Bridgetown – A historic reconnection is unfolding in Barbados this week. The Caribbean island which produced two presidents of Liberia, Arthur Barclay, the 15th president who ruled Liberia from 1904-1912, and Edwin Barclay, the 18th who ruled from 1943-1944, is welcoming scores of descendants whose families boarded the Brig Cora in 1865 for Liberia where they settled and help the new Liberian republic shape its legacy as the oldest independent nation on the African continent.
By Rodney D. Sieh, [email protected]
Addressing parliament recently, Prime Minister Mia Mottley recognized the importance of the event, dubbed, “Back to Barbados”. “We will also be reconnecting with our roots in Liberia. Many people do not know that the first Bajan to be a President in this world was not in Bridgetown, was not in Barbados, it was in Liberia – and we are reclaiming our Atlantic destiny with our Liberian pilgrimage with over three hundred and something people coming.”
President Arthur Barclay, born in Barbados in 1854, played a pivotal role in reconciling conflicts between mulattoes and black emigrants during his presidency from 1904 to 1912. His tenure witnessed constitutional amendments granting citizenship to tribal peoples and the introduction of ‘indirect rule’ systems. The genesis of the heritage event traces back to 2021 when Prime Minister Mottley expressed her aspiration to Ambassador Lorenzo Llewellyn Witherspoon during a meeting in Bridgetown. This vision evolved into the Sankofa Pilgrimage, aiming to reunite Liberian Barbadians with their ancestral homeland and vice versa.
Pilgrims, who began arriving on Sunday, were taken on a tour around the island and have already begun discovering the land of their ancestors. In 1864, the Liberian government offered free citizenship and land to the brethren of the Antiques as the island was then called. Exactly, 160 years on, descendants of those settlers are in Barbados to reconnect with the Bajan relatives with the hope of reawakening ties with both nations for many years to come.
Ambassador Lorenzo Witherspoon, the architect of the project says the idea for the pilgrimage was a purposeful decision taken by the Government of Liberia, suggesting after the passage of the slavery abolition act that since the newly-independent nation of 1847 was building a new independent black African republic, it was important to reach out to Barbados and seek help build Liberia.
Says Ambassador Witherspoon: “We know that they are dying to experience citizenship and landownership for example and so the President Barclay went to parliament and the parliament said, yes, let’s do this and in 1865 he reached out to the Barbados government and proposed it and the Bajans agreed. Therefore, the following year they got enough money to charter this vessel the Brig Cora which in 1865 was able to – after very careful vetting on the island of people who had signed up to go, three hundred and forty-six people were chosen, eventually they set sail for Liberia, and they were able to settle in Liberia on May 10, 1865. On arrival they found fourteen stowaways, that’s how important they were for Barbadians to get away to Africa and each family was give acres of fresh fertile lands and each individual, ten acres of land and they began their lives to build the new republic.”
In an exclusive interview with FrontPageAfrica recently, PM Mottley expressed shock about the lack of diplomatic ties between the two counries. “I could not believe that the country for which we have had a president (Arthur Barclay – 1904–1912), born in Barbados, we did not have diplomatic relations between the two countries. My government has moved to change that. I had early conversations with your president(Georg Weah) when I saw him at the COP Summit in Glasgow and I hope that we can literally deepen the cooperation between the two countries because this is a perfect example of being separated by the middle passage.”
That middle passage was a talking point for Motley when she addressed the historic and inaugural CARICOM-Africa virtual Summit and hosted by Kenya under the theme, “Unity Across Continents and Oceans: Opportunities for Deepening Integration.”
Senator John King, a former Minister of Culture in Barbados says he too was surprised to learn that there were no ties between Liberia and Barbados and so the seed was planted. “This is the beginning of us looking to see if we did this with Liberia, what other African countries we can find Barbadians and where else in the world we can find Barbadians who need a link with Barbados at this particular point in time.”
The effort paid off in February when the two countries solidified diplomatic relations through a historic signing ceremony held in Accra, Ghana on Tuesday. The event, presided over by Liberia’s Foreign Minister Sara Beysolow Nyanti, and Madam Juliette Babb-Riley, Head of Mission of the High Commission of Barbados, marked a significant milestone in the diplomatic landscape of both nations.
Slavery ended in the Caribbean, 30 years before it ended in the United States of America, but between 1834 and 1865, many felt it was worse than slavery because they were let go and they were on their own and left to fend for themselves .Thus, the voyage to Liberia offered a sense of belonging which Liberia provided.
For Ambassador Witherspoon, the pilgrimage is a labor of love and when Prime Minister Mottley approached him about the trip, he could not say no. During conversations with PM Mottley it was realized that none of the 346 Barbadians returned home following the 1865 voyage to the village of Crozierville.
Many of the pilgrims who arrive here this week are mesmerized by the similarities between Liberia and Barbados.
Former President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who previously visited Barbados in the 1970s sees the pilgrimage as a great opportunity and is looking forward to her meeting with PM Mottley this week. The former Liberian President will headline a trumpeted Sankofa Moment Commemorative ceremony that will feature a fireside chat on Thursday. A number of important events are planned this week including the Archives Genealogy Marketplace featuring Barbados culture and heritage, genealogical research done on families that migrated to Liberia and local cuisine presentations which will also offer a chance for pilgrims to interact with Bajans.