The
whole story
of the silver spoons and the family debate surrounding it has kept me
curious. The foundation of the story is that the rent collector raised the rent
on the Allison’s Irish lease-holdings to such an extent that the family picked
up and left Ireland, crashing off the coast of Nova Scotia and settling there
rather than their intended destination in Pennsylvania. There was always a suggestion in the family legend that the Allisons had a difficult and even impoverished life in Ireland. The more searches I did, the more I turned
up, even after publication of the blog.
The
Mount Allison University archivist identified a book that I didn’t have access to when I wrote the blog: A Genealogical Study by Winthrop Bell
(1962). The book focused on other
families, but did have a chapter on the Allisons. Winthrop Bell took to examining the silver
spoons story in some detail. He doesn’t really
argue with the premise, but perhaps casts some doubt on the perception that the
Allisons were poor. He suggests,
in fact, that the Allisons were relatively well off as leaseholders in that time period in Ireland. He doesn’t go so far as to argue that the
Allisons were landowners, just that their lease-holdings brought to them a decent income.
 |
| A page from the 1787 survey certificate |
I
have been able to find Allison landholdings in Nova Scotia in 1785 and 1787,
amounting to more than 2,000 acres. In
1791, all of the Allison men were paying five pounds each in poll taxes as
farmers. They were by no means a poor
family, and as landholders were far better off in their lives in Nova Scotia
than they would have been as leaseholders in Ireland. Bell goes so far as to argue that they began
amassing a certain amount of wealth in their new lives in Nova Scotia, and uses
as evidence that Joseph Allison (1720-1795), hero of the
story of the silver spoons, was also a slave-owner.
As
a Canadian, I learned that our place in the history of slavery was focused on assisting
those fleeing slavery through the Underground Railroad. I was not so naïve to imagine that there had
been no slaves in Canada, as historically that would have been unlikely. Learning about the link between my family and
slavery led me to want to learn more.
The
Nova Scotia archives contain plenty of evidence that slaves began to arrive in Nova
Scotia around 1749 with American and British settlers (although slavery had
existed in Canada since the late 1600s).
There was a slave auction in Halifax during that time, and there are
records of advertisements by slave owners asking for the return of runaway
slaves. In 1767 there were
104 free Black persons living in Nova Scotia (less than one per cent of the
total population). The slave population,
though, was in the many hundreds.
Enslaving
Blacks was consistent with the view of many whites of the time that Black
people were somehow of lesser human value.
Slaves laboured as domestics, agricultural workers and seafarers. Some were skilled labourers.
In
1784, the hundreds of enslaved Nova Scotia Blacks were joined by free Black
Loyalists numbering in the thousands.
These new immigrants included many people of distinction and education
as well as skilled and unskilled labourers.
They founded colonies in Nova Scotia, the largest of which was Birchtown (population
1,500). Not unexpectedly, given that
they immigrated to a colony that included some slaveholders, they were subject
to discriminatory treatment. The plots
of land Black Loyalists were given in recognition of their service to the
British were significantly smaller than the plots given to their White
counterparts.
Records
suggest that in 1784 there were 1,232 slaves in Nova Scotia, but this number
excluded some larger communities (such as Halifax and Birchtown) that had many
more slaves. It has therefore been estimated
that the actual number of slaves was probably at least double. Still, the number of free Blacks then living
in the colony was even larger.
 |
Black Loyalist family from the Black
Cultural Centre for Nova Scotia |
Incongruously,
as Black former slaves were arriving to claim their freedom in Nova Scotia as
Loyalists, British Loyalists were arriving with their families and their Black slaves. At the end of the century, though, slave
owners began freeing their slaves, beginning with John Burbidge. The law soon
followed.
Sixth
Chief Justice of Nova Scotia, Sir Thomas Andrew Lumisden Strange, was instrumental
in freeing slaves from their owners in the colony. Across the Empire, things were changing and
the slave trade was outlawed in 1807.
The
process of freeing slaves continued in Nova Scotia until 1812, by which time
there were very few left. The Slavery
Abolition Act of 1833 outlawed slavery altogether.
My
ancestor’s experiences of getting out from under the unfair treatment of a
British landowner clearly didn’t teach him empathy for others in positions of
servitude. There are those who may argue that I shouldn’t judge Joseph and his
family using my values as a barometer. I remember in
law school having a similar debate with a legal historian about applying modern
values to those we study from the past.
He argued that we cannot judge the past by the principles and values we
hold dear today. I argued that I
supposed it depended on who you talked to in that historical context. It was my view that an oppressed people knows
they are oppressed, and just because they didn't write the law or run the
country doesn’t mean their values and their opposition to their situation is
less valid. I feel the same way about
slavery.
Humans
do not want to be slaves, and having slaves means seeing a fellow human being
as lesser. This is wrong today
and was wrong three hundred years ago. If you need evidence, look to the
runaway slaves in Nova Scotia. Their efforts at escape are testimony to their objection to their own servitude. Further, you can look to people such as Sir Strange
and Burbidge to further support that there have always been those who were
clear in their opposition to this most inhumane treatment of people. The debate was alive in Nova Scotia in the
1700s, and those supporting slavery had lost much support as the
century came to a close.
Joseph
Allison, becoming increasingly prosperous in his new life, at some point
acquired a slave named Nelly (he may well have had other slaves, but there is
no evidence of this). He left Nelly to
his wife after his death in 1794. By
this time, slaves were being freed in the colony. There was a movement to free slaves across
the Empire. Even among the British
aristocracy, slavery was unpalatable. We
can imagine that Joseph left his elderly widow Alice with a slave to assist her
with domestic chores. My records suggest
that Alice died in 1797.
Joseph’s
estate sold Nelly to Simon Fitch for 39 pounds on March 2, 1807, around the
same time that the slave trade was abolished. I found Simon Fitch (1750-1824). He was born in Connecticut and arrived in Nova Scotia in 1765. He lived in the same area as the Allisons (Horton, Kings, Nova Scotia). Simon Fitch had six children with his wife Bathsheba and died in 1824. The record of the sale of Nelly from the Allisons to Fitch very clearly acknowledges that the sale of a human into
slavery is a dubious venture:
(The
Allisons) Have
Granted, Bargained, and Sold and made over unto the said Simon Fitch a certain
Negro woman named Nelly, of the age of twenty-five or thereabout, now in the
possession of the said Simon, where she hath been since the said Second day of
March last, which Negro woman was and is
a part of the personal Estate of the said Joseph Allison (if a Negro can be considered personal property in Nova Scotia)… (emphasis added)
Who
was Nelly? The family census records of the time often only recorded the head
of the family and the number and genders of other family members living with
them. So census records didn’t
help. There doesn’t seem to be a record
of Joseph Allison’s acquisition of a slave.
Essentially,
the only record I have of Nelly is the one quoted above. From that we learn that she lived first with
Joseph Allison, then she served Joseph’s widow Alice, and was later sold to Simon
Fitch. Let’s imagine a little about her
life.
Nelly
was likely a domestic slave, doing household chores for the Allisons, who had an increasingly large and prosperous farm. Over time, as Nelly worked for the Allisons,
she would have witnessed an increasing number of free Black people on the
streets of Halifax and owning their own property in Nova Scotia. She would have witnessed other Black slaves
being freed by their owners as the tides turned against slavery in the British
Empire. While all this was happening, twenty-five
year old Nelly was sold by my ancestor Allisons to their neighbour. The transaction record states that Nelly was
to serve her new owner for the remainder of her life.
Nelly would have been in her 40s when Simon Fitch died. I would like to hope
that the Fitch family saw fit to equip Nelly with skills, perhaps even a paying
position, and free her before slavery was outlawed altogether in 1833. We have no way of knowing what happened to
Nelly and who she was as a person. This is something I regret - as I would really like to tell the story of Nelly someday. The least I can do is name this blog after her and in honour of her.
Nelly
was by no means the last slave in Nova Scotia, but she was certainly among the
last. A dark stain on the family indeed.
Note on content: Please
keep in mind that this is a blog and is not intended as an academic
treatise. I suspect that there is debate
about some of the dates and facts cited herein.
I have done my best to summarize the parts of history that were relevant
to this story. History itself, however,
is far more dense, and I encourage readers who may be unfamiliar with the proud
history of African-Canadians to have a look at some of the sources listed
below. Feel free to add facts that you
believe are relevant in the comments section. I also used the nomenclature that was used in the references cited below. If I have used language or terminology that was offensive, I apologize. I think, somehow, it is impossible to write this story without offense. To be honest, it offended me deeply to think my proud history marred by slavery. The only way I could honour Nelly was to acknowledge that history and tell her story the best I can.
Sources:
Of
course, the source that started this line of inquiry was the book A Genealogical
Study, by Winthrop Bell (1962)
The Black
Cultural Centre for Nova Scotia (http://www.bccns.com/history/slavery/ )
contains some excellent resources as well.
I used some images from their site for this blog.
During the
period discussed in this blog, what is referred to as Nova Scotia also included
New Brunswick, so the archives of that province contain some interesting
information, including a paper called The Slave in Canada, by T.Watson Smith
(1898), which was very insightful and also references the Allison transaction
and states that it is the “latest of the kind in Nova Scotia” of which the
author has knowledge: (http://archives.gnb.ca/Exhibits/FortHavoc/html/Slave-in-Canada.aspx?culture=en-CA
)
There is
lots of easily accessible information on the web about Black Nova Scotians,
Black Loyalists and the history of slavery in Canada. Here are a few of the links I started with.
My primary
sources for this blog are various census and poll tax records, as well as land
ownership records.
