Times of the Islands Winter 2015-16

astrolabe newsletter of the Turks & Caicos National Museum
Story. The best way to accomplish that is with a documentary
video. In the 21st century the video medium is
what we turn to first for entertainment, to find the answer
to a question, or get a message out.
Recent publicity about discoveries of possible slave
shipwrecks in South Africa, the Florida Keys, and the
Bahamas have generated more public awareness of the
part slave ships played in the African Diaspora. Richard
Coberly (RC) and Veronica Veerkamp (VV) are documentary
producers with Windward Media in Houston, Texas,
who have been researching and filming the Museum’s
Search for Trouvadore Project from the beginning.
In a recent interview with Museum Director Pat
Saxton, they explained how the Trouvadore documentary
film project came about and what it’s going to take to
make it a reality.
Q: When did you first get the idea to make a documentary
about the Trouvadore story?
A: VV: I think it started in the late 1990s when we went to
interview Dr. Toni Carrell at Ships of Discovery in Corpus
Christi. We were doing a documentary film on the discovery
and excavation of La Belle, a ship French explorer La
Salle lost off the coast of Texas in 1686. Dr. Carrell was
one of the archaeologists working on the project at the
time. She mentioned her colleagues had recently discovered
the story of a long-forgotten slave ship in the TCI
that might be even more enthralling, and that they were
planning to look for it.
Q: And that was the Trouvadore?
A: VV: Yes, although that’s just one of the ways it’s
spelled in in the dispatches between Grand Turk and
Nassau, “Trovadore,” “Traubadore,” “Travadore,”
“Troubadour,” etc. Its identity and basic information were
murky because the trans-Atlantic slave trade had been
banned by that time. Secrecy was paramount, so ships
involved in the trade worked hard to hide or disguise
their origins, ownership, and identities. They changed
names frequently and often carried multiple captains,
logs, and sets of papers to support different registrations
and nationalities.
Q: When did you actually start shooting for the film?
A: RC: We started shooting in TCI in 2002, but the first
expedition footage was shot in 2004, so we’ve been at it
for about 13 years, on and off.
From top: Interviewees Veronica Veerkamp and Richard Coberly of
Windward Media share their thoughts on making a documentary
about the slave ship Trouvadore.
Shooting a documentary isn’t cheap, particularly when it involves
filming not only on and under the water, but above it as well!
Times of the Islands Winter 2015/16 67