Formerly the Newsletter of the Caribbean Amerindian Centrelink (ISSN 1684-0232): News, essays, website reviews concerning the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean, and the global struggle for indigenous rights.
Friday, December 26, 2003
Black-Indian Jamaicans sold into slavery in Louisiana: Documentation
The Afro-Louisiana History and Genealogy (1719-1820) online database provides documentation of individuals in different Caribbean territories who were sold into slavery in the United States. These individuals, most of those listed being born in Jamaica, are listed as "Grif...usually meaning a mix of Black and Indian". Often, these were Maroons from Jamaica, which further bolsters arguments advanced by others that the Maroons of Jamaica had some Amerindian ancestry. You can use the searchable database which is provided online and trace some of these entries yourselves.