Cocolos in Samana

reilleyp

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In several places I read about these English speaking cocolos who are descendants of slaves from the US who speak English in Samana. In ten years I have never encountered English speaking Dominicans/African slave descendants in Samana. Is this folklore or has anyone else met any of these cocolos? See below;

"In 1824 a ship, the Turtle Dove, filled with freed slaves from the United States (slaves who had escaped from the southern part of the United States and run away to the northern part of the United States) left from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (a state in the northern part of the United States). The ship was purchased by two Protestant sisters named Freeman who were of the Quaker Protestant religious faith. The ship was sailing to Liberia, a country in West Africa founded by freed American slaves in 1820. There was a big rainstorm in the Atlantic Ocean in front of Las Terrenas and the ship sank. The freed slaves swam to Las Terrenas. They spoke English. Their great- grandchildren still live in Las Terrenas and they speak English. They are called cocolos. On Sunday, you may attend a religious service at an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in the village of El Limon near Las Terrenas. There you will hear people singing American spiritual hymns in English."
 

the gorgon

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In several places I read about these English speaking cocolos who are descendants of slaves from the US who speak English in Samana. In ten years I have never encountered English speaking Dominicans/African slave descendants in Samana. Is this folklore or has anyone else met any of these cocolos? See below;

"In 1824 a ship, the Turtle Dove, filled with freed slaves from the United States (slaves who had escaped from the southern part of the United States and run away to the northern part of the United States) left from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (a state in the northern part of the United States). The ship was purchased by two Protestant sisters named Freeman who were of the Quaker Protestant religious faith. The ship was sailing to Liberia, a country in West Africa founded by freed American slaves in 1820. There was a big rainstorm in the Atlantic Ocean in front of Las Terrenas and the ship sank. The freed slaves swam to Las Terrenas. They spoke English. Their great- grandchildren still live in Las Terrenas and they speak English. They are called cocolos. On Sunday, you may attend a religious service at an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in the village of El Limon near Las Terrenas. There you will hear people singing American spiritual hymns in English."

i have never encountered any Spanish speakers in Samana, but i have met a few people with English surnames, such a Jones, and Williams, and Anderson.
 

Chirimoya

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If you watch the CCN Orgullo de mi Tierra video about Samana there are clips of locals speaking English - 4:20 and then 6:20.

[video=youtube_share;zToxhMONwqQ]https://youtu.be/zToxhMONwqQ[/video]
 

Squat

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Jan 1, 2002
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Only the elderly still speak English, as youngsters were raised to speak Spanish only (Trujillo policy). I once had conversations with some folks around El Limón (Agua Sabrosa) in English. They have a different accent, I am not skilled enough to describe it, but I perceived it as a mix between southern US and Caribbean.
 

AlterEgo

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Different migration - they came from the English-speaking Caribbean islands in the late C19th to work in the cane fields.

Ah, thank you for clarifying that. I remember meeting a woman in NYC, Dominican, spoke English well, said she was from "Saint Peter of Macoris". Left an impression on me.
 

bienamor

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http://www.theroot.com/dominicans-and-black-american-roots-1790898507

After the Haitian Revolution in the early 19th century, the leaders of Haiti had the opportunity to reshape the country's identity. One of the early leaders of Haiti after the revolution, President Jean Pierre Boyer, envisioned a country that was welcoming to all of those of African descent. He promoted brotherhood, equality and citizenship to those who immigrated to Haiti. Furthermore, he believed that bringing free Africans together in Haiti would stimulate the country's economy by increasing the labor force and strengthen diplomatic relations with the United States. In 1824, President Boyer offered several incentives to encourage free African Americans to immigrate to Haiti, such as a free passage, land grants and financial support upon arrival.

By August of 1824, several African Americans accepted President Boyer's offer and were preparing to move to Haiti. One of the largest groups left from Philadelphia and settled in the town of Samaná, which is now part of the Dominican Republic (as you may know, the two nations are on the same Caribbean island of Hispaniola).

Jonathas Granville and the Rev. Loring D. Dewey were two of the main proponents of African Americans immigrating to Haiti. Dewey was a member of the American Colonization Society, a group whose primary goal was to facilitate the return of free African Americans to Africa. The Rev. Robert Finley, a Presbyterian minister, had formed the society in 1816 based on his belief that Africans would never be fully integrated into the U.S. and were a threat to the nation's well-being. He believed returning to Africa was the best option for them.

Whatever the motivation, as a result of the work of the ACS, more than 12,000 African Americans immigrated to Liberia, the largest colony formed by the society. Although many in the ACS favored Liberia, it was logistically more difficult to send the emigrants to West Africa because the trip was longer and more expensive. Dewey heard of President Boyer's plans to repopulate Haiti, and thus he began correspondence with Boyer. From this effort, Dewey coordinated the immigration of African Americans to Haiti in 10 locations on the island (including Samaná).

Jonathas Granville was Haitian-born, and he was sent on behalf of Boyer to recruit African Americans to immigrate to Haiti. In June of 1824, he traveled first to Philadelphia, and then to New York, where he distributed some of the money allotted by President Boyer to pay passage to Haiti. The Rev. Dewey and others wrote extensively in newspapers regarding the status and quality of life of those who immigrated to Samaná. In March of 1835, the North Star in Danville, Vt., reported, "The government appears to have realized every promise made by Mr. Grenville and about 270 of the immigrants are located at Samaná, where land has been given to them, on which some are already at work to improve, and are much encouraged to be industrious."

Over time, approximately 6,000 African Americans immigrated to Haiti; however, many of them did not stay permanently. The new immigrants faced many challenges, such as mismanagement of the resettlement process and cultural differences between the Haitians and the African Americans. By 1826, the positive articles in newspapers had given way to criticisms of those who returned from Haiti stating that they were unwilling to work. A January 1826 edition of the United States Gazette wrote that "The public hears but little of Hayti [sic] as a place of emigration, since certain of those who visited the island 6 or 8 months since returned without being able to report that the place would afford shelter and sustenance to those who desire not to labor."
 

NALs

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Those are not cocolos, they are libertos.
 

Hillbilly

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I wish I had time to write more.
Cocolos are from the English Caribbean.

The Samaneses are from the 1823-24 migration sponsored by Boyer. Led here by Rev. Peter Van der Horst.

You can find these English speakers at the AME church any Sunday.

If you go out to Bethesda or Noroeste (Just ask around) and ask if there are any Shepards or Greens, Hamiltons, or Coplins around, you will find folks who speak 1823 Black English. It is very interesting. Almost 50 years agos I was studying it for a thesis....


HB
 

the gorgon

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I wish I had time to write more.
Cocolos are from the English Caribbean.

The Samaneses are from the 1823-24 migration sponsored by Boyer. Led here by Rev. Peter Van der Horst.

You can find these English speakers at the AME church any Sunday.

If you go out to Bethesda or Noroeste (Just ask around) and ask if there are any Shepards or Greens, Hamiltons, or Coplins around, you will find folks who speak 1823 Black English. It is very interesting. Almost 50 years agos I was studying it for a thesis....


HB

thanks for that info. i will make a trip there one Sunday to attend a service..
 

Auryn

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I wish I had time to write more.
Cocolos are from the English Caribbean.

The Samaneses are from the 1823-24 migration sponsored by Boyer. Led here by Rev. Peter Van der Horst.

You can find these English speakers at the AME church any Sunday.

If you go out to Bethesda or Noroeste (Just ask around) and ask if there are any Shepards or Greens, Hamiltons, or Coplins around, you will find folks who speak 1823 Black English. It is very interesting. Almost 50 years agos I was studying it for a thesis....


HB



That is fascinating stuff.  I would love to hear more if you have time.  Anthropologically speaking, the survival of their language would be so interesting to learn about. To hear them speak would be like stepping back in time, to a degree I suppose.  
 

the gorgon

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That is fascinating stuff.  I would love to hear more if you have time.  Anthropologically speaking, the survival of their language would be so interesting to learn about. To hear them speak would be like stepping back in time, to a degree I suppose.  

a few years ago, my buddy and i took a trip to Samana. when we got into town, the rains began to pelt down, and we decided to give some school kids a ride . we asked them their names, and all four had English surnames. it was like going back in time, as you say..
 

Auryn

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a few years ago, my buddy and i took a trip to Samana. when we got into town, the rains began to pelt down, and we decided to give some school kids a ride . we asked them their names, and all four had English surnames. it was like going back in time, as you say..



I remember English surnamed when I was there, but assumed they were all from a more recent (maybe gringo influence).  I’ve heard about the slaves going there.   I had no idea English was still spoken, let alone as Hillbilly had said.  Linguistically that’s pretty neat, considering the length of time. It’s been nearly 2 centuries!  I wonder how they’ve maintained it all these years in a predominantly Spanish speaking country. They can’t be that isolated. It happens elsewhere around the world, but usually the result is a pidgin dialect of some sort.  
 

Chirimoya

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I've visited places like Puerto Cabezas (Nicaragua), Puerto Limon (Costa Rica), Roatan (Honduras) and San Andres (Colombia) on and off the Caribbean coast of Central America. They are all parts of Spanish speaking countries but English is much more commonly spoken than in Samana. Some of these migrations date back to the 17th and 18th centuries. One factor in the preservation of English as their main everyday language must be their relative isolation from the rest of their respective countries, especially on the Atlantic coast of Nicaragua and the offshore islands like the Honduran Bay Islands and San Andres/Providencia. I also had a Panamanian colleague of English-speaking Caribbean descent who spoke perfect English as well as Spanish. Interesting to note the similarity between the names 'caracoles' and 'cocolos':

...there are substantial communities of Anglo-Caribbean origin along the Atlantic or Caribbean coast of Central America, as a part of the Western Caribbean Zone. These communities, which began forming in the seventeenth century, include areas of Nicaragua and Honduras that made up the Miskito Kingdom which was under British protection after 1740, the Garifuna community which was deported to the coast in 1797 and took up English as its language, and the many and numerous Anglophone Caribbean people who were brought to Central America by the canal companies (the French and American Panama canal efforts), railroad companies, and particularly the fruit companies, such as United Fruit after the 1870s and particularly in the first decades of the twentieth century. Many have never fully integrated into the otherwise Spanish-speaking communities in which they reside, such as the Caracoles of Honduras.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commo...mal_Anglophone_communities_in_Central_America
 

the gorgon

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I've visited places like Puerto Cabezas (Nicaragua), Puerto Limon (Costa Rica), Roatan (Honduras) and San Andres (Colombia) on and off the Caribbean coast of Central America. They are all parts of Spanish speaking countries but English is much more commonly spoken than in Samana. Some of these migrations date back to the 17th and 18th centuries. One factor in the preservation of English as their main everyday language must be their relative isolation from the rest of their respective countries, especially on the Atlantic coast of Nicaragua and the offshore islands like the Honduran Bay Islands and San Andres/Providencia. I also had a Panamanian colleague of English-speaking Caribbean descent who spoke perfect English as well as Spanish. Interesting to note the similarity between the names 'caracoles' and 'cocolos':



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commo...mal_Anglophone_communities_in_Central_America

a lot of the people in Central America are descendants of British caribbean nationals who went to work on the construction of the Panama Canal, and fanned out from there. if you watch a soccer match involving Costa Ricans, a lot of players have english surnames. like Dominicans, some have retained their proficiency in english.