Amistad

by David Pesci

  “Please, we just want to go home.”

  There was never an outright charge to see the Amistads, but a hat was passed after each performance. The amount of money that would be donated by a crowd was always a mystery. A gathering of nearly 200 people in Worcester yielded a little over $20. A collection among workers after a short tour of a rug factory in Lowell produced nearly $60. The reception by the crowds varied as well. Many people wanted to shake Singbe’s hand and would wait in line for an hour to do so. More than a few men, however, reaching the front of the line, tried to punch him. One woman in Hartford attempted to empty a chamber pot on him. Subsequently, Tappan began positioning two faithful abolitionists next to Singbe at each stop for protection.

  Stories in several New England and New York newspapers described the Amistads’ activities and their need for money to return home and start a mission. These accounts inspired people to send donations directly to the Amistad Committee. Each day the mails brought in hand-written notes containing as little as ten cents or as much as $20 for the Amistads. One note, penned by a Maine farmer, read:

  Here is four dollars and a half for the Amistad blacks. I intend to make it a full six after my crop comes in. God bless them all and your work.

  Tappan was heartened by the sympathies being expressed and theorized that the Africans’ tour may be extended to generate more interest and funds exceeding the $5,000 needed. He realized that once the Africans left America’s shores, public interest in them, and in the continuing work of the Amistad Committee, would quickly wane. For that reason he hoped he could keep Singbe and friends in the United States for as long as possible. But this did not mean the mission would have to wait for the Amistads. In fact, the committee, which had decided to change its name to the American Missionary Association, was actively interviewing candidates to begin work in Mende. Leading the mission would not be an easy task. During the last fifty years, the British missionaries had attempted to create ten separate missions in and around Freetown. Nine of these had failed. Climate, disease, tribal wars, and the incursion of Islam from the east had all played a part.

  Despite these hazards, a candidate was selected in late July – William Raymond, a Massachusetts man who had experienced a vision that in the Far East would be called enlightenment but in the West was known as receiving the call of God. Raymond’s vision, in which he saw “the sinners of the world descending into the flames and ravages of hell,” left him weeping for three straight days. When he recovered, he asked God aloud what He had planned for his humble servant. The next thing he saw was “West Africa, as though it was laid out before me.” He was hired at $20 a month and he and his pregnant wife, Eliza, immediately moved to Farmington where he began teaching the Amistads who remained on the farm.

  In early September, Tappan was persuaded to bring the touring Amistads back to Farmington for a “regrouping.” Jocelyn had reported that many of the tribesmen believed Singbe, Grabeau, and the others had actually been transported back to Africa and the rest had been left behind. They were becoming unruly and refused to take lessons or work in the fields where food had been planted to help them get through the winter. Tappan, too, was growing wary about the actions of Singbe and some of the others who were on tour. It had gotten to the point where Singbe would do nothing unless spectators first handed over money. He was also caught several times asking men and women for a dollar when they came up to shake his hand. When Tappan admonished him for doing so, Singbe shrugged.

  “You say we need money to get back home, Mr. Tappan. People want see me, shake my hand. I ask for money. What wrong with this?”

  Tappan spoke about manners and decorum and the way things should be done, but he could see his words were not making an impression. A few days later, at a stop in a Connecticut mill town, Tappan again scolded Singbe for soliciting and demanded he apologize to the people and return their money. Instead of demurring politely, Singbe shot back angrily.

  “No! I want money! I want go home!”

  Someone in the crowd yelled out that Tappan had trained his monkey but could no longer control him. Tappan turned angrily toward the mob but was met by a sea of laughs and jeers. He decided to cut the blacks’ performance short and leave. After they had returned to Farmington, Tappan recounted the incident to Jocelyn.

  “Lewis, we nearly have enough money,” Jocelyn said. “Perhaps it is time we sent them home. With Cinqué back among them, I can see a change. At first they were very happy when he returned, and they gladly went back to the fields. But now they grow more restless, almost defiant. It is obvious they do not want to be here any longer.”

  Tappan nodded sadly. He had hoped that in the end the Amistads, especially Singbe, would want to stay in America and help the abolitionists in their attempts to secure freedom for slaves nationwide.

  “Cinqué would have been such an excellent spokesman for our cause,” Tappan moaned. “The press love him.”

  “Perhaps he shall yet be a spokesman, albeit for the cause of Christianity in his native land,” Jocelyn said. “But I fear they must all return, and soon. As it is, some are quite depressed over being here this long.”

  Tappan nodded, although he wondered aloud how any man could be surrounded by the culture and beauty of such a place as Connecticut and want to leave.

  A few days after his conversation with Jocelyn, Tappan told Singbe that he would not have to tour for money anymore, that enough had been collected and arrangements were being made to secure all of them passage back to Africa. Singbe and the others were excited by the news and the next morning they returned to the fields to prepare for the harvest. However, when he came back to the barn that night, Singbe received terrible news. One of the tribesmen, Fon-ne, had drowned while swimming with a few of the other tribesmen in a nearby canal.

  “He was with us and then decided to swim up around the bend,” Burnah said. “He was good swimmer, the best of all of us. So Mr. Raymond say it okay. But then we leaving and we no find Fon-ne. Then Mr. Raymond find him near shore, face down in water.”

  While Jocelyn declared it a tragic accident, many of the tribesmen commented on how depressed Fon-ne had been, how, despite Tappan’s promises, he kept saying that they would never return to Mende. Some speculated that his growing depression drove him to taking his own life. Tappan considered their words, but he also turned over in his mind what Pendelton had said about people wanting to kill the Africans. The thought stayed with him only for a second, then his dismissed it. A week later, though, his suspicions were reignited by a second incident.

  Singbe and Grabeau had been working in the field where the tribesmen were growing vegetables. It was dusk and they had both stayed longer than the others picking corn. They grabbed the burlap bags filled with ears of corn and began walking the two-mile-long dirt road that led from the field back to the barn. After a few moments, Singbe realized he had forgotten his boots. He went back into the field to find them while Grabeau walked ahead slowly. At the first curve in the road, about one hundred yards up from the field, two white men leapt out and began beating Grabeau. He fought back, but they knocked him to the ground and were kicking him yelling, “Dumb African!” and “Murdering nigger!” They did not see Singbe come out of the field until he was almost upon them. The big one turned, ready, but Singbe swung his kerosene lantern into the man’s head, knocking him down. Grabeau kicked the other man in the knees, sending him to the ground.

  “We flog them both good with our feet and hands, Mr. Jocelyn,” Grabeau said while holding a rag to the gash in his head. “I know it not Christian to beat men, but I no feel sorry.”

  “I understand,” Jocelyn said, “and you should always try to resist the temptation of raising your fist against another.” Jocelyn paused, and then reached out and touched Grabeau on the shoulder. “Then again, my friend, the good book also says ‘the wicked shall fall by their own wickedness.’ I think you and Singbe may have given these men a taste of that.”

  The town’s sheriff was bro
ught to the place where the attack had occurred, but not much could be done.

  Still the two events coming so close together worried Tappan. There had been persistent rumors that some Southern plantation owners had paid men to come up North with the charge of kidnapping or killing Singbe and any of the other Amistads they could get their hands on. There were also many people in the North who would not be disappointed at seeing the Africans swinging from a tree by their necks.

  Tappan had hoped to go back to Singbe one more time and try to convince him to stay in America with his fellow Africans, at least through the winter, until a better financial base had been built up for the mission. But now the abolitionist saw that any more delay might be too dangerous. In October, he signed a contract with a shipping agency to transport to Freetown, Sierra Leone, passengers consisting of thirty-two free African men, three free African girls, and a missionary contingent of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond and child, the Reverend James Steele, and the West Indian-born mulatto minister Henry Wilson and his wife, a former slave named Tamar. The ship, a large four-masted freighter called the Gentlemen, would leave New York City on November 27, 1841.

  During the next month Tappan tried to work with the federal government to insure that Gentlemen would receive a guarantee of safe passage to Africa. The Spanish were still outraged over the Supreme Court ruling and continued to lodge diplomatic protests and demanded retribution for the blacks. However, Secretary of State Webster refused to even respond to Minister Argaiz’s entreaties for a meeting. As far as the U.S. Government was concerned, the affair had ended. As for an escort or guarantee, Webster informed Tappan that the Gentlemen would receive the same protection afforded all other ships sailing under an American flag, and if the Spanish dared to interfere in her voyage, it would be construed as a hostile act and responded to accordingly by the U.S. government. There would be, however, no special escort provided to the Gentlemen by the U.S. Navy.

  The passenger manifest grew by one the week before the Gentlemen was scheduled to leave. James Covey, who had been granted a discharge by the British Navy, asked if he, too, could return to Freetown. He was not sure if he wanted to go back to Mende, but he felt he needed to get back to Africa. Tappan made the necessary arrangements.

  The tribesmen were brought to New York for a grand send-off at the Broadway Tabernacle. Tappan, Jocelyn, and several esteemed guests gave speeches to a capacity crowd of more than four hundred people who had paid fifty cents each to benefit the newly formed American Missionary Association. The Africans performed readings, and Singbe, for the last time in America, told his tale of capture, slavery, and redemption. The night before the voyage, Tappan learned from a British Navy captain that the task of establishing the mission or even returning the Amistads back to their native land had become decidedly more difficult. The nation of Mende was at war again with their ancient enemy, the Timmani, whose lands lay between Freetown and Mende. Tappan told Singbe, who nodded gravely but said nothing.

  On the frosty morning of November 27, under gray skies, the Gentlemen left New York. Tappan and Jocelyn rode in a pilot boat alongside the ship until it cleared the harbor and lowered all her sails to catch the 22-knot wind blowing down from the northwest. Despite the cold, Singbe and many of the others stood on deck until the land called America was completely out of sight.

  There was great excitement among the tribesmen, but also a measure of anxiety and fear. They remembered well the terrifying storm that had nearly capsized the Amistad. They had also heard enough of the whispered talk among the whites to know that the people of Pepe Ruiz and Pedro Montes were still angry and might try to retake them as slaves. Many of the tribesmen declared that they would throw themselves into the sea before they would be in chains again. Singbe, Grabeau, and Burnah carried the same apprehensions, but the three leaders put on brave faces and spoke happily and confidently of how they would all be in Mende soon.

  Soon would be about six weeks. For Mendemen, whose measured time in days, phases of the moon, and the seasons, six weeks was not considered very long. However, the years spent away from their families and their country, and the traumatic events that each had endured during their capture, enslavement, liberation, and imprisonment among the Americans, had conspired to twist their casual sense of time so that the weeks stretching before them on the sea now seemed like an eternity.

  The missionaries, knowingly or not, helped defray some of the impatience and anxiety of the tribesmen by keeping them busy. Raymond ordered that instruction in the scriptures, reading, and writing take place for six hours each day. Steele, who insisted that the Africans refer to him as, “Mr. Steele, sir,” conducted many of the lessons and proved to be a strict task master who did not tolerate impertinent questions or the wandering attention of his pupils. He was also fond of reminding Singbe and Grabeau that it was he, Mr. Steele, and Mr. Raymond, who would be in charge of the Amistads now.

  “I know you will be anxious to see your kinsmen, but we are doing the Lord’s work here. Our first priority will be getting our supplies to Mende safely, locating an ideal spot for the mission, and erecting the structure. Once that is done, you will of course be reunited with your families and friends. I know you may be distressed over the delay, but the Lord has seen you this far, and a few more months toiling in His honor will be a gift made through His glory and grace.”

  Whenever Mr. Steele gave such speeches to Singbe, Grabeau, and the others, which was often, the men would smile and answer softly with the same utterance: “Yes, Mr. Steele, sir.”

  They continued east southeast. The weather warmed, slightly at first, and then, after the third week, all at once so that the tribesmen could abandon their greatcoats and take their lessons on deck each day. They did not see another sail on the water until the morning of the thirty-fifth day, when the sun came up revealing three large sails and cannon mounts of a military ship less than a half mile away. A British flag flew on the mast. It came in close and both captains spoke through large conical megaphones. The British ship was on anti-slave patrol. When its captain learned that the famous Amistads were on board the American barque, he declared that he would provide them with escort into Freetown harbor. Ten days later, just past noon, on January 11, 1842, the tribesmen arrived back in Africa.

  The Gentlemen was piloted to a mooring. The passengers rushed to the gangplank but Mr. Steele stopped them, insisting they all kneel and thank the Lord God for their safe arrival. He led them in a prayer of forgiveness that lasted nearly twenty minutes. When he finished, he was nearly pushed overboard by the jubilant tribesmen who ran down the gangway and the docks, falling to their knees and kissing the ground of Freetown. Many of the men began singing in Mende and dancing. They peeled off their fine coats and shirts proudly revealing their marks of Poro. Mende people, passing on the street, quickly joined in. Steele, Raymond, and Wilson were unsettled by what they saw as a decidedly pagan celebration. Steele began running through the dancing men, extolling them to get ahold of themselves.

  “Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Remember who you are! Remember that you are Christian gentlemen! Joseph! Joseph Cinqué! Get control of your people! Joseph! Joseph!? Where are you?”

  Steele and the other missionaries looked all over the docks, but Singbe and Grabeau were not to be found. More desertions followed. Within three days, all of the Mendemen had deserted the missionaries.

  Home

  Freetown was exactly what Steele would later refer to it in a letter to Tappan: a Sodom, pure and simple. Singbe and Grabeau knew it was a dangerous place when they strayed away from the missionaries’ care. Two black men, even dressed as finely as they were, could easily be waylaid, kidnapped, and sold into slavery. This was even more likely if they came across a group of Timmani men. But Singbe and Grabeau were willing to take the chance. Some would say it was a foolish move since the missionaries had supposedly negotiated a safe passage into Mende. But neither man could wait. They knew that they had to get home now, not days or weeks or months from now when the
missionaries decided it was proper.

  Despite the rashness of their actions, they did have a plan. Before leaving Freetown they passed through the bazaar. Singbe had nearly thirty American dollars with him, pieces of copper, silver, and gold, “handshaking money” that he had never passed on to Tappan. He had kept it hidden from everyone and only just shown it to Grabeau the night before they made port.

  “It will be enough to see us through.”

  They used the money to buy a pistol, powder, shot, a small coil of rope, two large knives with sheaths, four flasks of water, some dried fruit and meat, and two blankets. Just before nightfall they made their way out of the city and traded their fine top hats to a man, who had never seen such things or fur of that type, for a canoe. They got in and paddled their way up the river under the light of a three-quarter moon into Timmani country. They didn’t speak a word, but Singbe tingled with adrenaline as the stink and din of the city gave way to the warm heavy breath and wild sounds of the jungle.

  They paddled until dawn and then drew the boat into a thicket and covered it and themselves with leaves and branches. Singbe took the first watch, letting Grabeau sleep until the sun was directly overhead. As they ate some of the meat, Singbe handed Grabeau the pistol and lay back gently in the leaves and closed his eyes. Within minutes he was lost in a thick, black, dreamless sleep.

  Singbe awoke to a push against his shoulders and a hand over his mouth. He moved to struggle, not knowing where he was, but then saw Grabeau and the darkening sky. Grabeau winked but said nothing. They ate some fruit, drank from the water flasks and then pushed the canoe into the river and began paddling again. Sometime after midnight, Singbe felt Grabeau’s hand tapping on his shoulder. He stopped paddling and looked to the back of the boat. Grabeau pointed with his oar at a small inlet in the river to the left. A fallen tree stretched from the bank into the water, the base of the trunk and roots resting on the shore. At the fattest part of the trunk, just above the twisted, tangled roots that reached into the moonlight, a leopard sat feeding on freshly killed prey. Grabeau smiled broadly. Singbe nodded his head.