Sankofa Press

10/28/2021

Olaudah Equiano and the Zong Massacre

BLACK HISTORY MONTH/DISCOVERIES/FACTS

The Story Below seems to write about ALL Africans. Previously Or decades ago I found that people other than AFRICANS would write in a way that would ELIMINATE PARTS OF AFRICA Especially WEST AFRICA... This behaviour would have CONTINUED TO CREATE A DIVIDE. THE TRUTH IS NATIVE AFRICANS IN THE PAST LIVED MAINLY IN THE NORTH OF AFRICA AND DIFFERENT PARTS OF OUR WORLD; A FACT!

On June 21, 1948, hundreds of men and women from the Caribbean disembarked from a ship called the Emperor Windrush at Tilbury docks. Many still believe that this event marked the first arrival of a black population to the UK but in fact, there have been people of African descent living in this country since Roman times.

October in the UK is Black History Month, a month dedicated to remembering the contributions of those people from African and Caribbean heritage to our country’s history. So let's go back nearly two thousand years and discover a time that bears witness to the first known black presence in Britain.

The Roman Empire was the largest empire of the ancient world and lasted some 500 years. At its peak its territories stretched far and wide from north-western Europe, to North Africa and into the Near East. Although a gradual process, the conquest of Britain effectively begun in AD 43 under Emperor Claudius, when he installed the first governor of Roman Britain.

By its very design, the Roman Empire was multicultural. Through trade, logistical or military movements, civilian migrations both voluntary and forced, people travelled within the Empire, and by the 3rd century AD, there is evidence of the first African people making their way to Britain.

In 1953, an ancient skeleton was discovered in the East Sussex beauty spot of Beachy Head. It wasn’t until 2014 though that her identity was revealed. Through modern forensic techniques including isotope analysis, radiocarbon dating and facial reconstruction, it was concluded that this lady had lived around 200-250 AD, was from a Roman area in the south-east of England, had died in her early twenties and had sub-Saharan African ancestry. Not only is she the first black Briton known to us, her discovery suggests that people from beyond the North African Roman border were also present in Britain at this time.

The assumption that any African person living in Britain at this time would have most likely been a slave is contradicted by the next discovery. In 1901 in York, a skeleton, who would later be called the “Ivory Bangle Lady”, was discovered and subsequently dated to the second half of the 4th century AD. Buried in a stone coffin her remains were found with ivory bracelets, earrings, pendants and other expensive possessions indicating that she held a high ranking position within Roman York. Isotope analysis showed she had spent her early years in a warmer climate whilst her skull shape suggested she had some North African ancestry.

Other excavations at York conducted in the 50s discovered the largest number of human skeletons from Roman Britain ever exhumed. Dating from the 3rd century AD, several of the people were of African origin and made up various levels of society from soldiers to slaves. Society in Roman York could well have been more diverse that we previously believed.

Other archaeological discoveries have also shown an African presence in Roman Britain. The University of Leicester found 83 skeletons in a Roman graveyard. Some dated back to as early as the 2nd century AD and six of the skeletons were found to have African cranial features, with two of them appearing to have been born in England. DNA analysis on a group of Roman Londoners also revealed two with North African ancestry.

READ MORE:-

https://www.history.co.uk/article/the-history-of-black-britain-roman-africans

OTHER STORIES:-

https://www.history.co.uk/articles/the-story-of-dido-elizabeth-belle-britain-s-first-black-aristocrat

https://www.history.co.uk/shows/not-what-you-thought-you-knew/olaudah-equiano-and-the-zong-massacre

Olaudah Equiano, and the Zong massacre: the trial that galvanized the Abolition movement

10/21/2021

WE MUST DISCUSS THE AFRICAN OR BLACK DIVIDE

Things have SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVED for Black Lives concerning our UNITY

BUT THERE ARE STILL MAJOR PROBLEMS.

Personally and honestly speaking Ive only experienced something once thirty-five years ago but then it TURNED OUT TO BE MORE OF JEALOUSY than A DIVIDE; when Africans from The Diaspora and other countries CREATE PROBLEMS FOR those coming from OUR MOTHERLAND.
Ones Who Often have next to NO EDUCATION ABOUT HOW THE European INVASION AFFECTED AFRICA and somehow still has EFFECTS....

My mother is from WEALTH & ROYALTY but even though it makes SOME DIFFERENCES...

SOME of her ACTIONS OR BEHAVIOURS were INCREDIBLY STRANGE and it took me DECADES TO REALISE HOW SHE HAS BEEN AFFECTED.

One day when TALKING WITH A SISTER SOME OF THE THINGS THAT HAVE AFFECTED her mother has also affected mine. So even though THE MOST EVIL THINGS HAPPENED TO SOME OR A FRIGHTFUL LOT OF OUR ANCESTORS AND DESCENDANTS...

THOSE LEFT BEHIND WERE DESTROYED IN MANY WAYS

As such WE MUST CONCENTRATE ON WHAT MATTERS AND SOLIDIFY OUR UNITY
Otherwise after a while THERE WILL BE VERY LITTLE DONE.

IF YOU ARE TRULY A PRAYING PERSON YOU WILL KNOW OR HAVE SENSED WHAT I MEAN.
TIME & TIDE WAITS FOR NO MAN OR WOMAN!

PUSHING OUR YOUTHS TO HATE OR MURDER is NOT The Way FORWARD!!
#WakeUpAfricans

COMMENT: Yes it's true that they had to survive YEP. Those were the times BUT in MODERN TIMES ITS CARRYING ON WITHOUT BEING MONITORED OR FORCED TO BE THIS WAY/THERE ARE NO CONSEQUENCES WAITING.

10/21/2021

CHARLENE's ANCESTRY

WE MUST DISCUSS THE AFRICAN OR BLACK DIVIDE

Things have SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVED for Black Lives concerning our UNITY

BUT THERE ARE STILL MAJOR PROBLEMS.

Personally and honestly speaking Ive only experienced something once thirty-five years ago but then it TURNED OUT TO BE MORE OF JEALOUSY than A DIVIDE; when Africans from The Diaspora and other countries CREATE PROBLEMS FOR those coming from OUR MOTHERLAND.
Ones Who Often have next to NO EDUCATION ABOUT HOW THE European INVASION AFFECTED AFRICA and somehow still has EFFECTS....

My mother is from WEALTH & ROYALTY but even though it makes SOME DIFFERENCES...

SOME of her ACTIONS OR BEHAVIOURS were INCREDIBLY STRANGE and it took me DECADES TO REALISE HOW SHE HAS BEEN AFFECTED.

One day when TALKING WITH A SISTER SOME OF THE THINGS THAT HAVE AFFECTED her mother has also affected mine. So even though THE MOST EVIL THINGS HAPPENED TO SOME OR A FRIGHTFUL LOT OF OUR ANCESTORS AND DESCENDANTS...

THOSE LEFT BEHIND WERE DESTROYED IN MANY WAYS

As such WE MUST CONCENTRATE ON WHAT MATTERS AND SOLIDIFY OUR UNITY
Otherwise after a while THERE WILL BE VERY LITTLE DONE.

IF YOU ARE TRULY A PRAYING PERSON YOU WILL KNOW OR HAVE SENSED WHAT I MEAN.
TIME & TIDE WAITS FOR NO MAN OR WOMAN!

PUSHING OUR YOUTHS TO HATE OR MURDER is NOT The Way FORWARD!!
#WakeUpAfricans

COMMENT: Yes it's true that they had to survive YEP. Those were the times BUT in MODERN TIMES ITS CARRYING ON WITHOUT BEING MONITORED OR FORCED TO BE THIS WAY/THERE ARE NO CONSEQUENCES WAITING.

10/21/2021

WE MUST DISCUSS THE AFRICAN OR BLACK DIVIDE

Things have SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVED for Black Lives concerning our UNITY

BUT THERE ARE STILL MAJOR PROBLEMS.

Personally and honestly speaking Ive only experienced something once thirty-five years ago but then it TURNED OUT TO BE MORE OF JEALOUSY than A DIVIDE; when Africans from The Diaspora and other countries CREATE PROBLEMS FOR those coming from OUR MOTHERLAND.
Ones Who Often have next to NO EDUCATION ABOUT HOW THE European INVASION AFFECTED AFRICA and somehow still has EFFECTS....

My mother is from WEALTH & ROYALTY but even though it makes SOME DIFFERENCES...

SOME of her ACTIONS OR BEHAVIOURS were INCREDIBLY STRANGE and it took me DECADES TO REALISE HOW SHE HAS BEEN AFFECTED.

One day when TALKING WITH A SISTER SOME OF THE THINGS THAT HAVE AFFECTED her mother has also affected mine. So even though THE MOST EVIL THINGS HAPPENED TO SOME OR A FRIGHTFUL LOT OF OUR ANCESTORS AND DESCENDANTS...

THOSE LEFT BEHIND WERE DESTROYED IN MANY WAYS

As such WE MUST CONCENTRATE ON WHAT MATTERS AND SOLIDIFY OUR UNITY
Otherwise after a while THERE WILL BE VERY LITTLE DONE.

IF YOU ARE TRULY A PRAYING PERSON YOU WILL KNOW OR HAVE SENSED WHAT I MEAN.
TIME & TIDE WAITS FOR NO MAN OR WOMAN!

PUSHING OUR YOUTHS TO HATE OR MURDER is NOT The Way FORWARD!!
#WakeUpAfricans

COMMENT: Yes it's true that they had to survive YEP. Those were the times BUT in MODERN TIMES ITS CARRYING ON WITHOUT BEING MONITORED OR FORCED TO BE THIS WAY/THERE ARE NO CONSEQUENCES WAITING.

10/20/2021

Africatown Alabama, U.S.A.

BLACK HISTORY

AFRICAN TOWN ALABAMA US

Clotilda: America’s Last Slave Ship and the Community of Africatown

The Clotilda was a two-masted wooden ship owned by steamboat captain and shipbuilder Timothy Meaher. Meaher wagered another wealthy white man that he could bring a cargo of enslaved Africans aboard a ship into Mobile despite the 1807 Act Prohibiting the Importation of Slaves. In the autumn of 1860 Captain William Foster departed for West Africa and successfully smuggled 110 enslaved Africans from Dahomey into Mobile, with one person perishing during the Middle Passage. Africatown was founded by descendants of some of the enslaved people aboard the Clotilda, and it was the home to some of the last survivors of the transatlantic slave trade in the United States. The slavers burned the ship in Mobile Bay, where it was lost to history in the muddy waters of the bay until May 22, 2019, when the Alabama Historical Commission and partners announced that the wreck had been located.

https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/initiatives/africatown-alabama-usa

https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/initiatives/africatown-alabama-usa

Clotilda: America’s Last Slave Ship and the Community of Africatown The Clotilda was a two-masted wooden ship owned by steamboat captain and shipbuilder Timothy Meaher. Meaher wagered another wealthy white man that he could bring a cargo of enslaved Africans aboard a ship into Mobile despite the 1...

10/19/2021

AFRICA

AFRICA

10/14/2021

If You Want To Make A Change
STOP TALKING
AND DO SOMETHING!

10/14/2021

Cerys Matthews presents the story of Wales’s first black head teacher, Betty Campbell, and the new statue that will honour her lifetime of remarkable achievements.

After a public vote, Betty Campbell was chosen from a shortlist of incredible women from history to be immortalised as the first public statue of a named Welsh woman. Those who knew Betty well recall the life and work of this community icon from Cardiff’s Butetown and her journey from a tough childhood marked by tragedy and setbacks to the pioneering achievements that brought her plaudits from the likes of Nelson Mandela.

Told a working-class black girl could never achieve her ambitions, Betty proved her doubters wrong by battling racism to pursue her goal. After becoming Wales’s first black head teacher in 1973 on her home patch of Butetown, she made history, and ensured her pupils knew their history, by putting their multicultural heritage on the school curriculum. Her pioneering approach saw her create her own books and projects to teach her pupils about the positive contribution to British society by people of all races. She also helped create Black History Month.

Former pupils tell of how Betty Campbell's support was vital to their success. One, Louise Kelton, left Cardiff in her early twenties and rose to one of the highest positions in American law enforcement after being nominated by President Barack Obama to become a US marshall. Cerys discovers how Betty’s influence on Wales grew beyond the classroom with positions in public life and politics, and she finds out how Betty proved a passionate advocate for the people of Butetown as a councillor.

Filmed over three years, the programme follows the unfolding story of the groundbreaking statue that will keep her legacy alive, including the challenge faced by the world-renowned sculptor chosen to capture this heroine’s spirit. As unveiling day arrives and the statue for Betty Campbell is revealed to Wales and the world, what will her husband, children and those who knew her best think of it?
READ MORE:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/58732219

10/14/2021

Liverpool's first black Lord Mayor sworn in

BHM
LIVERPOOL'S FIRST BLACK LORD MAYOR SWORN IN

LIVERPOOL'S FIRST BLACK LORD MAYOR ANNA ROTHERY HAS BEEN SWORN IN.

MS ROTHERY, WHO WAS BORN IN TOXTETH, SAID SHE HOPED HER APPOINTMENT WOULD "OPEN DOORS" FOR PEOPLE FROM ALL BACKGROUNDS.

SHE SUCCEEDS PETER BRENNAN WHO RESIGNED AFTER SHARING A RACIST VIDEO ONLINE.

Published4 September 2019SectionBBC NewsSubsectionLiverpool

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-merseyside-49583332

Councillor Anna Rothery succeeds Peter Brennan who resigned after sharing a racist video online.

10/14/2021

BLACK HISTORY MONTH UK

John Richard Archer (1863-1932)

Early Black British mayor and a founding member of the Labour Party.

Keir Hardie and Ramsay MacDonald are well-known as the founding fathers of the Labour Party, but the part played by Liverpool-born John Archer is not always remembered.

John Richard Archer (1863-1932), was Mayor of Battersea in 1913 and one of Britain’s earliest black mayors. John Archer, was thought to be the first black mayor in Britain until quite recently, but an even earlier candidate for that honour is Dr. Allan Glaisyer Minns, Mayor of Thetford in Norfolk, elected in 1904, nine years before John. Dr. Minns was born at Inagua Bahamas in 1858 and Educated at Guy’s Hospital, London. He was Medical Officer at Thetford Workhouse and Thetford Cottage Hospital.

John Archer was born on 8 June and as a child lived at number 3 Blake Street, Liverpool, behind the present-day Lime Street Station, Liverpool, not far from the infamous Brownlow Hill Workhouse. Richard Archer, John’s father, was a Barbadian ship’s steward whilst his mother, Mary Theresa Burns, was Irish born.

John was a medical student for a time and a prizewinning photographer. A life-long socialist, John travelled at least three times around the world in his youth, living for a while in the West Indies and North America. He met his wife, Bertha, in Canada and returned to Britain, settling in Battersea in the 1890s near Battersea Park at 55 Brymaer Road.

Politically, Battersea was at the time dominated by the Labour, Liberal and radical internationalist movements. John was soon involved in the Battersea Labour League, but had originally begun his political life speaking against spiritualism. Well-known for his practical approach to social welfare, John was elected to the Wandsworth Union Board of Guardians in 1906, eventually being elected councillor.

When John was nominated for Progressive candidate for Mayor in Battersea in November, 1913. the black vote was very small indeed. The newspapers made something of a fuss, as the first Catholic mayor T. P. Brogan, had been John Archer’s mentor prior to his election. The press were not familiar with the old dual-heritage Liverpool-born Black Community and were somewhat mixed-up about his origins. Some members of the press thought that he was Burmese and were surprised at his command of the English language. When John was elected on 10 November, the Black American activist, W. E. B. Dubois, wrote in his journal, the Crisis, that he “…fears no man, and brooks no insult because of the race to which he is proud to belong.”

John faced a good deal of racism from the press. In November of 1913, following John’s election as mayor, one newspaper, the South Western Star, stated, “It is not meet that the white man should be governed and controlled by a man of colour. It has always been that the white man ruled and it must always be so. lf not, goodbye to the prestige of Great Britain.’”

Another newspaper, the Daily Express recorded John’s reply to the wild conjecture in the media about his ethnic origins:
https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/black-atlantic/information/john_archer/