapeake Bay to Georgia  After that war, they were settled in colonies of British Empire including Canada, Jamaica and the Bahamas. After the end of the War, the Colonial Marines were first stationed at the Royal Naval Dockyard, Bermuda, and on rejecting government orders to be transferred to the West India Regiments, agreed to be settled in Trinidad. The Governor of Trinidad, Sir Ralph Woodford, wanted to increase the number of small farmers in that colony and arranged for the creation of a village for each company on the Naparima Plain in the south of the island.They established as a community ...

Brief history of Jamaica

Brief history of Jamaica before, doing and after the Europeans invaded, occupied, colonized and enslaved the Island by the way of Christopher Columbus. You might call this the testing ground for the enslavement of Africans in what we now call the USA. Pre-Colombian Jamaica Prior to the arrival of Columbus in 1494, Jamaica was inhabited by Arawaks, living in simple communities based on fishing, hunting, and small scale cultivation of cassava. The impact of the contact with the Spanish was traumatic, and these communities disappeared in 70-80 years. Plunder, disruption of economic activities, new diseases, and migration decimated the indigenous population. Only a few artifacts-facts, examples of which are on display at the small museum at White Marl, and a few Spanish corruptions of place names (such as Ocho Rios) remain from this period. Otherwise, there is no Arawak influence on the subsequent development of life on the island. The Spanish Occupation, 1494-1655 Disappointed...

John Punch

Beginning of African Enslavement In the English Colonies and the USA John Punch is one of the first servants on record to be sentenced to slavery on the grounds of race in what we now call the USA. In other words, this was the beginning of African enslavement in the English colonies and subsequently the USA. Punch was a servant of the Virginia planter Hugh Gwyn, a wealthy landowner, a justice and one of the few members of the House of Burgesses, representing Charles River  County (which would become York County in 1642). In 1640, Punch ran away to Maryland with two European indentured servants of Gwyn. The three men were returned to Virginia and on 9 July, the Virginia Governor's Council, which served as the colony's highest court, sentenced the two Europeans to have their terms of indenture extended by four years each, but they sentenced Punch to a life of servitude. In addition, the council sentenced the three men to thirty lashes each. Wikipedia

Virginia and the Negro

Virginia and the Negro [African] in the 17th Century and Established the Standard for Slavery in the USA "Negroes [Africans] first appeared in Virginia in August 1619, transported aboard a Dutch frigate, not as slaves but as indentured servants. These twenty Negroes, three of whom were women, bound themselves as indentured servants, to work for masters for a specified length of time in return for their passage across the Atlantic. For the next seventy-five years, indentured s ervitude by both Negroes [African] - and whites provided a satisfactory solution to the need for a labor supply. By 1691, this situation had undergone a dramatic change and it became customary to hold black indentured servants past their term of service. A variety of factors contributed to this change in status for Black indentured servants. The supply of free labor decreased while their costs went up. Britain began to take control of the lucrative African and Caribbean slave trade so that there wer...