<B>A Resolution of Revolution</B>

"A Resolution of Revolution"

WRITER'S NOTE: This was written for "The Ebony Word" and "Soul Beats Newsletter" for January 1997. In stepping into a new year, we are taking the next step on a journey of positivity and upliftment. I was taught that "charity begins at home" and so does respect. Thus, as the history columnist, I could not begin without starting from home-the Sea Islands. This is in tribute to my ancestors whose spirits protect and guide me.

This is not to be copied in any form without permission. See bottom.

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A Resolution of Revolution

For many years we have heard people speak about African Americans still wanting their "forty acres and a mule." However, many of us that use this phrase do not really know how the phrase came about. Also, we never ask ourselves if we would have the fortitude to maintain forty acres and care for a mule if we received them. Well, there are those that did get the forty acres and have fought to hold on to them. These people are the Gullahs and Geechees of the Sea Islands.....

The new year brings a time when Afrikan people celebrate what they have harvested physically, emotionally, spiritually, and intellectually. It is a time when all people reflect on the past and prepare for the future. We speak to one another of our resolutions that we did not carry out and how we will, now that we have another opportunity to do so. After speaking of such things for many years, I decided to look up the word "resolution" in Webster's Comprehensive Dictionary of the English Language to find that it meant "the quality of not allowing difficulties or opposition to affect one's purpose." This definition epitomizes the story of my Sea Island ancestors.

On January 15, 1865, Union Army General William Tecumseh Sherman issued Special Field Order Number 15 which stated:

"I. The islands from Charleston, south, the abandoned rice fields along the rivers for thirty miles back from the sea, and the country bordering the St. John's River, Florida, are reserved and set apart for the settlement of the negroes [sic] now made free by the acts of war and the proclamation of the President of the United States.

II. At Beaufort, Hilton Head, Savannah, Fernandina, St. Augustine, and Jacksonville, the blacks may remain in their chosen or accustomed vocations, but on the islands, and in the settlements hereafter to be established, no white person whatever, unless military officers and soldiers, detailed for duty, will be permitted to reside; and the sole and exclusive management of affairs will be left to the freed people themselves, subject only to the United States military authority and the acts of Congress...."

The field order went on to outline the parameters for who would be entitled to plots of land and then went forth to state that once these stipulations were met, under the supervision of the inspector, "each family shall have a plot of not more than forty(40) acres of tillable ground, and when it borders on some water channel, with not more than 800 feet water front, in the possession of which land the military authorites will afford them protection until such time as they can protect themselves..."

There is never specific mention of a mule, but if you had tillable land at that time, you needed a mule or horse to plow the land. The other option was to strap a plow to someone's back and have them pull it which had been done to African people for many years by the people that enslaved them. However, when "we knew better, we did better." Thus, the ancestors found better means to take care of one another.

Part of the Sea Island tradition which still exist is protecting one another. Individual protection is woven into protection and preservation of the land, the language, and the customs of the Gullah and Geechee Sea Islanders. The memory of the kidnapping, brutality, and hard work on the plantations is ever present. As one walks the roads, touches the trees, feels the breeze, the spirits of Gullah, Geechee, and indigenous American Sea Islanders, speak and can be heard and felt.

When tuned in one can hear the spiritual Sea Island handclaps tell the stories of the 40,000 Afrikans that were settled on 40 acre tracts in the Sea Islands and lowcountry of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. One can feel the synergy of the community as seeds of African languages, customs, and traditions were planted in American soil to put out a tree called the Sea Islands whose fruits are Gullah and Geechee. You can begin to visualize the battle that these Africans in America had to go through to protect their tree from being dug up when Andrew Johnson became the President of the United States after Abraham Lincoln's assassination and he isssued pardons and restoration of property to the people that had enslaved the Gullahs, Geechees, and their foreparents on this land.

Gullah and Geechee Sea Islanders took to heart the words of Special Field Order Number 15 and protected themselves. They armed themselves with guns, roots, and the power of the Spirit in order to hold off anyone who tried to come in and move them from their property. They made a "resolution" to stand up and to hold on to that which they built and which was an extension of themselves-land, lanugage, customs, family, and community.

These spiritually fortified people were able to pass on a legacy to their descendants who are now fighting to hold on to what they have. Gullahs and Geechees are now looking back to the stories of their foreparents and valuing those things that they had taken for granted. They are now fighting to make sure that their children understand what it means to own your land, to be independent, to be have language, traditions and customs unlike others even a few miles away, to have everything around you connect you to your past, and most of all, to have the obligation to hold on to all of this.

There has been revolution in the Sea Islands through Denmark Vesey, Gullah Jack, the Angolans of the Stono Rebellion, Robert Smalls, the Seminoles and Afro-Seminoles, and even Harriet Tubman. There has been revolution through the in coming of non-islanders and the out going of Gullahs and Geechees. There has been revolution through the midwives, field hands, fishermen and women that put blood, sweat and tears into the soil and the sea of this rich and powerful marsh strewn, palmetto lined region. Yes, things have changed and still are changing.

Many people no longer have their forty acres and they do not even want to look at a mule. However, there are the others through which the fortitude of the first Gullahs and Geechees still lives. They are still holding on to the words set forth in Special Field Order Number 15 and awaiting the day to appeal the recending of this order by Andrew Jackson. They are still nurturing the tree and spreading its seeds further in the world. They have made a resolution for revolution.

Today one can still hear the songs that were sung in the Sea Islands before "big shoot" (the beginning of the Civil War). The songs are song in celebration and remembrance.....

"Stay in the field

Stay in the field

Until the war has ended...."

Still in the field because the revolutionary struggle continues,

Marquetta L. Goodwine

Gullah Historian

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Marquetta L. Goodwine is a historian and author who specializes in the Underground Railroad and the Sea Islands, home to Gullah and Geechee culture. She is the founder of the Afrikan Kultural Arts Network and the Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition. You can reach her at QueenMut@aol.com on line or AKAN PO Box 40-0199 Brooklyn NY 11240-0199 offline. She welcomes comments. In the meantime, check out more on her work and that of AKAN at http://users.aol.com./queenmut/Afrikan_Network.html

Reprinting of this piece in any form is not to be done without express permission from Ms. Goodwine who retains all rights.