Historical Site 1Kingstown
Tortola, British Virgin Islands
Kingstown is the first free African settlement of abducted Africans beyond the shores of the continent.
Parliament passed "An Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade" on March 25, 1807 abolishing the slave trade but not slavery itself. Slavery remained legal until 1833. Subsequent to the Act, the Royal Navy continued to patrol the waters of the Virgin Islands to capture traffickers transporting surviving Africans to the Americas. However, many Africans still died during the transatlantic crossing. In January 1808, HMS Cerberus seized the American schooner, the Nancy, carrying Senegalese Africans. Between August 1814 and February 1815 Africans were removed from the Venus, the Manuella, the Atrevido and the Candelaria. Over one thousand more were deposited on Tortola's shores. In 1819, a Portuguese slave ship, the Donna Paula, was wrecked upon the reef at Anegada. The ship's crew and 235 slaves were saved from the wreckage. Other shipwrecks off Anegada were reported in 1817 and 1824. Those liberated from those ships became known as "Liberated Africans".
Many accepted the opportunity to serve in the military on larger islands. Those who chose to settle on Tortola were made to serve an "apprenticeship" of 14 years, after which they were granted an "absolute" freedom. In 1828, certificates of freedom were issued to distinguish them from enslaved Africans. However, due to hindrances in the conditions imposed by former owners, many practices which would have led to self-sufficiency, were impeded.
Kingstown came into existence when the problem of relocation was solved in the 1830s with a grant secured from the British government for over 100 acres of land and structures thereon to be used as a settlement to create housing and, according to an opinion a governor, a British Crown representative in the territory, as a means for the Africans to grow their own provisions on an assigned plot of land in a subdivision named "Kingstown" or the "Liberated African Village".
The real importance in this church lies in the fact that it is recognized as being the first church to liberated Africans in all of the Americas. This makes the site an enormously important religious building to all peoples of African descent in the Americas.
The missionaries in the area made this conversion a "prime directive" to disassociate the "heathens" from their native religions. On this historical site, the ruins of St. Philip's Anglican church that stands scaffolded today was built by the Liberated Africans after they were converted to that faith. They began construction in 1840. In 1924, a hurricane destroyed the roof of the Anglican Church in Road Town. Since St. Philips church was no longer used, its roof was removed and replaced the Anglican church's roof. The red brick in the walls was originally used as ballast in ships' hulls from England.
Sources: Mr. Vernon Pickering, editor of the Island Sun newspaper is also an historian. His book is called The Concise History of the British Virgin Islands. ANGLICANS LAUNCH RESTORATION FUND FOR ST. PHILIP’S CHURCHhttp://www.islandsun.com/archives/2001-May/040501/local3-v4i57.html St. Philip's Church:http://www.answers.com/topic/st-phillip-s-church-tortola Slave Trade Act of 1807:http://www.answers.com/topic/slave-trade-act-1807
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