That we desire the civilization and enlightenment of Africa, the high and elevated position of Liberia among the nations of the earth, may not be doubted, as the writer was among the first, seven or eight years ago, to make the suggestion and call upon the Liberians to hold up their heads like men; take courage, having confidence in their own capacity to govern themselves, and come out from their disparaging position, by formerly declaring their Independence.
As our desire is to impart information and enlighten the minds of our readers on the various subjects herein contained, we present below a large extract from the First Annual Report of the Trustees of Donations for Education in Liberia. We could only wish that many of our readers possessed more historical and geographical information of the world, and there could be little fears of their going anywhere that might be incongenial and unfavorable to their success. We certainly do intend to deal fairly with Liberia, and give the reader every information that may tend to enlighten them. What the colored people most need is intelligence; give them this, and there is no danger of them being duped into anything they do not desire. This Board was incorporated by the Legislature of Massachusetts, March 19th, 1850, Ensign H. Kellogg, Speaker of the House, Marshall P. Wilder, President of the Senate; Trustees of the Board: Hon. George N. Briggs, LL.D., Hon. Simon Greenleaf, LL.D, Hon. Joel Giles, Hon. Albert Fearing, Amos A. Lawrence, Esq.; Officers of the Board: Hon. G. N. Briggs, President; Hon. S. Fairbanks, Treasurer; Rev. J. Tracy, Secretary. The conclusion of the Report says: "In view of such consideration, the Trustees cannot doubt the patrons of learning will sustain them in their attempt to plant the First College on the only continent which yet remains without one."
In this, the learned Trustees have fallen into a statistical and geographical error, which we design to correct. The continent is not without a College. There are now in Egypt, erected under the patronage of that singularly wonderful man, Mehemet Ali, four colleges conducted on the European principle: Scientific, Medical, Legal, and Military. NOTE: It may be that the Medical and Legal are adjunct departments of the Scientific College, which would make the number of Colleges in Egypt but two: as we are certain that the Military is separate entirely from the Scientific School, and spoken of by travelers as a splendid College. END NOTE.
These are in successful operation; the Military College having an average of eleven hundred students annually. The continent of Africa then is not without a college, but though benighted enough, even to an apparent hopeless degeneration, she is still the seat of learning, and must some day rise, in the majesty of ancient grandeur, and vindicate the rights and claims of her own children, against the incalculable wrongs perpetuated through the period of sixty ages by professedly enlightened Christians against them.
Cape Palmas
A glance at the map will show a sharp bend in this coast at Cape Palmas, from which it extends, on the one side, about 1,100 miles northwest and north, and on the other, about 1,200 or 1,300 almost directly east. In this bend is the Maryland Colony of Cape Palmas, with a jurisdiction extending nearly 100 miles eastward. This Colony is bounded on the northwest by the Republic of Liberia, which extends along the coast about 400 miles to Sherbro.
These two governments will ultimately be united in one Republic, and may be considered as one, for all the purpose of this inquiry. The extent of their united seacoast is about 520 miles. The jurisdiction of the Republic over the four hundred miles or more which it claims has been formally acknowledged by several of the leading powers of Europe, and is questioned by none. To almost the whole of it, the native title has been extinguished; the natives, however, still occupying as citizens such portions of it as they need.
The civilized population of these governments, judging from the census of 1843, and other information, is some 7,000 or 8,000. Of the heathen population, no census has ever been taken; but it probably exceeds 300,000.
The grade of Liberian civilization may be estimated from the fact that the people have formed a republican government, and so administer it, as to secure the confidence of European governments in its stability. The native tribes who have merged themselves in the Republic have all bound themselves to receive and encourage teachers; and some of them have insisted on the insertion, in their treaties of annexation, of pledges that teachers and other means of civilization shall be furnished.
Our accounts of churches, clergy and schools are defective. but show the following significant facts:
The clergy of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Liberia are nearly all Liberian citizens, serving as missionaries of the Methodist Missionary Society in the United States. The last Report of the Society gives the names of fifteen missionaries having in charge nine circuits, in which are 882 members in full communion and 235 probationers; total, 1,117. They have 20 Sabbath Schools, with 114 officers and teachers, 810 scholars, and 507 volumes in their libraries. They have a Manual Labor School and Female Academy. The number of Day Schools is not reported; but seven of the missionaries are reported as superintendant of schools, and the same number have under the charge several "native towns," in some of which there are schools. The late superintendent of the missions writes:
"It appears plain to my mind, that nothing can now retard the progress of our missions in this land, unless it be the want of a good high school, in which to rear up an abundant supply of well qualified teachers, to supply, as they shall rapidly increase in number, all your schools."
The Baptists are next in number to the Methodists. The Northern Baptist Board, having its seat in Boston, has in Liberia one mission, two outstations, one boarding school, and two day schools with about twenty scholars each, one native preacher, and four native assistants. The Southern Board operates more extensively. More than a year since, the Rev. John Day, its principal agent there, reported to the Rev. R. R. Gurley, United States Commissioner to Liberia, as follows: "In our schools are taught say, 330 children, 92 of whom are natives. To more than 10,000 natives, the Word of Life is statedly preached; and in every settlement in these colonies, we have a church, to whom the means of grace are administered; and in every village we have an interesting Sunday school, where natives as well as colonists are taught the truths of God's word. Say, in our Sunday schools, are taught 400 colonists, and 200 natives. . . .We have this year baptized 18 natives and 7 colonists, besides what have been baptized by Messrs. Murray and Drayton, from whom I have had no report."
The missionaries are all, or nearly all, Liberian citizens.
Mission school
The Board of Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the United States has five missionaries at four stations in Liberia. The first is at Monrovia, under the care of the Rev. Harrison W. Ellis, well known as "the Learned Black Blacksmith." While a slave in Alabama, and working at his trade as a blacksmith, he acquired all the education in English, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Theology, which is required for ordination as a Presbyterian minister. The Presbyterians of that region then bought him, and James, a colored man, was for some years a printer in the service of the American Board at their mission at Cape Palmas and the Gaboon River. He first went to Liberia as a teacher, supported by a society of ladies in New York. In the Presbyterian church under the care of Mr. Ellis are 39 communicants. During the year, 24 had been added, and 8 had been dismissed to form a new church in another place. Mr. Ellis also has charge of the "Alexander High School," which is intended mainly for teaching the rudiments of a classical education. This institution has an excellent iron school house, given by a wealthy citizen of New York, at the cost of one thousand dollars, and a library and philosophical apparatus, which cost six hundred dollars, given by a gentleman in one of the southern States.
The library contains a supply of classical works, probably equal to the wants of the school for some years. The land needed for the accommodtion of the school was given by the government of Liberia. The number of scholars appears to be between twenty and thirty, a part of whom support themselves by their daily labor. The English High School under the care of Mr. James, had, according to the last Annual Report, 52 scholars. At a later date, the number in both schools was 78. Mr. James has also a large Sabbath school; but the number of pupils is not given.
The second station on the north bank of the St. Paul's, about fifteen miles from Monrovia, and six miles below Millsburgh. The missionary is a Liberian, Mr. H. W. Erskine. On a lot of ten acres, given by the government, buildings on an economical scale have been erected, in which is a school of twenty scholars. A church was organized in November, 1849, with eight members from the church in Monrovia. They have since increased to fourteen. Here, too, is a flourishing Sabbath school. The citizens and especially the poor natives in the neighborhood, are extremely anxious that a boarding school should be established. To this the Committee having charge of this mission objects, as the expense for buildings and for the support of pupils would be great, and would absorb funds that can be more profitably expanded on day schools.
The third station is on the Simon river, 150 miles down the coast from Monrovia, where, at the mouth of the river, is the town of Greenville, and a few miles higher up, the newer settlements of Readville and Rossville. It is under the care of the Rev. James M. Priest. The number of communicants at the latest date, was thirty, and the field of labor was rapidly enlarging by immigration. The station is new, and it does not appear that any mission school had yet been organized.
The fourth station is at Settra Kroo, where there are five or six miles of coast to which the native title has not yet been extinguished. This station has been maintained for some years, at a lamentable expense of the lives and health of white missionaries. About 200 boys and a few girls have been taught to read. The station is now under the care of Mr. Washington McDonogh, formerly a slave of the late John McDonogh of Louisiana, so well known for the immense estate which he has bequeathed to benevolent purposes. He was well educated, and with more than eighty others sent out some years since at his master's expense. He has a school of fifteen scholars, with the prospect of a large increase.
The mission of the Protestant Episcopal Church is located in the Maryland Colony at Cape Palmas. Its last in actual operation; all containing from 200 to 300 scholars, of whom about 100 are in one Sabbath school. Five other schools had been projected and have probably gone into operation since that time. The greater part of the pupils are from native families. The Report states the number are from native families. The Report states the number of communicants at sixty seven, of whom forty are natives. A high school was opened January 1, 1850.
The laws of the Republic of Liberia provide for a common school in every town. It is supposed, however, that where there is a mission school, accessible to all children of suitable age, no other school exists; so that, in fact, nearly all the common schools in Liberia are connected with the different missions, the missionaries have the superintendence of their studies and the Missionary Societies defray a large portion of the expense. Yet it must be remembered that a large majority of the missionaries are citizens of the Republic, and some of them native Africans; so that the immediate control of the schools is not generally in foreign hands.
A portion, also, of the missionary funds, is contributed in Liberia; and something is paid by parents for the tuition of their children. Yet the Republic evidently needs an educational system more independent of missionary aid and control; and for that purpose, needs a supply of teachers who are not raised up in mission schools. And we have it in testimony, that the missions themselves might be more efficient for good if well supplied with teachers of higher qualifications.
Here, then, we have a Republic of some 300,000 inhabitants, of whom 7,000 or 8,000 may be regarded as civilized, and the remainder as having a right to expect and a large part of them actually expecting and demanding the means of civilization and Christianity. We have, supplying as well as we can by estimate, the numbers not defintely given, more than 2,000 communicants in Christian churches and more than 1,500 children in Sabbath schools, some 40 day schools containing, exclusive of the Methodists, who are the most numerous, and of whose numbers in school we have no report, about 635 scholars. The whole number in day schools, therefore, is probably not less than 1,200. We have the Alexander High School at Monrovia, where instruction is given to some extent in the classics; the English High School, at the same place, under Mr. James; the Methodist Manual Labor School and Female Academy at Millsburg; the Baptist Boarding School at Bexley; and the Protestant Episcopal High School at Cape Palmas. These institutions must furnish some students for a higher seminary, such as we propose to establish; and such a population must need their labor when educated.
However foreign to the designs of the writer of ever making that country or any other out of America his home, had this been done, and honorably maintained, the Republic of Liberia would have met with words of encouragement, not only from himself, an humble individual, but we dare assert, from the leading spirits among, if not from the whole colored population of the United States because they would have been willing to overlook the circumstances under which they went there, so that in the end, they were willing to take their stand as men, and thereby throw off the degradation of slaves still under the control of American slaver holders and American slave ships.
But in this, we were disappointed, grievously disappointed, and proceed to show in short, our objections to Liberia.
Its geographical positionin the first place, is objectionable, being located in the sixth degree of latitude North of the equator, in a district signally unhealthy, rendering it objectionable as a place of destination for the colored people of the United States. We shall say nothing about other parts of the African coast, and the reasons for its location where it is: it is enough for us to know the facts as they are, to justify an unqualified objection to Liberia.
In the second place, it originated in a deep laid scheme of the slaveholders of the country, to exterminate the free colored of the American continent; the origin being sufficient to justify us in impugning the motives.
Thirdly and lastly, Liberia is not an Independent Republic; in fact, it is not an independent nation at all; but a poor miserable mockery, a burlesque on a government, a pitiful dependency on the American Colonizationists, the Colonization Board at Washington city, in the District of Columbia, being the Executive and Government, and the principal man, called President in Liberia, being the echo, a mere parrot of Rev. Robert R. Gurley, Elliot Cresson, Esq., Governor Pinney, and other leaders of the Colonization scheme, to do as they bid, and say what they tell him. This we see in all his doings.
Does he go to France and England and enter into solemn treaties of an honorable recognition of the independence of his country? Before his own nation has any knowledge of the result, this man called President dispatches an official report to the Colonizationists of the United States, asking their gracious approval. When king Grando, or a party of fisherman besiege a village and murder some of the inhabitants, this same "President" dispatches an official report to the American Colonization Board, asking for instructions, who call an Executive Session of the Board, and immediately decide that war must be waged against the enemy, placing ten thousand dollars and war actually declared in Liberia, by virtue of the instructions of the American Colonization Society A mockery of a government, a disgrace to the office pretended to be held, a parody on the position assumed. Liberia in Africa is a mere dependency of Southern slaveholders, and American Colonizationists and unworthy of any respectful consideration from us.
What would be thought of the people of Hayti, and their heads of government, if their instructions emanated from the American Anti Slavery Society or the British Foreign Missionary Board? Should they be respected at all as a nation? Would they be worthy of it? Certainly not. We do not expect Liberia to be all that Hayti is; but we ask and expect of her to have a decent respect for herself, to endeavor to be freemen instead of voluntary slaves.
James Birney
Liberia is no place for the colored freeman of the United States; and we dismiss the subject with a single remark of caution against any advice contained in a pamphlet, which we have not seen, written by Hon. James G. Birney, in favor of Liberian emigration. Mr. Birney is like the generality of white Americans, who suppose that we are too ignorant to understand what we want; whenever they wish to get rid of us, would drive us anywhere so that we left them. Don't adhere to a word therein continued; we will think for ourselves.
Let Mr. Birney go his way, and we will go ours. This is one of those confounded gratuities that is forced in our faces at every turn we make. We dismiss it without further comment and with Colonization in toto, and Mr. Birney de facto.
But to return to emigration: Where shall we go? We must not leave this continent; America is our destination and our home.
That the continent of America seems to have been designed by Providence as an asylum for all the various nations of the earth, is very apparent. From the earliest discovery, various nations sent a representation here, either as adventurers and speculators, or employed seamen and soldiers, hired to do the work of their employers. And among the earliest and most numerous class who found their way to the New World, were those of the African race. And it is now ascertained to our mind, beyond a peradventure, that when the continent was discovered, there were in Central America, a tribe of the black race, of fine looking people, having characteristics of color and hair, identifying them originally of the African race, no doubt being a remnant of the Africans who, with the Carthaginian expedition, were adventitiously cast upon this continent, in their memorable excursion, to the "Great Island," after sailing many miles distant to the West of the Pillars of Hercules.
We are not inclinded to be superstitious, but say, that we can see the "finger of God" in all this; and if the European race may with propriety, boast and claim, that this continent is better adapted to their development, than their own fatherland, surely, it does not necessarily detract from our fatherland, to claim the superior advantages to the African race, to be derived from this continent. But be that as it may, the world belongs to mankind, his common Father created it for his common good, his temporal destiny is here; and our present warfare is not upon European rights nor for European countries, but for the common rights of man, based upon the great principles of common humanity, taking our chance in the world of rights, and claiming to have originally more right to this continent, than the European race. And had we no other claims than those set forth in a former part of this work, they are sufficient to cause every colored man on the continent to stand upon the soil unshaken and unmoved. The aboriginee of the continent is more closely allied to us by consanguinity, than to the European, being descended from the Asiatic, whose alliance in matrimony with the African is very common, therefore, we have even greater claims to this continent on that account, and should unite and make common cause in elevation with our similarly oppressed brother, the Indian.
The advantages of this continent are superior, because it presents every variety of climate, soil, and production of the earth, with every variety of mineral production, with all kinds of water privileges, and ocean coast on all sides, presenting every commercial advantage. Upon the American continent we are determined to stay, in spite of every odds against us. What part of the great continent shall our destination be, shall we emigrate to the North or South?
