Trinidad’s Merikin pioneers of freedom

THE MERIKINS were already free men, women and children when they arrived at their new home in south Trinidad over two centuries ago.

But the original Merikins and their descendants today are among the central figures in African Emancipation Day celebrations.

Akilah Jaramogi, a descendant of the original settlers, explained the intrinsic connection between Merikins – a group of formerly enslaved people from the US – and Emancipation Day, a national holiday commemorating the emancipation of enslaved people under the British Empire in 1834.

“Being free blacks, running away from plantations, burning down plantations, hiding in the swamps and on the shoreline – we’ve been resisting colonisers,” Jaramogi, a founding member and CEO of the Merikin Heritage Foundation told Newsday.

“And it’s a testimony to tell of the resilience, strength, and power of the Merikin people.”

The Merikin Heritage Foundation was established in 2010. Jaramogi first served as president, and is the current CEO.

The foundation has hosted several events this year, including sporting activities and field trips for children to educate them on the Merikins’ contributions to national development.

The original Merikins were represented by hundreds of their descendants and community supporters at the Emancipation Day parade in Port of Spain on August 1.

Jaramogi said the foundation put itself out on the national stage for the first time in years.

“I think this is a really special moment and event that we’re looking forward to,” she told Newsday ahead of the parade.

“It’s very, very important to celebrate Merikins around this time, because Merikins emancipated ourselves way before 1838.” (That year marked the end of apprenticeship, the years when formerly enslaved people still had to work on the estates for their former “owners.”)

“A lot of our people are emancipated around the world, but when it comes to the power, the liberty and mental freedom – I don’t think (enough) of them out there are at that level yet.

“It’s a good example to share that Merikin people have emancipated themselves way before that period when the colonisers (proclaimed) Emancipation.

Jaramogi is a descendant of the Merikins through her maternal grandparents, Arnold Elliot and Eugenia McLeod.

She estimated there are about 200,000 Merikin descendants alive today. Some of TT’s most prominent names have Merikin roots.

Some of the country’s most prominent names are also Merikins. They include Hazel Manning, formerly Kinsale, widow of former PM Patrick Manning, and calypsonian and former politician Winston “Gypsy” Peters.

Merikin names include, Kinsale, Mitchell, Gibson, Cole, Floyd, Cooper, Ayers, Hamilton, Foreman, Smith, Weston, Blackwell, Huggins, Jackson, Dickson, Bailey, Andrews, Braxton, Richardson, Fortune, Paul, Woods, Thompson, McNish, Saunders, Ransom and many others.

Today, some are concentrated in communities such as New Grant, Indian Walk, Company Villages, Hard Bargain, Fifth Company and Sixth Company

“Right now, the Merikins are all over Trinidad,” Jaramogi said.

The Merikins, also known as the American Settlers, comprised black soldiers who fought for the British during the War of 1812, and their families, who settled in Trinidad. The men escaped from American plantations and joined the British forces in exchange for the promise of freedom.

They were initially stationed in Bermuda, the British offered them a choice to join the British West India Regiment or settle as free men in a British colony. They declined military service and settled in Trinidad and Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada.

Trinidad’s governor Sir Ralph Woodford took instructions from Lord Bathurst, secretary for war and the colonies, to grant the soldiers 16 acres each of land in south Trinidad.

The first settlers arrived in May and July 1815. They were initially accommodated in Laventille and Caroni, owing to a failure by the colony to prepare the designated land for them in time for their arrival.

By November 1815, the third group of settlers was accommodated in the Naparima district, where land had been cleared for their settlement. The fourth group, comprising disbanded soldiers of the Third Battalion of the Colonial Marines, arrived in August 1816 and joined the others in Naparima.

They formed communities known as the Company villages, named after the companies of the Colonial Marines to which the settlers belonged, from First to Sixth Company.

Among them were 574 former soldiers and 200 women and children, mostly from Virginia and Georgia, and others who were freed or escaped American slavery.

These settlers, primarily from the Third Battalion of the Colonial Marines, were supervised by Robert Mitchell and established thriving agricultural communities, growing crops like corn, sweet potatoes and rice (a species now known locally as Moruga hill rice). They also worked on nearby sugar estates, specialised in trades, and started businesses.

The settlers received temporary accommodation, clothing, tools, and agricultural tools. For the first six-eight months, they were provided with daily food rations until they could subsist on their own crops.

Over time, many descendants entered the oil industry.

Religion played a crucial role for the early Merikins, allowing them to cope with the challenges of resettlement and the legacy of slavery, and church leaders were particularly respected.

Among the most prominent legacies of the Merikins was its contribution to the founding and spreading of the Spiritual Baptist (less commonly known as Shouter Baptist) denomination indigenous to Trinidad.

The Merikins preserved their community identity and African heritage by establishing their own schools and Baptist churches.

Though not all Merikins and their ancestors were or are Baptists, spirituality remains a primary component of their activities.

Jaramogi explained, “We would have a form of spirituality exising in us, each and every living human being. It’s a (matter of) how much you want to tap into and find yourself.

“The Merikins, because of our struggles, because of our resilient way of living and our radical ways of living, even the US, where we (rebelled), killed ‘massa’ and freed ourselves, living in the forests and caring for our family and so on, that kind of resistance and militant ways never changed.

“We’re tapped into spirituality to save ourselves and to keep the legacy alive because this holds onto our Orisha and Yoruba ways of living.

“Some of us find ourselves in the forest to appease the deities.

“So we held onto spirituality, both the Baptists and the Orisha spiritual ways. Also...we had some of our Yoruba
people who settled in Trinidad in 1807, before us, and we met them in Third and Fifth Company.”

Merikin Arrival Day is celebrated on August 20 annually. Another Merikin organisation – Merikin Incorporation – continues to host an annual Merikin Walk and will hold a candlelight procession this year.