A campaign has been resurrected by a Halifax senator and a number of Black communities to have the federal government declare August 1 as Emancipation Day to mark the end of slavery in Canada.
Blacks in Toronto and other cities have banded with those in Owen Sound, who are marking the 156th anniversary of the end of slavery, with calls for a federally-recognized national day so Canadians can learn more about their history.
There were bands, shows, exhibits and food as thousands attended the 156th Owen Sound Emancipation Festival last weekend. Owen Sound was the most northerly stop of the Underground Railroad and was used as a safe haven for hundreds of U.S. slaves who were smuggled to Canada to escape a life of forced servitude.
“Owen Sound was the most northerly retreat of the Underground Railroad journey in Canada” according to festival organizers. “Every year descendants of Blacks, who came via the Underground Railroad to settle in freedom, gather to reminisce and enjoy a time of fellowship.”
The festival has been taking place every August long weekend since 1862. It falls around the same time as the Toronto Caribbean Carnival, which marked its 51st anniversary last weekend with more than 1 million visitors.
In Toronto, more than 1,000 supporters attended the 6th Annual Emancipation Day Underground Freedom Train ride on a packed but private TTC subway car that travelled just before midnight from Union Station to Sheppard Ave. W., where they were met with entertainment.
There were speeches, readings and a tribute to the late Judge George Carter, the first Black Canadian-born judge in the country. He would have been 97 last week.
Well-wishers were also treated to a preview screening of an upcoming Marcus Garvey film by well-known Toronto director, Roy Anderson.
Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard, who has been visiting some of the Emancipation Day festivities, said there should be a day set aside to recognize Emancipation Day in Canada.
Bernard promised a vocal gathering that she will continue the work to help make an annual Emancipation Day a federally-proclaimed national day.
“Today is a very special day,” she said. “On August 1st, 1834 the Act for the Abolition of Slavery in the British Colonies took effect, which freed more than 800,000 enslaved Africans.”
We are pleased that Upper Canada, now Ontario, was the first colony in the British Empire to abolish slavery.
John Graves Simcoe, the first Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada, from 1791 to 1796, passed an Act Against Slavery in 1793, which led to the abolition of slavery in Upper Canada by 1810. It was superseded by the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, which took affect in 1834.
Simcoe was drawn to the plight of slaves after being told of the escape of Chloe Cooley, an enslaved Black woman in Upper Canada, who, in March 1793 was bound and thrown into a boat to be sold in the U.S. Witnesses saw what happened and relayed the incident to a concerned Simcoe.
He was moved to pass new legislation called ‘Act to Prevent the further Introduction of Slaves and to limit the Term of Contracts for Servitude’ or the ‘Act to Limit Slavery in Upper Canada’ in July of that year.
It was one of the first pieces of legislation aiming at prohibiting slavery in North America. The Act outlawed purchase of new slaves and freed the children of slaves when they reached 21 years old.
Passage of the act freed nearly one-million slaves in Canada, including those in Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, Barbados and other Caribbean countries as well as South Africa.
A petition was presented last year by the Ontario Black History Society to the federal government to officially declare an Emancipation Day. There has been no response from the feds.
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