Catherineberg, St. John

Last Monday I mentioned the slave revolt of 1733. Besides the hardship of slavery there were several other causes for the up-rising. A drought was followed by a hurricane. Then came a plague of insects. These natural disasters destroyed food crops and caused famine. The slaves, hungry and restless, began running away to the bush. (They were called maroons.) In a vain attempt to keep them from running away the Danes imposed a severe slave code with punishments that included torture, branding, whipping and even death.

Among the slaves were a large group from the war-like nation of Akwamu in present day Guinea. It was they who organized the rebellion, using drums to communicate.  In the early morning hours of November 23rd,  they killed six of the seven soldiers garrisoned at the fort at Coral Bay. The one surviving soldier managed to escape to St. Thomas to spread the word.

From the fort they swept through the rest of Coral Bay and on into the interior of the island, killing whites as they went. They did not destroy the plantations as their ultimate goal was to operate them.

Which brings us, finally to Catherineberg. Built around 1718 it was one first sugar plantations on the island. It is here that the Akwamu warriors headquartered themselves.

This picture is by Sydney and Russell Poore. The rest are mine.

It's the only windmill on the island (that I know of) that has rooms beneath it.

A wonderful book that tells the full story of the revolt of 1733 is Night of the Silent Drum, by John Lorenzo Anderson. John and his wife Adrienne, first came to St. John on their honeymoon in 1935. They stayed at my grandmother's guest house at Trunk Bay. John was so taken by the history of the revolt that he spent the next 40 years researching it. He learned to read nine languages in 18th century handwriting and traveled widely to gain access to archival documents. He and Adrienne (a children's book illustrator) came to St. John every year and were close family friends. In fact, it was Adrienne who gave me my very first drawing lesson when I was about seven years old.

Black History Month - The Long Road to Freedom

By 1733 there were 109 plantations on the tiny Danish island of St. John. Many of the slaves belonged to a fierce and proud African tribe called the Amina. In Africa they had been rulers and slave owners themselves. They were used to giving orders, not taking them.

1733 was a devastating year. A drought was followed by a hurricane, which was followed by a plague of insects. These natural disasters were particularly hard on the slave population because, on top of having to labor in the plantation fields, they had to grow their own food. Lack of rain, punishing winds, and insects made supplying their own needs nearly impossible.

Starving slaves began to grow restless, many escaping into the bush. In September, to keep more slaves from running away the Danes imposed a harsh slave code. Punishments were severe and included torture, cutting off an arm or leg, branding, whipping and death.

In the early dawn hours of November 23rd, a group of slaves carrying cane knives, entered the small fort at Coral Bay and killed six of the seven soldiers garrisoned there. That afternoon the one soldier and a few panicked refugees arrived on St. Thomas and told a frightful story.

Whites were being slaughtered, plantations destroyed.

It was a well planned revolt. For six months the slaves held the island of St. John. The Danes had to ask the French for help to quell the rebellion. In the end about a quarter of the 208 whites living on the island had been killed and 48 plantations had been severely damaged.

Only 146 of the 1087 slaves had actually taken part in the revolt. Those who were not captured and sentenced to death, committed suicide rather than surrender.

This first revolt set the huge ship called slavery into a slow turning towards freedom.

In 1755 King Frederick of Denmark issued the Reglement, in which slave rights was mentioned for the first time. In 1802 Denmark became the first European country to abolish the slave trade. Ten years later the Danes required all slave children attend school and classes were taught in English.

In 1834, when Britain freed their slaves, hundreds of slaves from St. John left their homes and families escaping to near-by Tortola. This caused such a labor shortage that it became hard for the plantations to continue operating.

Through continued acts of passive and active resistance and an uprising on St. Croix, all slaves in the Danish West Indies were finally given their freedom on July 3rd, 1848.

Though it had taken over a hundred years, the slaves in the Danish Virgin Islands had won their own freedom.

The news reached St. John on the 4th of July.

Part I - The Fourth of July

I don’t know that there’s any place in the United States that celebrates the Fourth quite like it’s celebrated on St. John.

To understand the significance one must have a little background. To that end, what follows if a very brief history of the U. S. Virgin Islands.

It all started when Columbus discovered the islands on his second trip in 1493. He landed on St. Croix and was chased off by the fierce and sometimes cannibalistic Carib Indians (for which the Caribbean is named.) Sailing north he came across a string of emerald jewels surrounded by turquoise water. There were so many islands he named them after St. Ursula and her entourage of 11,000 virgins.

The islands were “owned” by different countries over the course of the next several hundred years, including Spain, Britain, Holland, and France. During that time it was mostly pirates who used the harbors to hide out. It wasn’t until 1672 that the Danes established a permanent settlement on St. Thomas.

In 1694 the Danes claimed St. John and built a small fort at Coral Bay, perhaps the most protected harbor in the Caribbean. St. John soon became the home to many plantations and over a thousand slaves. By 1733 conditions for the slave population were abysmal. Hurricanes, drought, an insect plague, crop failures, epidemics of cholera and small pox, a severe code of treatment, along with an influx of slaves who had been royalty, all led to a brutal slave uprising.

The revolt of 1733 was bloody and violent. For six months the slaves held the island of St. John. They were not defeated until the Danes called for help from French troops stationed on neighboring islands. Even then, the leaders of the revolt refused to surrender. Knowing they would die a slow painful death if they did, they chose instead to commit mass suicide. (An excellent historically accurate account of the revolt is told in the book Night of the Silent Drum by John L. Anderson.)

This revolt is the cornerstone, the foundation, on which was built, over the course of the next 100 years, the determination by an enslaved people to be free.

There are many things that happened, many things the slaves did in an effort to win their freedom, but the final straw was a slave revolt on St. Croix which forced Governor Peter von Scholten to abolish slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation was read on St. Croix on July 3, 1848.

This is a picture of the Lord God of Sabaoth Lutheran Church where the proclamation was read.

St. John, home of the first revolt, didn’t get the news until the next day, on July 4th.

In 1917 the islands were bought by the United States. The islanders embraced being citizens and identified with those who fought for their independence from England.

And that’s why the Fourth of July Festival on St. John is celebrated with such enthusiasm. It is a celebration of freedom from slavery and freedom from tyranny, a celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation and the Declaration of Independence.

Coming soon? well, certainly eventually:
Part II - The St. John Festival