black loyalists

Here is another early "fourth of July" entry.

Just recently a good Black friend of mine told me that his family had cottage in Canada. And that every year they had a tradition of going there for the fourth of July. Go figure.

Anyway, it seems like a couple hundred years ago there were thousands of Black folks who had the same idea. I need to double-check to make sure that I'm remembering this correctly but I seem to recall seeing a historical special on tv which actually made the claim that MOST Blacks in the American colonies were Loyalists (pro-British) during the American revolution. They realized that the American revolution wasn't being fought for their freedom, and the British were offering land, freedom and security to Blacks who joined them... and according to some sources, hundreds of thousands took them up on it. Many of them ultimately settled in Canada. Check it out.

The Black Loyalist Heritage Society webpage

Another Black Loyalist Homepage

A page on Black Loyalists from the The On-Line Institute for Advanced Loyalist Studies