University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER IV

COLONIZATION AS A REMEDY FOR MIGRATION

BECAUSE of these untoward circumstances
consequent to the immigration of free
Negroes and fugitives into the North, their enemies,
and in some cases their well-intentioned
friends, advocated the diversion of these elements
to foreign soil. Benezet and Brannagan
had the idea of settling the Negroes on the public
lands in the West largely to relieve the situation
in the North.[1] Certain anti-slavery men
of Kentucky, as we have observed, recommended
the same. But this was hardly advocated at all
by the farseeing white men after the close of
the first quarter of the nineteenth century. It
was by that time very clear that white men
would want to occupy all lands within the present
limits of the United States. Few statesmen
dared to encourage migration to Canada because
the large number of fugitives who had already
escaped there had attached to that region
the stigma of being an asylum for fugitives
from the slave States.

The most influential people who gave thought
to this question finally decided that the colonization
of the Negro in Africa was the only solution

of the problem. The plan of African colonization
appealed more generally to the people
of both North and South than the other efforts,
which, at best, could do no more than to offer
local or temporary relief. The African colonizationists
proceeded on the basis that the Negroes
had no chance for racial development in
this country. They could secure no kind of
honorable employment, could not associate with
congenial white friends whose minds and pursuits
might operate as a stimulus upon their industry
and could not rise to the level of the successful
professional or business men found
around them. In short, they must ever be
hewers of wood and drawers of water.[2]

To emphasize further the necessity of emigration
to Africa the advocates of deportation
to foreign soil generally referred to the condition
of the migrating Negroes as a case in evidence.
"So long," said one, "as you must sit,
stand, walk, ride, dwell, eat and sleep here and
the Negro there, he cannot be free in any part
of the country."[3] This idea working through
the minds of northern men, who had for years
thought merely of the injustice of slavery, began
to change their attitude toward the abolitionists
who had never undertaken to solve the
problem of the blacks who were seeking refuge

in the North. Many thinkers controlling public
opinion then gave audience to the colonizationists
and circles once closed to them were
thereafter opened.[4]

There was, therefore, a tendency toward a
more systematic effort than had hitherto characterized
the endeavors of the colonizationists.
The objects of their philanthropy were not to
be stolen away and hurried off to an uncongenial
land for the oppressed. They were in accordance
with the exigencies of their new situation
to be prepared by instruction in mechanic arts,
agriculture, science and Biblical literature that
some might lead in the higher pursuits and
others might skilfully serve their fellows.[5]
Private enterprise was at first depended on to
carry out the schemes but it soon became evident
that a better method was necessary. Finally
out of the proposals of various thinkers
and out of the actual colonization feats of Paul
Cuffé, a Negro, came a national meeting for
this purpose, held in Washington, December,
1816, and the organization of the American Colonization
Society. This meeting was attended
by some of the most prominent men in the
United States, among whom were Henry Clay,
Francis S. Key, Bishop William Meade, John
Randolph and Judge Bushrod Washington.

The American Colonization Society, however,
failed to facilitate the movement of the free
Negro from the South and did not promote the
general welfare of the race. The reasons for
these failures are many. In the first place, the
society was all things to all men. To the antislavery
man whose ardor had been dampened
by the meagre results obtained by his agitation,
the scheme was the next best thing to remove
the objections of slaveholders who had said they
would emancipate their bondsmen, if they could
be assured of their being deported to foreign
soil. To the radical proslavery man and to the
northerner hating the Negro it was well
adapted to rid the country of the free persons
of color whom they regarded as the pariahs of
society.[6] Furthermore, although the Colonization
Society became seemingly popular and the
various States organized branches of it and
raised money to promote the movement, the
slaveholders as a majority never reached the
position of parting with their slaves and the
country would not take such radical action as to
compel free Negroes to undergo expatriation
when militant abolitionists were fearlessly denouncing
the scheme.[7]

The free people of color themselves were not
only not anxious to go but bore it grievously

that any one should even suggest that they
should be driven from the country in which they
were born and for the independence of which
their fathers had died. They held indignation
meetings throughout the North to denounce the
scheme as a selfish policy inimical to the interests
of the people of color.[8] Branded thus as
the inveterate foe of the blacks both slave and
free, the American Colonization Society effected
the deportation of only such Negroes as southern
masters felt disposed to emancipate from
time to time and a few others induced to go. As
the industrial revolution early changed the aspect
of the economic situation in the South so
as to make slavery seemingly profitable, few
masters ever thought of liberating their slaves.

Scarcely any intelligent Negroes except those
who, for economic or religious reasons were interested,
availed themselves of this opportunity
to go to the land of their ancestors. From the
reports of the Colonization Society we learn that
from 1820 to 1833 only 2,885 Negroes were sent
to Africa by the Society. Furthermore, more
than 2,700 of this number were taken from the
slave States, and about two thirds of these were
slaves manumitted on the condition that they
would emigrate.[9] Later statistics show the
same tendency. By 1852, 7,836 had been deported

from the United States to Liberia. 2,720
of these were born free, 204 purchased their
freedom, 3,868 were emancipated in view of
their going to Liberia and 1,044 were liberated
Africans returned by the United States Government.[10]
Considering the fact that there were
434,495 free persons of color in this country in
1850 and 488,070 in 1860, the colonizationists
saw that the very element of the population
which the movement was intended to send out
of the country had increased rather than decreased.
It is clear, then, that the American
Colonization Society, though regarded as a factor
to play an important part in promoting the
exodus of the free Negroes to foreign soil, was
an inglorious failure.

Colonization in other quarters, however, was
not abandoned. A colony of Negroes in Texas
was contemplated in 1833 prior to the time when
the republic became independent of Mexico, as
slavery was not at first assured in that State.
The New York Commercial Advertiser had no
objection to the enterprise but felt that there
were natural obstacles such as a more expensive
conveyance than that to Monrovia, the high
price of land in that country, the Catholic religion
to which Negroes were not accustomed to
conform, and their lack of knowledge of the
Spanish language. The editor observed that
some who had emigrated to Hayti a few years

before became discontented because they did not
know the language. Louisiana, a slave State,
moreover, would not suffer near its borders a
free Negro republic to serve as an asylum for
refugees.[11] The Richmond Whig saw the actual
situation in dubbing the scheme as chimerical
for the reason that a more unsuitable country
for the blacks did not exist. Socially and politically
it would never suit the Negroes. Already
a great number of adventurers from the United
States had gone to Texas and fugitives from
justice from Mexico, a fierce, lawless and turbulent
class, would give the Negroes little
chance there, as the Negroes could not contend
with the Spaniard and the Creole. The editor
believed that an inferior race could never exist
in safety surrounded by a superior one despising
them. Colonization in Africa was then
urged and the efforts of the blacks to go elsewhere
were characterized as doing mischief at
every turn to defeat the "enlightened plan" for
the amelioration of the Negroes.[12]

It was still thought possible to induce the Negroes
to go to some congenial foreign land, although
few of them would agree to emigrate to
Africa. Not a few Negroes began during the
two decades immediately preceding the Civil
War to think more favorably of African colonization
and a still larger number, in view of

the increasing disabilities fixed upon their class,
thought of migrating to some country nearer to
the United States. Much was said about Central
America, but British Guiana and the West
Indies proved to be the most inviting fields to
the latter-day Negro colonizationists. This idea
was by no means new, for Jefferson in his foresight
had, in a letter to Governor Edward Coles,
of Illinois, in 1814, shown the possibilities of
colonization in the West Indies. He felt that
because Santo Domingo had become an independent
Negro republic it would offer a solution
of the problem as to where the Negroes should
be colonized. In this way these islands would
become a sort of safety valve for the United
States. He became more and more convinced
that all the West Indies would remain in the
hands of the people of color, and a total expulsion
of the whites sooner or later would take
place. It was high time, he thought, that Americans
should foresee the bloody scenes which
their children certainly, and possibly they themselves,
would have to wade through.[13]

The movement to the West Indies was accelerated
by other factors. After the emancipation
in those islands in the thirties, there had for
some years been a dearth of labor. Desiring to
enjoy their freedom and living in a climate
where there was not much struggle for life, the
freedmen either refused to work regularly or
wandered about purposely from year to year.
The islands in which sugar had once played a
conspicuous part as the foundation of their industry
declined and something had to be done
to meet this exigency. In the forties and fifties,
therefore, there came to the United States a
number of labor agents whose aim was to set
forth the inviting aspect of the situation in the
West Indies so as to induce free Negroes to try
their fortunes there. To this end meetings were
held in Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and

Boston and even in some of the cities of the
South, where these agents appealed to the free
Negroes to emigrate.[14]

Thus before the American Colonization Society
had got well on its way toward accomplishing
its purpose of deporting the Negroes to
Africa the West Indies and British Guiana
claimed the attention of free people of color in
offering there unusual opportunities. After the
consummation of British emancipation in those
islands in 1838, the English nation came to be
regarded by the Negroes of the United States
as the exclusive friend of the race. The Negro
press and church vied with each other in praising
British emancipation as an act of philanthropy
and pointed to the English dominions as
an asylum for the oppressed. So disturbed
were the whites by this growing feeling that
riots broke out in northern cities on occasions of
Negro celebrations of the anniversary of emancipation
in the West Indies.[15]

In view of these facts, the colonizationists had
to redouble their efforts to defend their cause.
They found it a little difficult to make a good
case for Liberia, a land far away in an unhealthy
climate so much unlike that of the West
Indies and British Guiana, where Negroes had

been declared citizens entitled to all privileges
afforded by the government. The colonizationists
could do no more than to express doubt that
the Negroes would have there the opportunities
for mental, moral and social betterment which
were offered in Liberia. The promoters of the
enterprise in Africa did not believe that the
West Indian planters who had had emancipation
forced upon them would accept blacks from
the United States as their equals, nor that they,
far from receiving the consideration of freedmen,
would be there any more than menials.
When told of the establishment of schools and
churches for the improvemnt of the freedmen,
the colonizationists replied that schools might
be provided, but the planters could have no interest
in encouraging education as they did not
want an elevated class of people but bone and
muscle. As an evidence of the truth of this
statement it was asserted that newspapers of the
country were filled with disastrous accounts of
the falling off of crops and the scarcity of labor
but had little to say about those forces instrumental
in the uplift of the people.[16]

An effort was made also to show that there
would be no economic advantage in going to the
British dominions. It was thought that as soon
as the first demand for labor was supplied
wages would be reduced, for no new plantations
could be opened there as in a growing country

like Liberia. It would be impossible, therefore,
for the Negroes immigrating there to take up
land and develop a class of small farmers as
they were doing in Africa. Under such circumstances,
they contended, the Negroes in the West
Indies could not feel any of the "elevating influences
of nationality of character," as the
white men would limit the influence of the Negroes
by retaining practically all of the wealth
of the islands. The inducements, therefore, offered
the free Negroes in the United States were
merely intended to use them in supplying in the
British dominions the need of men to do drudgery
scarcely more elevating than the toil of
slaves.[17]

Determined to interest a larger number of
persons in diverting the attention of the free
Negroes from the West Indies, the colonizationists
took higher ground. They asserted that the
interests of the millions of white men in this
country were then at stake, and even if it would
be better for the three million Negroes of the
country gradually to emigrate to the British
dominions, it would eventually prove prejudicial
to the interests of the United States. They
showed how the Negroes immigrating into the
West Indies would be made to believe that the
refusal to extend to them here social and political
equality was cruel oppression and the immigrants,
therefore, would carry with them no good will

to this country. When they arrived in the West
Indies their circumstances would increase this
hostility, alienate their affections and estrange
them wholly from the United States. Taught
to regard the British as the exclusive friends of
their race, devoted to its elevation, they would
become British in spirit. As such, these Negroes
would be controlled by British influence
and would increase the wealth and commerce of
the British and as soldiers would greatly
strengthen British power.[18]

It was better, therefore, they argued, to direct
the Negroes to Liberia, for those who went there
with a feeling of hostility against the white people
were placed in circumstances operating to
remove that feeling, in that the kind solicitude
for their welfare would be extended them in
their new home so as to overcome their prejudices,
win their confidence, and secure their attachment.
Looking to this country as their
fatherland and the home of their benefactors,
the Liberians would develop a nation, taking the
religion, customs and laws of this country as
their models, marketing their produce in this
country and purchasing our manufactures. In
spite of its independence, therefore, Liberia
would be American in feeling, language and interests,
affording a means to get rid of a class
undesirable here but desirable to us there in

their power to extend American influence, trade
and commerce.[19]

Negroes migrated to the West Indies in spite
of this warning and protest. Hayti, at first looked
upon with fear of having a free Negro government
near slaveholding States, became fixed in
the minds of some as a desirable place for the
colonization of free persons of color.[20] This was
due to the apparent natural advantages in soil,
climate and the situation of the country over
other places in consideration. It was thought
that the island would support fourteen millions
of people and that, once opened to immigration
from the United States, it would in a few years
fill up by natural increase. It was remembered
that it was formerly the emporium of the Western
World and that it supplied both hemispheres
with sugar and coffee. It had rapidly recovered
from the disaster of the French Revolution and
lacked only capital and education which the
United States under these circumstances could
furnish. Furthermore, it was argued that something
in this direction should be immediately
done, as European nations then seeking to establish
friendly relations with the islands, would
secure there commercial advantages which the
United States should have and could establish
by sending to that island free Negroes especially
devoted to agriculture.

In 1836, Z. Kingsley, a Florida planter,[21] actually
undertook to carry out such a plan on a

small scale. He established on the northeast
side of Hayti, near Port Plate, his son, George
Kingsley, a well-educated colored man of industrious
habits and uncorrupted morals, together
with six "prime African men," slaves liberated
for that express purpose. There he purchased
for them 35,000 acres of land upon which they
engaged in the production of crops indigenous
to that soil.

Hayti, however, was not to be the only island
to get consideration. In 1834 two hundred colored
emigrants went from New York alone to
Trinidad, under the superintendence and at the
expense of planters of that island. It was later
reported that every one of them found employment
on the day of arrival and in one or two instances
the most intelligent were placed as overseers
at the salary of $500 per annum. No one
received less than $1.00 a day and most of them
earned $1.50. The Trinidad press welcomed
these immigrants and spoke in the highest terms
of the valuable services they rendered the country.[22]
Others followed from year to year. One
of these Negroes appreciated so much this new
field of opportunity that he returned and induced

twenty intelligent free persons of color
living in Annapolis, Maryland, also to emigrate
to Trinidad.[23]

The New York Sun reported in 1840 that 160
colored persons left Philadelphia for Trinidad.
They had been hired by an eminent planter to
labor on that island and they were encouraged
to expect that they should have privileges which
would make their residence desirable. The editor
wished a few dozen Trinidad planters
would come to that city on the same business
and on a much larger scale.[24] N. W. Pollard,
agent of the Government of Trinidad, came to
Baltimore in 1851 to make his appeal for emigrants,
offering to pay all expenses.[25] At a
meeting held in Baltimore, in 1852, the parents
of Mr. Stanbury Boyce, now a retired merchant
in Washington, District of Columbia, were also
induced to go. They found there opportunities
which they had never had before and well established
themselves in their new home. The account
which Mr. Boyce gives in a letter to the
writer corroborates the newspaper reports as to
the success of the enterprise.[26]

The New York Journal of Commerce reported
in 1841 that, according to advices received at
New Orleans from Jamaica, there had arrived
in that island fourteen Negro emigrants from

the United' States, being the first fruits of Mr.
Barclay's mission to this country. A much
larger number of Negroes were expected and
various applications for their services had been
received from respectable parties.[27] The products
of soil were reported as much reduced from
former years and to meet its demand for labor
some freedmen from Sierra Leone were induced
to emigrate to that island in 1842.[28] One Mr.
Anderson, an agent of the government of Jamaica,
contemplated visiting New York in 1851
to secure a number of laborers, tradesmen and
agricultural settlers.[29]

In the course of time, emigration to foreign
lands interested a larger number of representative
Negroes. At a national council called in
1853 to promote more effectively the amelioration
of the colored people, the question of emigration
and that only was taken up for serious
consideration. But those who desired to introduce
the question of Liberian colonization or
who were especially interested in that scheme
were not invited. Among the persons who promoted
the calling of this council were William
Webb, Martin R. Delaney, J. Gould Bias, Franklin
Turner, Augustus Greene, James M. Whitfield,
William Lambert, Henry Bibb, James T.
Holly and Henry M. Collins.

There developed in this assembly three
groups, one believing with Martin R. Delaney
that it was best to go to the Niger Valley in
Africa, another following the counsel of James
M. Whitfield then interested in emigration to
Central America, and a third supporting James
T. Holly who insisted that Hayti offered the
best opportunities for free persons of color desiring
to leave the United States. Delaney was
commissioned to proceed to Africa, where he
succeeded in concluding treaties with eight African
kings who offered American Negroes inducements
to settle in their respective countries.
James Redpath, already interested in the
scheme of colonization in Hayti, had preceded
Holly there and with the latter as his coworker
succeeded in sending to that country as many as
two thousand emigrants, the first of whom
sailed from this country in 1861.[30] Owing to
the lack of equipment adequate to the establishment
of the settlement and the unfavorable
climate, not more than one third of the emigrants
remained. Some attention was directed to California
and Central America just as in the case
of Africa but nothing in that direction took tangible
form immediately, and the Civil War following
soon thereafter did not give some of
these schemes a chance to materialize.