GRIOTS REPUBLIC - An Urban Black Travel Mag - March 2016

In the early months of 1768, on March 17th, the island’s slave
population staged a revolt. The plan was to use the drunken
revelry of the Feast Day of St. Patrick, when the island’s Irish
plantocracy’s guard would be lowered under the inebriation
of heavy drink in celebration of the holiday. In their plan, the
field hands would storm the Governor’s mansion in the capital
of Plymouth using the tools of their trade as weapons: clubs,
stones, machetes, rakes, hoes and other metal implements.
The domestic, or house, slaves would be charged with
using knives and confiscating the swords of their drunken
Irish house guests to be used by their field counterparts.
The revolt failed. A female slave, domesticated to work as a
seamstress in the “Great House,” revealed the plot and the Irish
were prepared for the surprise attack. The revolt’s leaders were
systematically sought out and ruthlessly tortured and killed as
an example to the slave population, in hopes of thwarting future
The Lady & The Harp
is its national emblem,
and is located on the flag.
This represents Erin - the
feminine personification
of Ireland, with her harp,
while holding up a cross
representing Catholicism.
attempts. Local lore dictates that they were hung on the silk
cotton tree in Cudjoe’s Head. The tree still stands in the village.
Over the centuries, the interaction between the island’s
African slaves and the Irish landowners created a unique
set of circumstances on Montserrat. As a direct result
of the cultural diffusion that transpired between the two
groups due to interaction and inter-marriage, a biracial
population emerged. Irish surnames such as Riley, O’Garro,
Farrell, Greenaway, Burke, and Daley are common. Even
Monserrat’s food feature cultural collaborations, evident
in the island’s fabled national dish of “Goat Water,” not to
be confused with the similarly named Jamaican “Mannish
Water,” said to be an amalgamation of Irish goat stew infused
with spices commonly used by the African population.
Longtime visitors to Montserrat are often alarmed to hear
Afro-Caribbean children speak of leprechauns and mermaids,
long before the existence of Walt Disney’s hit animated
production. Tales of mermaids and nefarious imps have