How a Nova Scotia ship played a role in international Black history | 24CA News
A Nineteenth-century ship that after sailed between Yarmouth and Boston performed a little-known half in worldwide Black historical past.
The S.S. Yarmouth was the primary vessel acquired by the Black Star Line, the primary Black-owned transport line in North America.
Built in 1887, it was nicely previous its prime when the charismatic chief of the New York City-based United Negro Improvement Association, Marcus Mosiah Garvey Sr., bought it in 1919 for his new firm.
Garvey was a political activist and a frontrunner within the pan-African motion, devoted to African independence and unity.
The goal of the Black Star Line was to present discrimination-free transportation to the Caribbean, South and Central America and Africa.
But a mere three years later, Garvey was charged with mail fraud and later convicted in reference to promoting shares within the firm.
Symbol of Black achievement
Born in Jamaica, Garvey had moved to the United States in 1916 and based the corporate within the hopes that it will turn into an emblem of Black achievement and empowerment.
But students consider his lack of expertise in working a transport line and the belief he positioned in others could have doomed the Black Star Line from the beginning.
Unable to boost sufficient capital to buy the vessel from its Nova Scotia house owners outright, Garvey’s firm chartered the vessel for a journey to the West Indies, unofficially renamed it the SS Frederick Douglas, and entered into a purchase order settlement.
According to a 1922 report from the Bureau of Investigation (the precursor to the Federal Bureau of Investigation), Garvey wound up paying far greater than the vessel was value as a result of he was so decided to have a ship to fulfil guarantees he had made and to “enhance the stock selling possibilities.”
“They entered into the various agreements with Harriss, Magill & Co. to purchase for $168,000, in addition to the price of the charter, this thirty year old ship in dilapidated condition, and this at at time when many and good ships could have been obtained at ridiculously low prices,” the report acknowledged.
‘Propaganda’ worth
With its primarily Black crew, the ship was supposed to assist increase consciousness about the corporate and drum up curiosity in shopping for $5 shares in it.
The Black Star Line later purchased two different ships, however neither of them have been as common or as well-travelled because the S.S. Yarmouth.
According to Rupert Lewis, a professor emeritus on the University of the West Indies in Jamaica and creator of a e-book about Garvey, the ship had great “propaganda” and mobilization worth for the Garvey motion.
The ship generated nice pleasure among the many native Black populations when it made stops at ports in Jamaica, Costa Rica, Cuba and Panama.
“Thousands of people came out to observe the Garvey ship in different parts of the Caribbean, and the word spread,” Lewis mentioned.
“People bought shares. People joined the UNIA. People travelled on these boats and therefore it was of tremendous symbolic importance, but also practical significance because it actually happened.”
In late 1920, whereas anchored in New York City, the S.S. Yarmouth was broken in a collision and required intensive repairs. The ship was bought by public public sale for $1,625 the next yr and was subsequently scrapped, ending its lengthy and storied existence.
Charges racially motivated, professor says
In January 1922, Garvey was charged with mail fraud. After a trial, he was discovered responsible in June 1923. He was sentenced to 5 years in jail and fined $1,000.
Garvey appealed the choice however his enchantment was rejected and he was despatched to a federal jail in 1925 to serve his sentence.
Justin Hansford, a professor and director of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Centre at Howard University in Washington, D.C., mentioned Garvey’s prosecution was largely motivated by race.
“The argument was nobody, no Black man, no Black person, could operate his own shipping line,” Hansford mentioned.
“So by definition, a Black person saying that he was going to operate his own shipping company had to be a fraud because that’s a preposterous proposal in the first place.”
Hansford mentioned there was no proof that Garvey gained financially from the Black Star Line, together with from the sale of shares within the firm.
Deportation to Jamaica
Submitting to public strain – significantly strain from African Americans – President Calvin Coolidge commuted Garvey’s sentence in November 1927.
Garvey was deported to Jamaica the place he bought concerned in politics. He later moved to England and died there in 1940 at age 52.
Today, 100 years after he was charged, efforts are nonetheless being made within the United States by members of Garvey’s household, Hansford and others to have him pardoned and his function in Black historical past extra widely known.
But in his native Jamaica, Garvey was declared the nation’s first nationwide hero in 1969. His physique was faraway from England and reinterred in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1964.
Meanwhile, Lewis mentioned the Black Star Line’s five-pointed black star, which as soon as flew above the S.S. Yarmouth, impressed the Black Star of Africa that right now adorns Ghana’s nationwide flag.
For extra tales in regards to the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success tales throughout the Black neighborhood — try Being Black in Canada, a CBC mission Black Canadians may be pleased with. You can learn extra tales right here.
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