Black Loyalists in Canada

 

During this Black History Month the Canadian mint has issued a commemorative $20 silver coin which will actually set you back a hundred bucks if you decide to purchase one. Here is the description accompanying the coin, or a portion of it: 

The coin is engraved with the armorial bearings of the Black Loyalist Heritage Society as a tribute to the free and enslaved Black people who re-settled to British North America before, during and after the American War of Independence.During the war, many slaves were offered freedom in exchange for joining the British Army.

After the war, many Black Loyalists established roots in Lower Canada and the Maritime Provinces. However, their promise of a better life went largely unfulfilled and they faced many struggles and hardships.

Those who remained in British North America, despite adversity, helped re-shape Canada's culture and character, and the struggles and achievements of the Black Loyalists and their descendants are an important part of Canadian history.

If you have been reading this blog for a while you'll know that I have been interested in Black history in Nova Scotia over time because we lived in Halifax for a time. I was present  the July morning in 2002 when Sheia Copps named Africville a National Historic site, a moving event.

I read Lawrence Hill's novel The Book of Negroes while vacationing on the South Shore of Nova Scotia and realized that we were only minutes away from Shelburne and Birchtown where thousands of Black Loyalists came for a new life of freedom, only to be exploited. 

The Black Loyalist Heritage Centre at Birchtown is a place to spend hours considering what those immigrants experienced. It was there that I learned about pastor David George who   established a church in Shelburne and became the leader of the Baptist contingent of the  Loyalists. Some whites resented his influence in the community and his house and those of many of his followers were attacked and destroyed in July 1784 by racist mobs in the Shelburne Riots George and his wife moved to nearby Birchtown, but chose to migrate with other Black Loyalists to Freetown, Sierra Leone, West Africa, where the British provided some assistance in setting up a new colony and settlement. 

The commemorative coin doesn't turn my crank, but I'm glad the news about it's issue, prompted me to recall some aspects of Black history in Canada. Here is the link for the Heritage Centre, in case you're interested in learning more. 

https://blackloyalist.novascotia.ca/