Betsimisaraka federation, in northeastern Madagascar, reveal, at this stage, the complex workings of early modern colonizing projects that progressed in multiple directions, and these relations demonstrate the transregional nature of the slave trade.37 The story of the slaves and early immigrants from Madagascar should be seen in this evolving global context.
The trajectories of the Madagascar slave trade to America were transregional and transnational, and actors entered and played the game both from the metropole (England, France) and from new territories that eventually were established as possessions of either crown. The historical record allows us to at least cobble together a liste de présence that reveals the dynamics that led to shipments between Madagascar and Virginia, and from this we can discern the local interplay of forces that, while leading to the Betsimisaraka federation, also led to the deportation of hundreds of people from the northeast of Madagascar.
For the purpose of their subsequent debarkation, and after traveling in canoes that plied the riverways of areas further inland, young women, men and children in slave coffles were likely forced to march to the northeastern coastal area facing Saint Mary’s Island and to the port town of Fort Dauphin, further south along the coast. It is probable that they knew what they were in for. As we have seen, by 1716 this area was known for its brisk commerce with foreigners, including slave trading. Since slave exports had seen a peak in the late seventeenth century, some fifteen years earlier, the presence of Anglo-American foreigners circulating along the coast may have suggested to the captives that their destination would not be slavery within Madagaskaria, or the Red Island, as it was known to its European visitors. However, while captives probably suspected shipment abroad, they could not have imagined their coming voyage of thousands of miles to the New World.
Due to navigational constraints, such as ocean currents, seasonal monsoons, and the difficulty of sailing the Mozambique Channel most of the year, the greater part of the trade destined for the Americas traveled from Madagascar’s eastern coast southward, stopping for provisions and trade at the Cape of Good Hope, in what is today South Africa, before crossing the Atlantic.
In 1721 Capt. Joseph Stretton entered Kingston, Jamaica, with 243 Negroes from “Africa” in the Tunbridge Galley of Bristol. Historian Virginia Platt suggests that often, when the generic term Africa was listed and the captain of record had Madagascar experience, it is probable that the ship was illegally carrying captives from Madagascar. Many captains simply reported Africa as the source of slaves in order to avoid discovery during the period between 1698 and 1712, when the Madagascar trade was illegal.38 In 1721 the trade eventually closed again, which may be why Stretton listed “Africa” as his port of call.
Stretton’s next post was as captain of the Prince Eugene, a vessel in which the British merchant John Duckinfield was an investor. The Prince Eugene, having been on an unlicensed voyage to Madagascar, arrived in Virginia from Madagascar after making a stop in Jamaica. Later, a vessel named the Duckinfield (partially owned by John Duckinfield) entered Kingston with 280 slaves from “Africa,” also probably in 1721.39 That ship also continued on to Virginia. As it happens, Duckinfield was also among the owners of the Rebecca Snow, one of the other ships arriving in Virginia from Madagascar during this period.40 These are four examples of ships partially owned by John Duckinfield that brought Malagasy slaves to Jamaica, three of which continued their voyages to the Virginia Commonwealth.
Family Oral Traditions
Scholar Alessandro Portelli suggests that the diversity of oral history lies in the fact that “wrong” statements are still psychologically “true,” and that this truth may be equally as important as factually reliable accounts. Further, orality and writing, he points out, have not existed separately for several centuries. If many written sources are based on orality, Portelli argues, modern orality itself is saturated with writing.41
In the research for this volume, I discovered that for slave descendants today in America there is an interesting circularity between the received spoken word and the written word of professional historians. This has to do, I found, with family members who have a desire to know more about the stories they have heard and, as important, with their need to make a contribution to the ongoing narrative of family ancestors. A query that I received in 2001 on my e-list on “Madagascar ancestors” (managed through rootsweb.com from 2001 to 2003) is relevant to the story of early Anglo-American networks to Madagascar.42 This query was from someone who thought he might be descended from a British slave trader and a slave from Madagascar. He had found his surname, Duckinfield, in archival records as he searched to identify the young Englishman who, according to family stories, took a slave concubine in Jamaica and brought her to the Anglo-American colony of Virginia, thus begetting an Afro-Virginian family. The present-day Mr. Duckinfield’s archival search led him to discover the existence of John Duckinfield, one of the major slave ship owners for brigs going to and from Madagascar in the eighteenth century. He learned that John Duckinfield was connected with several ships that traded between Madagascar, Jamaica, and Virginia in the eighteenth century.43
According to the family oral tradition, John Duckinfield’s son became quite enamored of his concubine and consequentially became estranged from his father. The father was upset by his son’s unreasonable demand to keep the concubine, and the son moved to Virginia with his concubine to settle there. This is the end of his family narrative as far as I was able to note it.
The contemporary African American Mr. Duckinfield did his own research to see if he could find any evidence of British Duckinfields trading in the Americas. He learned of the investor John Duckinfield of Duckinfield and Company of Bristol.44 He did not at the time associate his family with Madagascar, but he did want to know his ancestry. In an e-mail, he expressed to me that, although his family did not mention Madagascar specifically, he thought that given the family story of his British forebear, there was a likelihood that the maternal ancestor in question may have been a Malagasy slave. He therefore joined our discussion group in the hopes of learning more. Thus, today’s family narratives are transmitted by people who spend significant time looking through written histories. Unfortunately, as with other cases, the oral history does not in this case allow for a conclusive alignment of one story (familial) to the other (historical record). Portelli speaks of the inherent incompleteness of oral sources and of data that, once extracted from an interview, is always the result of a selection produced by the mutual relationship of interviewer and interviewee.45 Certainly in this case the contemporary Mr. Duckinfield did seem to want more information. I was sorry that, in spite of my study, I had none to offer him.
The Duckinfield example reminds us that the “captives” and the “slaves” to whom archival documents refer were, after all, people. Like others who have been forced to migrate and endure horrendous ordeals, enslaved people left a mark on their descendants through their very anonymity. That is, the lack of information about forebears leaves its own mark, giving an unknown ancestor a different importance than that attributed to ancestors whose identities are known. That absence perturbs the consciousness like a missing limb. Though their personal stories do not appear in the historical record, the descendants of slaves continue to ponder the traumatic experience of slavery and to keep their own records, and their own counsel, about what they think happened.
2
Shipmates
THIS CHAPTER BEGINS an inquiry into histories of Virginia slaves and family stories by and about slave descendants, stories that echo a sense of separation and displacement. Through historical records we gain some idea of what happened to Malagasy slaves who were brought all the way from the Indian Ocean to the Americas, and through family oral narratives we get a glimpse of how families perceive a Malagasy descent that shapes their identities. These are families of African descent who also claim Malagasy descent, as well as Anglo-American and in some cases Native American ancestors. The term shipmates
