His Majesty's ship Leopard forced the [USS] Chesapeake to surrender off the Virginia Capes in 1807, and sullied American national honor by impressing American men ... two of the four impressed sailors were men of color. White dominated national memory veiled that fact. Black Jacks; African American Seamen in the Age of Sail, by W. Jeffrey Bolster (Harvard University Press, 1997)
The misconception that African Americans have had little to do with the shaping of this nation is widely held. If all Americans were to read W. Jeffrey Bolster's book Black Jacks, this misconception would quickly be dispelled. If I had my druthers, it would be required reading for all people, everywhere.
Bolster's book was published while he was an assistant professor of history at the University of New Hampshire in 1997. He is a professional seaman who holds a master mariner's licence. Among the many informational sources cited by Bolster in Black Jacks is the noted historian, Joseph P. Reidy. Professor Reidy currently teaches at Howard University in Washington, DC. He has spent the past eight years studying African Americans' involvement in the Civil War especially in US naval service.
One of the long series of events that precipitated the War of 1812 was the encounter between HMS Leopard and the USS Chesapeake. At the time that the Chesapeake's captain, James Lawrence, shouted his famous words to his crew, Don't give up the ship!
American hopes for uninterrupted peaceful commerce at sea were being incrementally dashed. Impressment into the British navy had become commonplace. Americans who would not submit to service aboard British vessels were imprisoned for years in the British admiralty's dreaded Dartmoor prison. This desolate and unforgiving prison situated amid England's Devonshire moor was the place of death for many during their incarceration. Some Americans did not even make it to the prison; death overtook them during the march they were forced to endure in order to reach it.
By the end of 1813, 6000 prisoners of war were being held at Dartmoor. Nearly 1000 of that number were African Americans. It is as sad as it is ironic that, as horrible a place as it was, for a time black sailors were treated with a good deal more dignity and respect while they were in that English prison than they were, regardless of whether they were free or enslaved, in America.
Racial segregation at Dartmoor prison initially existed only within messes, the groups of six men who were issued food together. This changed once Americans mustered sufficient numbers to assert themselves against the French prisoners, and once the black population swelled enough that white sailors perceived it as threatening. Ten months after the first Americans arrived, some whites petitioned Captain Cotgrave to have the black prisoners separated.
As I read Black Jacks, the issue of reparations came to mind. I found myself thinking, Anyone who is opposed to repairing the longstanding damage that American-style racism has done to African Americans should consider the plight of black mariners. You see, those sailors, cooks, mates and even the occasional Northern captain were not allowed to disembark under any circumstances in many ports, especially Southern ones. Some of the locals' concern had to do with the fact that many black mariners helped slaves escape.
For Charleston slaveholders, racial worries shadowed commercial profits. Scarcely a vessel ... arrives in our port from the North, they lamented in 1823, which has not two or three, or more black [here, read free] persons employed.
Whites prophesied that their slaves would be seduced from service of their masters in greater numbers and that Abolition Societies of the North would intrigue, through this class of persons, with our slave population.
Not only were those black mariners who ventured ashore arrested and imprisoned, but very often even those who did not disembark were forcibly taken from their vessels and jailed for the duration of their vessels' time in port. Moreover, they were made to pay for the confinement, food and paper work provided by the local sheriff. A seaman's pay was precious little in those days.
Nevertheless, some ships' captains passed on the cost of imprisonment to the black hands. 'We had to pay our jail fees, the Recorder's and officer's bills, lamented a seamen after a stint in the New Orleans prison. The expenses were not inconsequential. In November 1843, Captain Dill of the brig Penguin paid $23.43 for 'arrest, registry, dieting, etc. of Robert White, John Pluten, [and] Richard Fabler, colored seamen, in Charleston. In 1844 a ship's agent in New Orleans paid $8.25 'for taking the Cook out of jail. Cooks then earned only $16 to $20 per month, and seamen a few dollars less. Black mariners absorbing the cost of a southern port stay found weeks or even months of their wages deducted.
While I suspect that Bolster's writing of this book was not intended to be an argument in support of paying reparations to African Americans for the past evil and lingering residue of slavery in America, it is my opinion that, no matter how inadvertently, he has made one of the best cases that I have read, to date, for doing precisely that. I urge you to read this book!
BY BRANDON ASTOR JONES
[The writer is a prisoner on death row in the United States. He welcomes letters commenting on his columns (include your name and full return address on the envelope, or prison authorities may refuse to deliver it). He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, EF-122216, G3-77, Georgia Diagnostic & Classification Prison, PO Box 3877, Jackson, GA 30233, USA, or email <brandonastorjones@hotmail.com>. Jones is seeking a publisher for his autobiography, growing down. Please notify him of any possible leads. Visit Jones' web page at <http://www.brandonastorjones.com>.]