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Runaways| A History of Bahamian Enslavement

Runaways was conceived to amplify the voices of runaway slaves in and through The Bahamas. Runaway slave advertisements are important to see those people who otherwise might be hidden from the historical narrative. In Bahamian history, slave advertisements from The Bahamas are one of the only ways to see the enslaved persons actions clearly from primary source documents.

While runaway slave advertisements speak with a colonial voice, they possess great possibilities for information. Despite the silences within the newspaper advertisements, you can begin to imagine and piece together, with other primary source material, the possibilities and meanings of these silences in the archive.

Runaways is a resource for researchers, teachers, and students who want to learn more about those “with the look of a complete villian.” 1 Running away was a common act of resistance amongst enslaved persons. With Runaways, all the runaway slave advertisements published in the Bahamian colony are compiled in one place for everyone to view.

Map of the Bahama Islands and the Turks & Caicos Islands.

Take a look and meet Castalio who ran with Dick from New York to Abaco or Peter and Pindar who ran away from their enslaver’s plantation with their four sons. Black Loyalists, Sambo and Prince, appear in the archive as well. Or see Charlotte who ran away at least twice from her enslaver. These persons named are just a small few that appear in over 300 runaway slave advertisements.

Reading runaway slave advertisements combined with the photography by Jacob Frank Coonley (Courtesy of the University of Cambridge Library) will help you to visualize Nassau, New Providence and The Bahamas more widely.2 See yourself walking along Bay Street and breathing in the salt air. Walk Over-the-Hill to Grant’s Town and see the stacked stone walls and thatched roof houses Black Bahamians lived in. Let your mind carry you to Alligator Bay, Long Island, and labour alongside field workers as they harvest sisal and herd cattle.

Use the photos and the runaway slave advertisements to see what life would have been like in the eariler late 18th and eariler 19th century for enslaved people of colour.3

To promote Bahamian Creole – yes, it is a “real” language – some of the website contains words, phrases, and entire paragraphs in Bahamian Creole. Bahamian Creole is a language separate from British or American English.4 It has its own grammar and linguistic rules. Don’t argue wit me, argue wit ya ma! See da video dun below fa more info!

Notes

  1. Bahama Gazette, October 28, 1786. ↩

  2. These photos are estimated to be from around 1890-1895 and are primarily set in Nassau, New Providence. The people in these photos are not enslaved but their way of life and geography of Nassau did not change much from emanicipation to the late 19th century. ↩

  3. These photos from Cambridge’s archive allows viewers to see Black Bahamians engaging with jobs they would have done while enslaved. Some of the locations, such as Grant’s town were places that enslaved and free people of colour lived that only grew after emanicipation. Many of the buildings seen in these photos were built by the early 19th century. ↩

  4. Bahamian Creole is an English-based creole language. It is made of British English and West-African Languages as the main influences on it. ↩