Warwick Community Emancipation Service

Under and around the great Warwick rubber tree, about 100 Bermudians gathered on the eve of July 29 to 'remember and celebrate those who came before us.' As the Salvation Army Band opened the Warwick Community Emancipation Service, playing against the nearby traffic of Middle Road, the audience took seats on provided white plastic chairs, some stood, and some sat in their cars. There was a handful of whites were among the predominantly black crowd, who, based on my later conversations, came from all over Bermuda, not only Warwick. Following introductory prayers and remarks by members of the Warwick Ministerial Alliance, who co-organised the service with the Department of Community and Cultural Affairs, in his deep and resonating voice Mr. Denny Richardson delivered a speech for 'sharing precious memories' entitled 'Lest We Forget'. He reminded the audience of the atrocities of the slave trade and slavery in the UK colonies and Bermuda specifically, going on to explain the eventual abolition of the trade in 1807 by King William IV. He then made the leap to today's multicultural Bermuda—'a bag of colourful marbles'—where he urged we remember the 'vision and conviction of organisations who have built and sustained the civility' of the island. The audience was asked to personally pledge their efforts to overcome all forms of slavery, from discrimination to drugs, and expressed the need for Bermuda to unite on a 'socio-economic front'. The Salvation Army Band's trumpeters helped Reverend Howard Dill to bring forth the audience's collective voice in 'This Holy Ground', an apparently well-known hymn to many attending, to honour the event's location as a burial site for slaves and free blacks. In contrast to the proud and immaculate church cemetary directly across Middle Road from the event, the Rubber Tree is skirted with asphalt composing the Warwick Post Office parking lot and a familiar stretch of Middle Road. An unassuming monument to the original burial site was recently erected here, and several people attending that I spoke to, in addition to myself, did not know the significance of teh site or the placement of the marker until only very recently. Minister Dale Butler later laid a pink and purple floral wreath at the foot of the memorial, below a bronze marker reading 'Old Warwick Graveyard - Sacred to the Memory of our Brothers and Sisters in Christ who were laid to rest in this hallowed spot'. Several people told me that archaeology, or an excavation of some manner, had been carried out here at some point, though details of who, when and the consequences of that investigation were unclear. Archdeacon Andrew Doughty used the national tendency to remeber veterance by a tomb of the unknown soldier as an anaology to the Warwick burial site, in terms of being one of the few remaining or known places representing so many un-named Bermudian slaves and free blacks of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. He also presented a historical narrative tracing the slave trade abolition in 1807 (and mentioning the 2007 bicentennial) and noting Bermuda emancipation in 1834 and its considerable predating of US emancipation in 1888. He reminded of the many enduring forms of global slavery today and questioned what it would take to end slavery for good. Commmunity and Cultural Affairs Minister, the Hon. Dale Butler, incorporated discussion of the earliest colonists such as Sir George Somers and a tracing of slavery into his speech. Like Mr. Richardson, he recognised the community organisations to whom Bermudians have historically been attached, such as churches, lodges and schools. Echoing his remarks on Friday evening at the Friendly Societies March, he lamented the lack of these attachements today, particualrly for young people and proposed this as major factor in the social changes and issues Bermuda is facing at this time. Following the formal service, particpants gathered and caught up with one another—showcasing the connections among them—over some warm (and extremely delicious) homemade ginger bread and juice. A 'Customer Satisfaction Survey' was distributed by the Department of Community and Cultural Affairs.