R.I.'s former slaves achieved great things

Far too many public interpretations of the transatlantic Slave Trade and the enslavement of Africans in Rhode Island have overshadowed the narratives of the Africans themselves, rendering their past lives and accomplishments nearly invisible to the present-day audience.

There are endless interpretations of the slave institution and master, with little recognition of the African experience in early Rhode Island. Fortunately, there are reams of primary historical documents in Rhode Island's historical institutions that show our early African men and women were complex and captivating human beings.

One such account is tied to the important works of the Rev. Samuel Hopkins, minister at the First Congregational Church in Newport. Hopkins is recognized as one of the first clergy members to actively denounce African enslavement. He is regarded as America’s first abolitionist. A prolific writer, his “A System of Doctrines Contained in Divine Revelation, Explained and Defended," published in 1793, is recognized as an important work of early American religious doctrine.

Traditionally, publishing and distribution costs for books were covered largely through subscribers. The "Who’s Who" of colonial America listed as patrons to Hopkins’ work is impressive on its own, but it is the list of 17 free African subscribers, nearly all of whom are living in the reverend’s own community of Newport that stands out. These men and women, who had all been born in Africa, endured the transatlantic passage and years of human bondage, became part of one of the exceptional free African communities of Newport and Providence.

Individually and collectively, these Africans made a lasting mark in the early history of black business, arts, culture, religion, education and civic advancement. Subscribers included: Prince Amy, Lincoln Elliot, Mrs. Wishiee Buckmaster, Newport Gardner, Mrs. Jenny Gardner, Mrs. Pricilla Freeman, Robert Keith, Congo Jenkins, Adam Miller, Salmar Nubia, Mrs. Obour Tanner, Zingo Stevens, Mrs. Duchess Quamino, Cato Coggeshall, Cato Mumford, Nimble Nightingale and Bristol Yamma

These free Africans not only improved the conditions of their own world, but set the stage for a better world for African-Americans.

Bristol Yamma would join Duchess Quamino’s husband John Quamino as the first Africans to enter college at what is today Princeton University, prior to the American Revolution. Prince Amy, Lincoln Elliot, Bristol Yamma, Zingo Stevens and Newport Gardner would become founders and early members of the Free African Union Society in Newport, in 1780. The society is recognized today as America's first African benevolent society.

Newport Gardner, aka Nkrumah Mireku, would also become the first published African musician in America and a founding member and teacher in 1808 of the first free African school. Obour Tanner would become a founder of the Free African Female Benevolent Society in 1809, the first African society of its kind in America. In her earlier life, Tanner was a friend and correspondent with Phyllis Wheatley, America’s first African woman published poet.

Duchess Quamino would be known as the “Pastry Queen” of colonial Rhode Island and her lifelong devotion to her church and belief in God would cause the Rev. William Ellery Channing, one of the early founders of the Unitarian Church, to call her a woman of “exemplary piety.” Zingo Stevens would become a master stone mason and his work carving headstones for his fellow Africans is recognized as an early example of African artwork in America.

The exceptional lives and contributions of these 17 men and women is only a portion of the numerous stories of African contributions in early Rhode Island and America. While the recognition and understanding of the slave trade as a profound contributing institution to the building of Rhode Island and America are important, so are the factual stories that present Africans as more than chattel property. For it is through their blood, sweat and tears that our great state and nation was built. To know more about them is to know more about ourselves as Rhode Islanders and Americans.

As my Newport grandmother would often remind me, “Slavery is how we got here, but it tells you little as to who we are as a people.”

 Keith Stokes, of Newport, lectures nationally on early African heritage and history.