A prize-worthy book

by Oscar Allen 03.AUG.07

This is a mature book by a matured scholar, and although we have had to wait more than thirty years for it to be published, it now comes to us as a richer and more substantial study. The pity is that even after 30 years after his PhD study, Dr. Marshall can still say, it is “the first attempt to analyze the nature of slave society in these four communities (Tobago, Grenada, St.Vincent and Dominica) during sixty critical years of slavery in the Caribbean”.{{more}} The book has the title “Slavery Law and Society in the British Windward Islands1763-1823; A Comparative Study”. Written by Vincentian born historian, the late Bernard Marshall, it is published under the imprint of Arawak Press in 2007

Marshall has in a sense bequeathed this work to all of us. He has dedicated it to his biological parents Maria and Casper Marshall, and to his intellectual mentor, the late Professor Elsa Goveia. The book is written in the spirit of militant history, refuting and revising the story which the colonial interpreters told us, glorifying themselves and diminishing us. It is useful to note that Bernard Marshall is of Garifuna ancestry, and his siblings are persons who continue to give community service in the region-including Nelcia Robinson Hazel, Rawle, Anselm, Hayden, and Gregory Marshall.

There are ten chapters in the book. Here are some of the chapter titles (1) The 18th century sugar revolution and Black Carib/Kalinago resistance, (3) The failure of the federal idea 1763-1775 (4) The legal, judicial systems; (5) Slavery and the plantation system; (6) Law as a weapon of state coercion; (8) Religion as an agent of social control and social stability; (9) Slave resistance marronage, rebellion, revolt. Although it is a kind of slim book of 300 pages -to be carrying all these disciplines, the treatment that Marshall gives them is engaging, at points fascinating, and always informative. He is in the intellectual tradition of Goveia, Rodney, Fanon, and Marx.

Marshall, discussing the Kalinago defence of their homeland, takes a militant stand against William Young’s account of the British war against the Kalinago – “the savages” according to Young, against the “innocent” British. He reports that in 1772 the British decided to call up the following forces to achieve “the absolute and immediate removal of the Kalinago from St. Vincent”.

All the troops in the Grenada government and Dominica

Two regiments from North America, and if needed

The forces in the Leeward Islands and the naval squadron in the area.

This mobilisation shows how much the British respected or feared the national tenacity and fighting skill-the martial arts of our Kalinago fore citizens.

In his chapter on Laws, Dr. Marshall points out two features of the clauses in the Act, policing features and economic features. Policing features or measures controlled the movement of slaves, the beating of drums, the confrontation with white people, the access (searching) to slaves houses, and the gathering together of slaves. The death sentence was in place for violating many of these measures, including settling fire to cane or cocoa cultivation. The economic features made the slaves depend on the “owners” for their livelihood, and thus kept them submissive.

The St. Vincent Act gave to male slave once a year “one pair of drawers, and a shirt or close bodied frock. It gives to females “a petticoat and a short or close bodied frock”. There is quite some detail in the account of slave Law which Marshall describes as “an instrument of oppression, brutality, barbarism…” engineered by the minority ruling class.

When he turns his attention to Religion, Marshall gives some attention to the Methodist mission work. He notes that at the end of the period covered by his study- in 1823 the Methodist in the West Indies had 50 missionaries, 955 whites in membership, and 25,176 slaves as members. The St. Vincent Station had 5 missionaries, 12 whites in membership and 2,889 slaves as members. Noting the “the invaluable contribution in the field of elementary education for the slaves” as a positive effect of the Methodist mission, Marshall adds however that “these praiseworthy aspects… were from another point of view outweighed by the contributions they made to social stability” (of slavery). His discussion of this on pp 196-199, deserves some reflection.

Bernard Marshall’s book presents us with material that we will not find put together anywhere else. It does not disappoint the readers. It makes me reflect though that particularly in the Windward Islands, or the OECS, we need to establish a house of learning about ourselves. It took 30 plus years for us to be able to read Bernard Marshall’s work, Woodville Marshall’s study of peasant history in the Windwards after emancipation is 40 years old and has not been published – Kenneth John’s study of our politics (1951 – 1970) has not been published and so much more.

We have been intellectually impoverished and underdeveloped by our learning institutions and publishers. Can we award this book by Marshall as our pioneer small island learning prize (with suitable name)? Can we begin to set up our small island House of Learning? This book by our brother, the late Bernard Marshall is a fit work for us all to embrace in our various interests and disciplines. It should motivate our present population of students to want to do their own studies and help us know ourselves better, help us to become wise.