& copy; D. Gail Saunders

As indicated in the last two articles, many Liberated Africans were settled in free black villages outside of the town of Nassau. Carmichael, about ten miles southwest of the city of Nassau was settled in about 1824 on about 400 acres of land purchased by the Collector of Customs, Mr. Charles Poitier. The Surveyor General, J.J. Burnside divided the parcel into half acre lots available for purchase by Liberated Africans at a cost of ten shillings a lot or two pounds an acre.

By 1832 there were five hundred and fourteen (514) Liberated Africans living in and around the village of Carmichael. It was named after the then governor, Sir James Carmichael Smyth (1829-1833), an ardent abolitionist and opponent of corporal punishment for female slaves.

Carmichael was used by Governor Smyth to settle Liberated Africans off the Vigilante on 1 April, 1836 and the brig Creole also in that year. During 1838, Liberated Africans were settled at Carmichael off the Diligent and the Scorpion, which contained between twenty and thirty children between the ages of four to six years. Additionally, a number of Liberated Africans landed in 1841 from the ships the Jesus Maria and the Meg Lee were settled there.

When the Africans arrived, many were in poor health and had to be sent to the African Hospital at Roslyn, situated about a mile west of Nassau, before being dispatched to one of the villages.

Carmichael was the village used as a reception area for numerous African arrivals. Soon after its establishment, a school and a church were established. In 1832 forty-nine (49) children attended school. In less than ten years (1841) Carmichael was described as "a thriving and extensive settlement of independent Africans."

While the new arrivals were provided with clothing and utensils, the Liberated Africans were given employment such as building and repairing roads. They were trained to prepare themselves for living as free persons.

A superintendent was appointed to Carmichael in 1838 in order to administer the village. He was mandated to hold Anglican services twice daily, night school for adults and day classes for children. His duties also included maintaining law and order and protecting the Africans at the village. He was also to tutor the Africans in abiding by the law and generally to encourage them to be industrious and of good behaviour.

Most of the Liberated Africans at Carmichael or "Headquarters", as part of Carmichael was known, cultivated vegetables for the Nassau Market. Finding that it was too far to carry their produce to the Nassau Market every day, many settled at the site which ultimately became known as Grant's Town.

By the mid 1850s, the population of Carmichael village had decreased and the village became increasingly deserted. Rev. Richard Chambers in the Nassau Quarterly Report of October 1853, stated "the settlement of Carmichael is fast decreasing from its former flourishing state."

Many of the younger residents moved nearer to Nassau and settled at Grant's Town, as they admitted: "there is no permanent means of support for the inhabitants."

It is interesting to note that the original Anglican Church building constructed in the nineteenth century was incorporated into the recently constructed Saint Ambrose on Carmichael Road.

(I am indebted to Patrice M. Williams' A Guide to African Villages in New Providence). See also Gail Saunders Slavery in The Bahamas 1648-1838.