By Jennifer Corr
It was a solemn weekend in Oyster Bay, as the replica slave ship schooner, Amistad, docked at the western end of Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Park from July 11 to July 13.
On the Saturday that the ship was open for tours, a raising of the Black Lives Matter flag followed after a ceremony led by the Rev. Dr. Marcus Tillery, senior pastor at the Community Church of East Williston. Ravin Chetram, vice president of the Oyster Bay-East Norwich Chamber of Commerce, then led a crowd to Oyster Bay Town Hall for a Black Lives Matter rally and vigil.
Discovering Amistad is an educational, non-profit organization based in New Haven, Conn., that owns and operates the traditional wooden schooner called Amistad, a replica of the ship, La Amistad (see sidebar), that once carried enslaved Africans before they broke free. The goal of operating this replica, according to its website, is to provide a floating classroom, educating people from port to port about the Amistad Revolt and its lessons of unity, the enduring fight for freedom and the legacy of the Transatlantic slave trade.
“We are grateful for the warm welcome we received from the Oyster Bay community,” Beth Robinson, the captain of Amistad, said, noting her gratitude to Dawn Riley of Oakcliff Sailing for help in organizing the dockside events.
“The Amistad’s story has never been more relevant,” Robinson added. “As we teach this history at sea, empowering people with leadership skills they can transfer to their daily lives ashore, we are mindful of the continuing struggle for equality. It has been especially powerful to visit Oyster Bay, sailing in the wake of the Amistad Africans.”
When Chetram went up to speak at the microphone placed in front of the ship docked in his Town of Oyster Bay, he asked onlookers to just take a moment to look at the Amistad. “I wanted them to understand what is was [representing], the ship itself,” he said. “It wasn’t a slave ship. It was a ship that brought whatever it needed to bring: objects, property, whatever it was.”
One day Africans were kidnapped Africans, he added. “And there they were, stacked at the bottom,” Chetram said. “But they were able to get out.”
The history of slavery and the period of segregation that followed still lingers in American society today, he said, and it took a movement like Black Lives Matter and the events that brought it on, to bring this history to the forefront again.
And in order to not forget, the Chetrams, along with other community leaders like Hope Taglich, 21, have been holding rallies about once a week. Chetram said he is not against the police; rather, he is against police brutality. He then thanked Nassau County Police Department officers for blocking off the road to keep demonstrators safe.
“Black lives still matter even though Breonna Taylor’s name is no longer trending on Twitter,” Taglich told the crowd at the rally in front of Town Hall. “Black lives still matter even though your [social media] feed went back to normal. Black lives still matter even though the protests are getting smaller and smaller.”
Other community members also took to the microphone to describe their experiences with racism, prejudice and discourse on the matter before participating in a vigil to remember the names of police brutality victims like Taylor, George Floyd, Muhammad Abdul Muhaymin, Elijah McClain, Tamir Rice, among other victims.
Arianna Chetram, the president of education and community reform non-profit PWR N Noise, said she hoped that when Oyster Bay residents and visitors saw Amistad, along with the rally taking place down the block, that they would not forget the message.
“I want people to know that [injustice] has been going on forever and even though it hasn’t always been on the news, it’s happening,” she said. “I hope people will have an open heart to it and try to see where we’re coming from, especially since Oyster Bay is known for [slavery.]”
On Monday, July 13, the Amistad replica sailed away from the town that in 1790 had 381 enslaved men and women living there.
Sidebar: Why La Amistad is remembered.
According to archival content from Cornell University, 53 African natives were kidnapped in 1836 from Sierra Leone and were sold into the Spanish slave trade, were placed on a Spanish slave ship bound for Havana, Cuba.
Once there, they were classified as native Cuban slaves and were purchased at an auction by Don Jose Ruiz and Don Pedro Montez, with plans to move the enslaved to another part of Cuba. Shackled, the Africans were brought onto the ship called “Amistad.”
Three days into the journey, however, a 25-year-old man named Sengbe Pieh broke out of his shackles and freed the other captives. The Africans then revolted, killed crew members and demanded that Montez and Ruiz return the ship to Africa. The ship, though, ultimately ended up grounding on Long Island, near Montauk.
After the U.S. government seized the ship and charged the 53 Africans with piracy and murder, sending them to prison to await their trial, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Africans because they were never citizens of Spain, were illegally taken from Africa and were free men under the law. Once their freedom was affirmed, the men sailed back home on the ship called “Gentleman.”
Sidebar: About the Schooner Amistad
The designers of the replica schooner, Tri-Coastal Marine of Richmond, Calif., used computer technology to recreate the vessel, following the plan of the Baltimore clipper ships that were unique for the period in both design and proportion.
Type: Baltimore Clipper Launched: March 2000 Operator: Amistad America Inc. Displacement: 136 tons Length overall: 129 feet Length at water line: 78 feet Beam: 23 feet Draft: 10.6 feet Height of masts: 100 feet Sail area: 5,200 square feet Engines: 2x CAT3304 Diesel 135HP each
Photo by Jennifer Corr.
Uploaded online at https://www.liherald.com/stories/reflecting-on-injustices-in-oyster-bay,126634.
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