This is the second verbal snapshot of a period in time that made it into a historical account from which I have condensed the following. It goes back to 1841 and it is quite fascinating that we can get this glimpse and perspective at this time. Tony Hadley
One hundred and sixty years ago, a schooner leaves Grenada and arrives, anchors in Kingstown Bay at “five in the morning, Sunday April 10th, 1841. On the schooner,
Henry Nelson Coleridge starts his observations.
“The view of the town and
surrounding country is thought by many to be the most beautiful thing in the
Antilles. Kingstown lies in a long and narrow line upon the edge of the water;
on the eastern side is a a substantial and handsome edifice containing two
spacious apartments, wherein the council and Assembly debate in the morning and
ladies and gentlemen dance in the evening; towards the western extremity is
also a substantial and ugly building, something between a hospital and a
barrack which has the honour of being a church; hard by, yet opposite to it is
an airy and comfortable tabernacle for the methodists and between both, but
rather closer to the latter, stands the humble mansion of the hero of Curacoa”.
He goes on to write that while
attending church in St.Vincent, he perspired invincibly under the eyes of
Clarissa - a Creole – one of the
prettiest girls in the West Indies with a figure which was rich in all of the
fascinations of tropical girlishness who sat in the same pew as him.. (I hope
they both asked for forgiveness). He continues:
“As to the story about rouge,
I do not believe one word about it. No woman would venture such a thing in a
crowded church in these countries”.
He writes the following:
“The church establishment is
very defective, there being, I believe, only two churches – one built by ‘Nash
of Cariacou’. There are some papists also with a South American priest of not
very good character. Hence the methodists florish like a palm branch, and live
and sing away in complete clover. There was
legislation for building a Church in Bequia and two more in St.Vincent
and I trust that this Act will not be allowed to fall asleep as some others of
this sort have done.
Among others, one thing that
disgusted him was the sight of ‘working’ runaway, riotous or convict slaves in
chains on the streets of Kingstown.
Tony Hadley