In 1840 an American slave ship ran aground in the Bahamas.
On British ground, the 38 people below deck could not be owned. 🇬🇧
Free Black boatmen rowed out, magistrates came aboard, and all 38 walked ashore free.
19 October 1840. The Hermosa, a schooner out of Richmond, Virginia, bound for the slave markets of New Orleans.
Below deck, 38 enslaved people. Her papers listed them as cargo.
She struck a reef off Abaco, in the Bahamas. British ground.
Bahamian boatmen rowed out through the surf, free Black men who worked these reefs for a living, and carried all 38 safe to Nassau. Britain had abolished slavery 6 years before.
The captain refused to let them ashore. He called for another ship to carry them back to bondage. Then British magistrates came aboard, armed men at their backs. No fleet. No proclamation. A local court doing its ordinary work.
In Virginia, paper made those 38 people property. On British ground, no paper on Earth could. One by one, 38 people stepped ashore at Nassau. Free.
The owners demanded them back for years. They never got them.
Nobody famous freed those 38. Boatmen rowed out. Magistrates climbed aboard. Ordinary hands, keeping Britain's word.
In Virginia, paper made them property. On British ground, thanks to the British citizens, it could not. 🇬🇧
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