The Great Stain

by Noel Rae

  “His captains were all dressed in silk, and his men were drawn up in long ranks so as to form a broad avenue, up which Caramanca proceeded with many people in a war-like manner, with a deafening hubbub of kettle-drums, trumpets, bells and other instruments. Most of his people were naked, their skin gleaming with oil, which made them look even blacker; their privy parts were covered with pouches made of monkey skin or woven palm leaves. All of them were armed, some with spears and shields, others with bows and arrows; instead of helmets they wore monkey skins studded with animal teeth. Noblemen were followed by two pages, one carrying a round wooden stool so that they could sit down and rest whenever they wished, and the other a war shield. [In fact, these stools were emblems of chieftainship.] These lords wore rings and golden jewels on their heads and in their beards.

  “Their king, Caramanca, came in their midst. His legs and arms were covered with gold bracelets and rings, around his neck he wore a collar from which hung small bells, and gold bars were plaited into his beard. To add to his dignity, he walked very slowly and lightly, never once looking to either side. When he had drawn near, Diogo de Azambuja went forward to meet him. Caramanca took his hand, then let it go and snapped his fingers while saying ‘Bere, bere’ which means ‘Peace, peace.’ This snapping of fingers is a sign among them of the greatest courtesy.” The king then stepped aside so that his lords could greet Azambuja, “but the manner in which they snapped their fingers was different: wetting their fingers in their mouths and wiping them on their chests, they cracked them from the little finger to the index finger. This is a custom used only when greeting princes, for they say that fingers can carry poison if not cleaned in this manner.”

  When these and other courtesies were completed, Azambuja, with the aid of an interpreter, launched into a lengthy speech—part flattering, part cajoling, and part threatening—whose gist was that they wanted to build a fortress in Caramanca’s town. This would be greatly to the king’s benefit: the fortress would safeguard “the rich merchandise never before seen in that land,” and the trade would make him so wealthy and powerful that he would become “lord of his neighbors, for no one would dare challenge him since that building, and the power of the King of Portugal, would be there to defend him.”

  Although, according to the narrator, Joao de Barros, Caramanca “was a savage, he was also a man of good understanding, and he not only listened carefully to the interpreter but also observed Diogo de Azambuja closely. He and his men were perfectly silent; no one so much as spat.” When the speech was over Caramanca remained silent, staring at the ground, and then made his reply: he appreciated the king’s concern, which he certainly deserved since he had always treated the Portuguese who came to trade faithfully and honestly; he was impressed by how well dressed his visitors were and pleased that they wanted to establish a residence in his land. But there were problems: someone so important as the Captain, and the gallant officers who accompanied him, “would require that everything should always be on a lavish scale. Such high-spirited noblemen could not be expected to endure the poverty and simplicity of so savage a land as Guinea. This would lead to quarrels and passions.” Also, as a general rule, “friends who meet only occasionally remain better friends than if they are neighbors.” He therefore hoped that they “would be pleased to depart, and allow things to go on as before.”

  Azambuja was having none of this. In a reply that was as menacing as it was flowery, he explained that he had no choice but to carry out the orders of a king “whose subjects feared to disobey him more than they feared death itself. In this matter of establishing peace and erecting a fortress he would sooner lose his life than fail. At these words, Caramanca clapped his hands as a sign of agreement, and all the Negroes did the same.” No doubt the presence of five hundred Portuguese soldiers, whose weapons were probably not all that well concealed, also helped win the argument.

  Over the years to come, many other European countries would build their own fortresses on the Guinea coast, as much because of their mutual rivalries as they were a means of cowing the natives; but none were so famous as El Mina, formally known as Sao Jorge da Mina, with its own Gate of No Return, and its chapel “where God is praised not only by our own men but also by the Ethiopians, who having been baptized are included among the faithful. And in this church a mass is said every day for the soul of the Infante Don Henrique, the author of these discoveries.”

  Among those visiting El Mina during the next few years, either as one of Azambuja’s officers or during a trading voyage to the Guinea coast, and while there no doubt attending the fort’s chapel and praying for the soul of Prince Henry the Navigator, was that other dreamer with large ambitions, Christopher Columbus.

  On his return from his first voyage to the West Indies, which to the end of his life he persisted in believing were offshore islands belonging to Cipango (Japan) and Cathay (China), Columbus wrote his royal patrons, Ferdinand and Isabella, a glowing description of how, after a voyage of thirty-three days, he had discovered “a great many islands, inhabited by numberless people; and of these I have taken possession for their Highnesses by proclamation and by displaying the Royal Standard.” While performing these ceremonies many natives had gathered round, and “as I saw that they were very friendly to us, and could be more easily converted to our Holy Faith by gentle means rather than by force, I gave them some red caps, and strings of beads to wear round their necks, and other trifles. They were delighted with these gifts and became very friendly, and later they came swimming out to our ships, bringing parrots, balls of cotton and other things which they traded with us.”

  Christopher Columbus, Discoverer of the New World, and originator of the trans-Atlantic slave trade—not the one that went from Africa to America, but from west to east, the cargoes being natives of the West Indies. The trade was not a success, as most died in transit or soon after arriving in Spain.

  Of all the islands that he visited, Columbus was especially pleased with Hispaniola, where “the trees are as green and lovely as the trees in Spain in the month of May” and where “the nightingales sing even in November. Its hills and mountains, fine plains and open country, are rich and fertile, suitable for planting and for pasturage. It has splendid seaports, magnificent rivers, abundant spices and vast mines of gold and other metals. The people have no iron or steel, nor any weapons, nor would these be of any use to them, for though they are well-made and robust, they appear to be exceptionally timid. Their only arms are sticks of cane sharpened at one end, and even these they are afraid to use.” They were also very generous—“they never refuse anything that is asked for and in return are satisfied with the merest trifle”—and were ripe for conversion, having no religion of their own. And they had the highest opinion of Columbus and his crew, for “they firmly believe that I, with my ships and men, came from heaven.” Indeed, as he explored the island, “wherever I went, they would run on ahead, going from house to house and calling out ‘Come! Come and see the men from heaven!’ Then all the people, men and women, young and old, would gather about us, bringing something to eat and drink, which they offered with wonderful kindness.”

  These people were Tainos. Other islands were inhabited by Caribs, “a wild and mischievous people,” according to Pietro Martire. “There is no man able to behold them but he shall feel his bowels grate with a certain horror.” The Caribs often raided the Tainos, seizing young boys and castrating them “to make them fat, as we do cock chickens and young hogs, and eat them when they are well fed.” However “they abstain from eating of women, and count it vile. Therefore such young women as they take they keep for increase, as we do hens to lay eggs. The old women, they make them drudges.” The Tainos were no match for the Caribs and “confess that ten of the Cannibals are able to overcome a hundred of them.”

  Concluding his letter, Columbus promised “to send their Highnesses as much gold as they desire,” along with spices, cotton, aromatic gum, aloe wood and “as many slaves as they choose to send for,
all of them heathens.” But then, disappointingly, it turned out that there was little gold or cotton to send, and that the spices were of the wrong kind, and so slaves became the only apparently profitable export. By implication these slaves would be Caribs, but the Tainos were much easier to capture, and soon a shipment of fifteen hundred was on its way. But then came another disappointment: hundreds died on the way over, and those who survived did not last long.

  And the Tainos weren’t the only inhabitants of the New World who failed to give satisfaction. When Ponce de Leon set out to “govern and conquer” Florida, “the Indians came out and fought valiantly until they defeated him, slaying almost all the men with him. He escaped with only six companions and sailed for the island of Cuba, where all died of the wounds.” Not long after, Lucas Vazquez de Ayllon “armed two ships and sent them out among the islands to capture Indians who would be put to work in the gold mines. But because of bad weather they got lost and landed at a place they called Santa Elena [possibly Cape Fear in North Carolina].” Soon after they had landed, “the Indians approached in great fear and amazement to see such strange vessels and men with beards and wearing clothes. Nevertheless they treated each other in a friendly manner and exchanged gifts … After this the ships took on supplies of wood and water, and the Spaniards invited their new friends to come on board and take a closer look. Trusting the good faith of men who had treated them so kindly, and wishing to see things so new to them, more than a hundred and thirty went on board. Then, when they were below deck, the Spaniards locked them in, weighed anchor and set sail for Santo Domingo. However, during the voyage one of the ships was lost at sea, and though the other arrived safely it was found that all the Indians had died of sorrow and starvation, for being angry at the way they had been betrayed under the guise of friendship, they had refused to eat anything at all.” (This account is by Garcilaso de la Vega.)

  So, with little gold to be found and a dearth of slaves suitable for export, the Spanish took to exploiting the land, dividing it up into large holdings known as repartimientos and setting up a system of encomiendas, whereby in return for “protection” and being taught the Holy Faith, the natives were required to work the land without pay. Since the Tainos were reluctant to adopt this system, they had to be forced into it, usually at the point of a sword. In addition, the Spaniards brought with them smallpox and measles, diseases to which the natives had no immunity.

  The result of all this was described by someone who, before his religious conversion and taking holy orders, had himself been one of the conquistadors—Bartolomeo de las Casas, who had arrived in Hispaniola in 1502 and spent several years as a planter and slave-owner. As he became convinced that the treatment of the natives was a great sin, endangering the souls of the Spaniards as well as destroying the lives of the natives, Las Casas began a campaign of denunciation, testifying back in Spain before the Council of the Indies and the monarch himself, and publishing a book, Brevissima Relacion de la Destruccion de las Indias—A Brief Account of the Devastation of the Indies. What he wrote came “from my own knowledge, having been an eye-witness to many of the deeds” of his fellow Spaniards, who he described as “ravening wild beasts, wolves, tigers, or lions that had been starved for many days.” Greed and ambition were the causes—“the Christians’ insatiable desire to acquire as much gold as they can, as fast as they can, and to rise to a status far beyond their merits.” Here is some of what he had to say:

  “The Island Hispaniola was where the Spaniards first landed, and where they carried out their first ravages against the native people, destroying and devastating as they went, seizing and abusing the women and children, devouring their food, and forcing many to flee to the mountains. The Indians then began to resist, but their weapons were almost useless, and the Christians with their horses and swords and pikes began to carry out massacres and strange cruelties. When they attacked towns they spared neither the children nor the aged, nor pregnant women, nor women in child-bed, not only stabbing them but cutting them to pieces as if they were sheep in a slaughterhouse. They laid bets as to who, with one stroke of the sword, could split a man in two or cut off his head. Other victims were wrapped in straw and then burned alive. Still others had their hands cut off and then tied around their necks and were told to carry this message to those who had fled to the mountains. And because all those who could do so fled to the mountains the Spanish captains pursued them with fierce dogs specially trained to follow and attack the Indians, tearing them to pieces and devouring their flesh.

  “And when the wars and killing came to an end, the survivors were distributed among the Christians to be slaves. The pretext for this repartimiento was that it would facilitate the instruction of the Indians in the Christian Faith—as if those cruel, greedy and vicious Christians could be caretakers of souls! And indeed all the care they took was to send the men to the mines to dig for gold, which is unbearably hard labor, and the women to the fields to hoe and till the land, which is work suitable only for strong men. Nor did either the men or the women get enough to eat, and so the milk in the breasts of the mothers who were nursing dried up and their infants soon died. And since the men and women were kept apart there could be no marital relations. And the men died in the mines and the women died on the ranches from the same causes, exhaustion and hunger. And thus was depopulated that island, which had once been so densely populated.”

  Thanks largely to Las Casas’ advocacy, a number of reforms known as the New Laws were promulgated in 1542; but, as always, promulgation and enforcement were not the same thing, and the oppression and depopulation went on. So, with the Taino population reduced in Hispaniola alone from perhaps half a million to a few thousand, and the Caribs too fierce and savage to be subdued, who was to dig the gold, plant and harvest the crops, or do the work around the haciendas? Certainly not the conquistadors, who scorned to labor; peasants and farmers from Spain were too few in number and too ambitious to become encomienderos themselves; Jews, Muslims, Protestants and other heretics were not allowed. That left only one answer. Among those in favor of importing slaves from Africa was Las Casas himself. Like almost everyone else of that period, he was not opposed to slavery as such, just to what were considered its abuses—for example, enslaving someone in a war that had not officially been declared “just.” And in fact it was precisely this requirement that later made him realize what a mistake he had made, for on reading Chief Chronicler Azurara’s account of Henry the Navigator and the doings of the Portuguese in Africa, it dawned on him that the wars in which the Africans had been made prisoners were not, in fact, just: apart from some of the Moors taken in the early days, the slaves were not Muslim heretics, and so did not qualify for being enslaved. For his mistake Las Casas “judged himself guilty through ignorance.” Many others have also blamed Las Casas, but the suggestion of one man is hardly likely to have given rise to so vast a trade.

  And vast it certainly was. Over the centuries, well over ten million Africans were brought to the Americas, the vast majority going to the sugar and coffee plantations in the West Indies and Brazil, and only about four hundred thousand coming to what are now the United States. It was an extremely lucrative business, and the Spanish and Portuguese authorities at first tried to maintain a monopoly; but they lacked the means to enforce it, nor could their slavers meet the ever-increasing demand. Other sea-going nations were not slow to take notice and join in.

  The first of these were the English. Led by the buccaneering Sir John Hawkins, they burst in upon the African slave trade in their usual vigorous and self-righteous manner—a drawn sword in one hand, a Bible in the other. An added incentive to their intrusion was the bitter rivalry between Protestant England and Catholic Spain—when translated into English, the Brevissima Relacion bore the title Popery Truly Display’d in its Bloody Colours.

  According to the chronicler Richard Hakluyt, “The first Voyage of the right worshipful and valiant Knight, Sir John Hawkins, made to the West Indies,” took place in 1562
. After lining up several wealthy investors—Adventurers, as they were then called—he outfitted three ships, set sail, and reached Sierra Leone in October. Here he “got into his possession, partly by the sword, and partly by other means, to the number of three hundred Negroes at the least, besides other merchandise which that country yieldeth. With this prey, he sailed over the ocean sea unto the island of Hispaniola, and arrived first at the port of Isabella; and there he had reasonable utterance of his English commodities, as also of some part of his Negroes; trusting the Spaniards no further than that, by his own strength, he was able still to master them. From the port of Isabella he went to Porte de Plata, where he made like sales; standing always upon his guard.” In exchange for his slaves and English goods, Hawkins received “such a quantity of merchandise that he did not only lade his three ships with hides, ginger, sugar and some quantity of pearls; but he freighted also two other hulks with hides and other like commodities. And so, with prosperous success, and much gain to himself and the aforesaid Adventurers, he came home, and arrived in the month of September, 1563.” (That harmless-sounding phrase, “and partly by other means,” included attacking a Portuguese ship and robbing it of its cargo of slaves.)

  The second voyage did not go so well. On arrival at Sierra Leone they were told of a town called Bimba, “where was not only a great store of gold but also there were not above forty men, and a hundred women and children in the town.” Hearing this, Hawkins “prepared his men in armour and weapons, together to the number of forty men.” But the raid fizzled. “We landing, boat after boat, and divers of our men scattering themselves (contrary to the Captain’s will) by one or two in a company, for the hope they had to find gold in their houses, ransacking the same; in the meantime the Negroes came upon them and hurt many, being thus scattered. Being driven down to take their boats, they were followed so hardly by a rout of Negroes that not only some of them, but others standing on the shore not looking for any such matter … were suddenly so set upon that some, with great hurt, recovered their boats; othersome, not able to recover the same, took to the water and perished by means of the ooze.”