JAMAICANS AND HISTORY

History of Jamaica


The aftermath of the 1882 Kingston fire.



Jamaica, the third largest Caribbean island, was inhabited by Arawak natives. When Christopher Columbus arrived at the island, he claimed the land for Spain. Still, it was not truly colonized until after his death. But only a few decades after Columbus' death almost all Arawaks were exterminated^. Spain held the island against many buccaneer raids at the main city, which is now called Spanish Town. Eventually England claimed the island in a raid, but the Spanish did not relinquish their claim to the island until 1670.
Jamaica became a base of operations for buccaneers, including Captain Henry Morgan. In return these buccaneers kept the other colonial powers from attacking the island. Africans were captured, kidnapped, and forced into free labour to work on plantations when sugarcane became the most important export on the island.
Many Africans arrived in Jamaica via the Atlantic trade during the same time Africans arrived in North America. During this time there were many racial tensions, and Jamaica had one of the highest instances of African uprisings of any Caribbean island. After free labour was abolished, the Jamaicans began working toward independence.
Prehistory and European discovery


Tainos from South America had settled in Jamaica at around 1,000 BC and called the land Xamayca, meaning "a land of wood and water". After Christopher Columbus' arrival in 1494, Spain claimed the island and began occupation in 1509, naming the island Santiago (St. James). The Arawaks were exterminated by the Spanish. Some also committed suicide, presumably to escape. Spain brought the first slaves to Jamaica in 1517.
On Jamaica one outspoken man, Bartolomé de Las Casas, worked for the protection of the Taino population. It was also he who suggested, and later came to regret, the importation of slaves from Africa. De Las Casas was a Spanish priest, and wrote several books about the poor treatment of the natives by Spanish conquistadors. He believed that the Spanish should work to convert the Tainos to Christianity.
Spanish rule


The settlers later moved to Villa de la Vega, now called Spanish Town. This settlement became the capital of Jamaica. By the 1640s many people were attracted to Jamaica, which had a reputation for stunning beauty, not only when referring to the island but also to the natives. In fact, pirates were known to desert their raiding parties and stay on the island.For 100 years between 1555 and 1655 Spanish Jamaica was subject to many pirate attacks, the final attack left the island in the hands of the English. The English were also subject to pirate raids after they began their occupation of the island.
The 1907 Catholic Encyclopedia states, "A review of the period of Spanish occupation is one which reflects very little credit on Spanish colonial administration in those days. Their treatment of the aboriginal inhabitants, whom they are accused of having practically exterminated, is a grave charge, and if true, cannot be condoned on the plea that such conduct was characteristic of the age, and that as bad or worse was perpetrated by other nations even in later years."
British rule


A depiction of daily life in Jamaica from the early nineteenth century. Watercolor, ink, and pencil. Created beteween 1808 and 1816.



The cultivation of sugar cane and coffee by African labour made Jamaica one of the most valuable possessions in the world for more than 150 years.


History of the African Jamaicans During some serious times on the continent of Africa, turmoil occurred between the tribes of Western African (who received compensation from European Slave Traders for each person they captured)and the Jews of Eastern Africa. The Jews were hunted and round up with guns given to the capturers by the Slave Traders. Some were killed, others afraid to be killed by the new weapons simply surrendered. They were taken to Accra in nowadays Ghana and was shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to Port Royal, Jamaica to be sold to Slave Merchants. The Slave Merchants then would transport the slaves to their final destination around the Caribbean & the U.S. Colonies, where they work without wages for more than 300 years. Still, more than half jumped overboard in the ocean prior to reaching the new land.
The Maroons: A tribe from Central Africa (Ashanti Tribe)that were brought to Jamaica. Upon their arrival to the new land, they formed an alliance with the other slaves. Together they rebelled against the traders and escaped slavery. They formed a colony in the hills around the Blue Mountains, called Maroon Town. The Maroons formed armies that patrolled the woodlands, keeping Maroon Town safe from Europeans, Mercenaries and other invaders. Maroon Town today, is still considered a separate nation within Jamaica. They kept their African traditions and customs even until today. The most famous of the Maroons is Nanny, a woman who actually fought many of the oppressors by ambush and is now a Jamaican National Hero. The Birth of Ras Tafari:
Ras Tafari Makonnen was born July 23, 1892. Rastafari is a movement which originated in Jamaica and other Caribbean Islands when the Ras Tafari Makonnen was born July 23, 1892. The movement have spread from a few Blackheart men (so they were called in those days), to millions around the world today including the United States, Japan, Israel, Germany, the entire Caribbean to name a few. These people are mainly Vegan (vegetarians who do not eat any flesh) and uses Marijuana as a Spiritual Sacrament. They also grow their locks as according to the order of separation given by Moses in the book of Numbers (Chapter 6). In the early days, Rastafarians (so they are called by other Religious groups) were harassed, beaten, jailed and subjected to cutting their locks by the authorities in Jamaica. They were treated cruelly and treated as outcasts of the society who couldn’t understand the practice of growing locks. They then, relocated to the hilly regions of the country to escape the discrimination of their spiritual practices. Today, Rasta people are highly respected in music, nutrition and alternative medicine, being that they are usually in good health and are great musicians with political & spiritual contents in their music.
The Salomonic Dynasty of Horn of Africa through King Salomon & Queen of Sheba started upon her departure from Israel. The two married and had a son by the name of Menelik, the first Davideon King of the region. The tradition continued up until 1976 when the King H.I.M. Haile Selassie the first removed himself from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, after making an announcement during a coup attempt to overthrow the Ethiopian Monarchy. The announcement state the, "...if this revolution is the people’s choice he will gladly step out of the way for the progress of the Ethiopian people..." He then went into exile at an unknown location. Some claims stated that he was killed by mercenaries; others claim that he moved to London and changed his name, some say that they have proof that he moved to Axum, the spiritual center of Ethiopia and is now a priest and a guardian of the Holy Sanctuary where the Ark of the Covenant is kept. I don't know which is true, but since they could come up with a burial site for the king, I a deep feeling that he could very much be alive and among us. The Bible says of Christ, he came to his own and they received him not. Could he have come to the Ethiopians and they didn't recognize his importance.
Prior to all that, on November 2, 1930, Ras(prince) Tafari Makonnen was visited by leaders & statesmen from 72 leading nations including the U.S. and at the time Princess Elizabeth (now Queen of the Brits). They all came to witness crowning of Ras Tafari Makonnen as King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Lion of Judah.
The drive out onto the Palisadoes (the long, flat spit of land leading out to Port Royal from Kingston) was very scenic. Becoming very narrow at spots, it was easy to see the harbour waters on the right, and the ocean waves not far away on the left. I could imagine how this fragile link to the mainland, only opened in 1936, could easily be cut by storms. Tall skinny cactus plants (like scaled-down saguaros) were growing amongst the sand dunes and mingling with the mangrove bushes. I later learned that the area supports a rather rare, precarious ecosystem.[/size]
We walked down the main road, actually a narrow lane. Then came a grassy park (the old Muster Grounds) with one of those historical marker signs, telling briefly about the history of Port Royal:
Walking further, past some small homes, and a small rosy-coloured Methodist church (just barely seen on the right side), we spotted a moderate-sized gray-colored church beyond on the other side of the street (far left).

It was said the communion silver of St. Peter's Church had been willed to the church by Sir Henry Morgan from his Spanish plunder. This is it. I actually drank communion wine from the goblet on the right.




One of the founders of St. Peters was Lewis Galdy – a local hero who had survived the earthquake. We found his tomb in the churchyard, with a succinct history of his life:

Here lies the body of Lewis Galdy who departed this life at Port Royal on December 22, 1739 aged 80. He was born at Montpelier in France but left that country for his religion and came to settle in this island where he was swallowed up in the Great Earthquake in the year 1692 and by the providence of God was by another shock thrown into the sea and miraculously saved by swimming until a boat took him up. He lived many years after in great reputation. Beloved by all and much lamented at his Death".

Nelson's Quarterdeck
Exiting the museum, we followed the fort tour guide into the shade of an overhanging platform. She explained that the wooden decking above us was called Nelson’s Quarterdeck, for that is where the young Horatio Nelson was said to observe the horizon for enemy ships (actually, the wood was fairly new, having been replaced after a fire in 1953). We climbed steps up to the platform, with it’s numerous guns pointing out to sea, where we could see that it made a splendid observation point.


Leaving the fort through the southern gate, our guide took us took the remains of the Victoria and Albert Battery – several large gun pits sunk into the sand, connected, we were told, by underground tunnels – installed in the late 1880’s. The 9.2 and 6 inch guns are now gone, having been quite disrupted by the 1907 earthquake. That same earthquake also tilted the late 19th century powder magazine/artillery storehouse, now canted at a 35 degree angle. Inside the "Giddy House" we had much fun taking photos of each other looking as if we were leaning at quite a drunken angle. (Tamara Eastman is in the doorway).



Back inside the fort, we stopped for drinks in the cool interior of the brick Grogge Shop. It was easy to visualize this building back in the early 18th century, minus it’s modern accoutrements, and imagine what a grog shop of the period might look like. But it had not always been a grog shop. Our tour guide had told us this building was once a prison, then a powder store house.






Buccaneer's Roost
Down a street leading off the plaza, we saw a restaurant with a festive second story terrace, flying the Jolly Roger high overhead. Looking closer, the sign said Buccaneer Restaurant, with another sign above it declaring Buccaneer’s Roost.


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''The Two Jamaican Girls'', by Augustus John (1878 - 1961)


About the artwork


�I think Jamaica would be a nice place to go and work.� wrote Augustus John in 1911. However it was not until late in 1937 that he realised this ambition. His journey by boat took almost three weeks. Tourism in the Caribbean and Jamaica in the 1930s was not the major industry that it is today. John painted this picture soon after his arrival. He stayed first in an hotel a few miles outside Kingston called The Mona Great-House. In his autobiography, 'Chiaroscuro' published in 1952, John refers to ��the prim black servants�I got some of them to sit for me.� It seems safe therefore to assume that the two young women in this picture were hotel workers.
John wrote with great sympathy and enthusiasm about the Jamaican people and landscape. In a letter to a friend he said �nobody believes I'm serious when I tell them I am only interested in painting the coloured people.� In his autobiography he wrote, �the superior race with few exceptions takes little interest in the population of the Island except as affording an inexhaustible supply of cheap labour. The blacks�are at the mercy, for the most part of the United Fruit Company, a benevolent tyranny with its roots in the USA.�
John's visit to Jamaica coincided with the first stirrings of a serious revolt by Jamaican workers against their poor wages and conditions. In May and June of 1938 there were strikes and demonstrations throughout the Island. During these 8 people were killed, 171 wounded and 700 arrested and prosecuted. These events resulted in the rapid growth of trade unions and the foundation of the Peoples National Party. It was the beginning of a political process that would lead to independence; the 40th anniversary of which we are celebrating this year. Augustus John was made aware of the root causes of the revolt when he met with a group of political activists who mistook him for a visiting Member of Parliament. They told him that wages were as low as 4p per day and that the people suffered generally from wide spread unemployment, malnutrition and disease. He wrote, �in my idle day dreams I imagined myself heading an uprising of the Island, driving the whites, the good governor and all, including a number of my new friends into the sea and inaugurating a reign of Harmony in this potential Paradise.�
John returned to England early in 1938. 'The Two Jamaican Girls' was purchased from an exhibition of his work held in May and June in London. The show was a great success, almost all the pictures were sold. The Walker paid £450 for the painting and it remains one of the most popular pictures in the gallery.
Augustus John was born in Tenby in South Wales in 1878, one of four children. His sister Gwen also became an artist. John showed an early talent for drawing. At 16 he enrolled at the Slade School in London where there was a special emphasis on draughtsmanship. John was a star student and received several prizes during his four years of study. However, success as an artist was far from sudden. In 1901 he came to Liverpool to teach at the University School of Art for three days per week. He was by this time married and he needed the £300 salary to support his wife and child.
By the summer of 1902, tired of his teaching responsibilities he returned to London. There he built a reputation as a controversial but fashionable young painter. John was a larger than life figure and a tireless self- publicist. Six feet tall with a Christ-like beard, large earrings, long hair and a big black hat, he cultivated an image of the great artist, lover and bohemian. Throughout his life he travelled constantly in search of inspiration for his work. He was also fascinated by the Romany language and way of life. For several months went on the road with his wife and children in a Gypsy caravan.
In spite of his carefully cultivated image as an outsider and all-round rebel, John was seldom without a steady supply of wealthy and influential patrons. During the First World War he was rejected as unfit for service but volunteered to work for the Canadian War Memorials Fund in 1917, with a rank of major. He produced numerous sketches and studies and began a 40-foot canvas 'The Pageant of War', which was never completed. He was forced to return from France in March 1918 to avoid a court-martial after striking a fellow officer.
In the 1920s he continued to travel, paint and prosper. He painted his many children and mistresses as well as aristocrats and celebrities. In 1928 he became a member of the Royal Academy, the rebel had surrendered to the art establishment. John excelled at portraits done in two or three hours, a brilliant likeness quickly drawn with brushes and colour. As early as 1902 he had written, �I fancy portraits should be painted in an hour or two. The brush cannot linger over shabby and ephemeral garments.�
The pictures that he painted in Jamaica have been described as the best work produced in the last 25 years of his life. This painting of two young Jamaican women is a perfect example of his portraiture. The colour though thickly applied remains bright, not muddy. John paints in an Impressionist manner. The Impressionists excelled in describing light and atmosphere. In this picture John succeeds in capturing perfectly the emotional atmosphere. The young woman at the front appears bored in her new subservient role as an artist's model. Her companion seems apprehensive, as many young women were in the presence of Augustus John, or 'disgusting John' as he was once known. Perhaps their troubled expressions simply reflect the turbulence of the time that they are living through.
Further information about this picture and other paintings that include black people can be found in the booklet 'The Black Presence' that is available in the gallery shop or via mail order, price £2.95.

that was a good read