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The duplicity of the House Slaves crushed the 1823 Demerara Rebellion

Aug 27, 2024 Letters

Dear Editor,

August remains a month of great significance to all of the people of Guyana. On the 1st of August, the horrible and inhumane activity of slavery was brought to an end through an Act of the British Parliament. This was the culmination of many uprisings, and protests, and the result of Africans who were tricked, captured, and enslaved on their arrival in Guyana.  The 1823 Demerara Rebellion helped break the back of colonial slavery. Slaves along the East Coast of Demerara, using available means of communication, took action to relieve this burdensome process conducted by the plantocracy.

Thanks to the duplicity of the House Slaves, the uprising was crushed.  The bleeding heads of some of our ancestors were cut off and placed on staves around that area off Middle Street, known as the Parade Ground. This brutality was intended to tell the slaves to behave themselves and most of all, to understand their place in the scheme of things. As far as the imperial government was concerned, its place was to provide free labour, so that the Master could accumulate enormous wealth. It was an attitude that exists to this day, and on this day, I ask every Guyanese, but especially the descendants of those African slaves who civilised the entire Coastal Belt, to honour them and to ensure that their martyrdom is not in vain.

The booklet written by Bro. Noah Yahshnarun, titled ‘The Ancestors of the Manumitted Africans of Guyana,’ is necessary reading, for political and social activists and students, so that we can all be knowledgeable and so strive for total liberation. A liberation we are yet to achieve. By a happy coincidence, perhaps a better-known event, that is the 1763 Revolution is captured in the exceedingly well-researched and powerfully presented book, written by  Professor Elisa Carbone, titled ‘Blood on the River.’  Professor Carbone had the advantage of going through many documents in Dutch and interviewing many Africans.

Fortunately, the good lady will be in Guyana to speak to and with the Nation on this important period of our history, and the many lessons for contemporary Guyana on Saturday, August 31, 2024. She will make a presentation at the Theatre Guild at 6:00 p.m. I hope that, unlike the failed attempt by the Government bureaucracy and their acolytes on Emancipation Day, August 1, 2024, to suffocate the traditional Emancipation Day activities at the National Park, I hope no effort will be made by the same bureaucracy to keep people away from the educative and informative presentation.

In life, we often experience labels on a jar that do not truly represent the contents of the jar. In Guyana, large groups of citizens, many operating in the high positions of the present administration, flaunt deceptive labels. One example is those, who like me, carry Anglo-Saxon-English names alien to those who endured that Trans-Atlantic journey. To those persons, I say be strong, be brave, be proud of who you are, and embrace the utility of ancestral piety. And so, no matter what position you hold in this Government, neither disgrace nor let down your courageous ancestors. Some of them, recognizing that their abode ships were taking them to an unknown destination, jumped overboard.

Today, their bones are rattling on the seabed of the Atlantic Ocean, pleading with us to be proud, to be strong, and to resist all forms of evil and subtle re-enslavement. As such, we expect all Administrators, MPs, and indeed all Guyanese, not to allow anyone to instruct you to stay away from this event on Saturday afternoon at the Theatre Guild at 6:00 p.m.

Hamilton Green

Elder

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