Genealogy workshops to find your slave ancestors
For the CM98 association, finding his slave ancestors and the origin of his name helps to come to terms with his history.
The motto of the association is thus "Find, Understand, Honor".
Getty Images / Juanmonino
Text by: Lou Roméo Follow
5 mins
On the occasion of the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, this Thursday, March 25, we are heading for an interesting initiative.
The genealogy and history workshop of West Indian families, organized by the Comité Marche association of 23 May 1998 (CM98), allows Guadeloupe, Guyanese, Reunion and Martinican people to trace their family histories and find their ancestors. in slavery.
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Gilles Mith, food and carpenter in Martinique, married in 1851 his former slave Rose, number 469, after having freed her.
They have together a little girl, a "mulatto", Rose-Tomasine, who will grow up free.
Samuel was freed on September 7, 1849, when his mother Henriette died as a slave.
At the age of 49, he received the name Cresson, assigned at random from a list by the registrar Yves-Guillaume Marlet.
For their great-great-granddaughter Marie-Josèphe Cresson, knowing their names and their stories is crucial.
"
I feel more solid now that I have reconstructed this history, this genealogy, it comforts me in who I am
", she confides at 78 years old.
►To (re) listen: Why tell stories about slavery?
One of the works by the couple of sociologists Pinçon-Charlot offers a point-based “quiz” to assess its proximity to the upper middle class: one of the items concerns the names and first names of great-grandparents.
Can you name all eight of them?
An interesting question, since it points to genealogy as a social marker, as proof of a valued and smooth family transmission.
A database with the names of 150,000 freed slaves
Quite the opposite of what exists in many families of descendants of slaves.
But on March 6, 2021, Marie-Josèphe was also able to make her own “family presentation”, and tell her ancestors, whom she did not know, to the members of
the CM98 association
.
Since 2005, the association has offered genealogical workshops every Tuesday evening to allow descendants of slaves to find their ancestors and reconstruct their family history.
"
The idea was born after the great silent march of 1998, which brought together 40,000
West Indians in Paris to honor the memory of the victims of slavery
," explains Emmanuel Gordien, president and founder of CM98
.
We said to ourselves,
"We have walked for our ancestors, but do we know them?"
"
As the answer is "no", then begins a great research work: the volunteers of CM98 identify the names of the 150,000 slaves freed and named in 1848, during the abolition of slavery.
From this emerged an important database,
Anchoukaj.org
, available free on the Internet.
►Also read:
France: disparities and gaps in the teaching of the history of slavery
Emmanuel Gordien himself thus finds in the registers of the new freedmen of Guadeloupe the trace of his ancestor.
"
Georges," says Bouaki, aged about 42, born in Africa, living in the Saint-Pierre house, under the registration number 2
660, receives the patronymic name of Gordien, on February 2, 1849
", he recites. he from memory, moved.
Linking big and small story
Evelyne was also able to find some of her ancestors and link “big” and “small” history in all its nuance and complexity.
His grandfather, Jean-Baptiste Vincent, who bought and freed his mother Manette in 1832, thus owned slaves himself, and did not emancipate them until 1848. “
I think he was a quarteron , born of a relationship between a master and a slave,
assumes the Guadeloupean
.
He was a mason, knew how to read and write. It is typical of the "half-breeds" of the time.
"
But beyond the registers, she realizes once her trace has been found that this ancestor is very close: an elderly cousin tells her to have known the son of Jean-Baptiste, and to continue to maintain his grave.
►To (re) read: The slave trade, a story still alive
"
It is the interest of this research,
" she confides.
I was able to speak with several members of my family, childhood memories emerged.
It is not a backward-looking approach, it helps to better appropriate the present and to make the link with the rest of the family
.
While many participants were confronted with the silence of their parents, who refused to discuss the period of slavery, genealogical research helped unblock memories and anecdotes.
Precious stories, to give these slave ancestors a stronger identity than just paper records.
"
Aimé
Césaire said
:" I live in imaginary ancestors "
,
quotes Emmanuel Gordien
.
Mine are no longer imaginary, they exist.
Through research, we can tell descendants of slaves: "
Your names come from somewhere, they have a story
."
"
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