Telling the Vincentian Story!

Drs Fraser, Cleve Scott and Michael Dennie are authors of this first volume. Dr Arnold Thomas served as a consultant but will be featured as one of the authors for Volume 2. Our story like that of sister Caribbean colonies was told by others, the planters, missionaries, colonisers and their friends. What they gave us was really their story, not ours. We were objects of what was supposed to be our history, not subjects. They defined us in ways that suited their interests and goals, sometimes, or most times in the most derogatory ways possible.

Our indigenous ancestors were painted as cannibals. They even told us which Europeans tasted best for them. They said that our African ancestors came here to be exposed to civilisation and to be Christianised. Two remarkable books began to change that: CAPITALISM AND SLAVERY by Dr. Eric Williams, a former Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, and another Trinidadian CLR James, author of the BLACK JACOBINES. Eric Williams challenged the story given about the emancipation of the enslaved people. James made the enslaved subjects of their own history. Eric Williams said that the British government was faced with the alternatives of either Emancipation from above or from the enslaved themselves as happened in Haiti.

Other West Indians and critics of European colonialism got on board with their critique of the story told by the planters and colonisers. West Indian history began to be taught in our schools, but the focus was on the larger colonies and Barbados as they were then. The history of the smaller colonies, to the extent that it was told, did not capture our uniqueness and show the differences that existed in our stories. Our history, even when it was told by our brothers and sisters, did not therefore fully tell our story. How many of us knew that St. Vincent (with Tobago) was the last to be colonised by the Europeans and kept up the struggle against the Europeans up to 1797?

Some years ago, the need for a history of our country began to be expressed. Eventually the government of Dr. Ralph Gonsalves commissioned the work. Dr Godwin Friday who was then leader of the opposition indicated to one of the authors that whenever he got into government, he will pass the baton on to us to continue to tell the story. We worked as a team, meeting two days a week by ZOOM. We built a bond, shared information based on our individual research. We wrote, discussed, analysed and at times invited others to be part of our conversation.

It is fitting that this book will be launched this month, Heritage Month, because it looks at the struggles of our indigenous ancestors and the life of our enslaved and their struggle against Slavery. Chatoyer is featured. The story of his death rejected. We examined the circumstances which led to 4, 633 of the indigenous people being sent to the barren island of Balliceaux and to the death of half of those who were sent to that island. That was a period of Genocide as the Kalinago and Garifuna struggles played themselves out.

On March 14, a week ago, a large team of descendants visited for a journey to Balliceaux to pay tribute to their ancestors who died on that small island that had no streams nor springs. They gathered at the Obelisk at Dorsetshire Hill to honour their Chief who we recognise as our first National Hero and not as the villain as he was described by the colonisers who wanted the lands of his people. Following the ceremony at the Obelisk at Dorsetshire Hill, Vincentians and the visiting Garifuna people journeyed to Greigs, one of the communities formed by the Garifuna/Kalinago people who had evaded capture and had refused to surrender. They had moved into the interior to avoid capture by the English. There were other communities, including one at Lapiton in the Spring Village area.

The story is told of Nelly Ibo who was reported to have killed on Mayreau in 1809 planter St. Hilaire of French descent. While the Emancipation Bill was being discussed in the British parliament they were informed of disturbances in the Carib Country estates. Some of the enslaved were turning out to work late, even attributing their lateness to the coldness of the weather. Groups of 30 to 40 people were going to the estate hospitals (sick houses) claiming to be sick. Others protested in a variety of ways.

We concluded the volume: – “On November 27, 2025, as this volume was being finalised, the ULP lost the general elections. This loss meant that after 24 years in opposition, the NDP had returned to office. This momentous exercise of the franchise is reflective of the Vincentian peoples’ capacity to command global attention, to transfix the Caribbean with the audacity of their boisterous voice, and to alter the trajectory of their experience. But in the full sweep of Vincentian sensibilities, there is the capacity to do large things; to do historic things and these legitimise the deeper study of Vincentian history.”