The Barbados Landship is the oldest serving African-Barbadian organization in existence to date.
The Barbados Landship was established in 1863. It was formed by Africans living on the plantations tenantries in Barbados after they were emancipated from slavery. The organisation provided a safe haven for them to progress out of poverty. Unlike the plantation owners who were compensated for each African that was freed, our African forefathers received nothing. They were kicked off the plantation and assigned to infertile lands called tenantries. They then had to build their own huts and find work to earn money as they endeavoured to start from scratch. Many went back to work on the plantation. Skilled workers and artisans became more independent.
Many of the benefits which workers receive today were not available to them. There was no pension after working and toiling all their lives on a plantation. There were no welfare services which would allow them some relief. They had no health or life insurance and did not even have the money to bury their dead.
It is out of these conditions that the Barbados Landship was born. Some say it is the benevolence of the African which our forefathers brought with them that they employed to support themselves. The Barbados Landship is therefore a system of benevolence and cooperation which is based on a small contribution from each member. When pooled together these small contributions became significant and allowed the organisation to develop the resources to help each member in times of need.
MEMBERSHIP
The first known statistics of its membership was during the 1930s when it was recorded there were three fleets of sixty ships with a membership of over 3,000 men and 800 women. Over the following years, there have been several periods of adjustment with the number of ships and membership fluctuating until at present there is only one ship remaining with twenty-four members. After all this time, not much is known by the Barbadian public about the Landship outside of its visual impact of lily-white uniforms decorated with colourful cords, and animated performance with the accompaniment of the Tuk Band known as its “engine”.
AFRICAN CONNECTION
The phenomenon known as the Barbados Landship is truly an example of an oxymoron of the English language. This is a combination of two contradictory terms - a marine activity on land. This institution carries within the body of its manoeuvres the oldest African-based performance of the journey known as the Middle Passage.
This traumatic experience of the enslaved West Africans, who were brought to Barbados mainly during the seventeenth century, created this re-enactment to ensure that their children never forget from whence they came. It demonstrates the predominantly African provenance of the Barbados Landship which origins can be traced to the traditional maritime organisation of the Fante peoples from the Gold Coast region of Ghana known as the Asafo.
The general characteristics of the Asafo organization are quite similar to those of the Barbados Landship in several areas: the development of companies or ships located within one domicile; the naming and identification of companies; the titles attached to the offices and uniforms within the companies; the collection of the monetary contributions accumulated by the membership, linked to the responsibility for the funeral ceremonies of their members and, most importantly, the animated ceremonial processions and performances within the communities.
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