During the past week of May 7th – 12th 2024, Barbados hosted and welcomed home a contingent of Liberians for a time of celebration and exchange, in honour of the shared ancestral past. It was a poignant, soul-searching, reflective time as people conversed with each other, explored the island, engaged with the stories, embraced the spaces where their ancestors would have traversed, and enjoyed every moment of every event. There were a number of events, which were the staging grounds for these exchanges.
BACKGROUND
Here is some of the background to the Liberia settlement story. American authorities concerned for the numerical growth of Free Negroes in America, in an effort to control this development gave birth in 1816 to the founding of the American Colonization Society, which was originally known as the American Society for Colonizing the Free People of Color of the United States. This entity was founded specifically for the transporting of Free Negroes in America, to return to the African continent. In
the face of many setbacks the settlers pressed on and overcame the obstacles and in 1824, the settlement was successful enough to be named. Liberia was the name given and its capital, Monrovia.
The African west coast had lost many of its inhabitants to the vile system of slavery, as they were stolen away from their homelands as slave labour to the imperialist European nations, in this context Britian was that power. However, forty-one years later on April 6,1865, after the settlement of Liberia, the Brig Cora left the shores of Barbados for Liberia, carrying free men, women, and children who decided to make lives in Africa in an effort to rebuild the continent. The British end or emancipation of slavery had occurred in 1838 and these men and women were moving back to the continent, they had made that conscious decision. Many of these families are represented here on this journey today, they have returned to visit their ancestral homeland, to this place where their kidnapped ancestors were brought to Barbados as enslaved labour. However, today in honour of the ancestors, these descendants make this Sankofa Pilgrimage as free and accomplished people, some of whom continue to reside in the borders of Liberia and others across the world! WELCOME HOME … Barbados loves you!
Claudette Levi-Farnum
Historian
May 12, 2024