Trade centres · documented from the 16th century
Kru mariners
The surf-canoe seamen of the Kru coast, contracted by European shipping across the whole Atlantic seaboard of Africa.
Biography
Kru and Grebo men mastered the surf that made most of this coast unapproachable, working dugout canoes through breakers that would swamp a ship's boat. From the sixteenth century European vessels hired them by the voyage as boatmen, stevedores and interpreters.
They travelled under contract, were paid, and returned home — and the Kru towns enforced a fiercely held rule against selling their own people into slavery, which is one reason Kru men could work Atlantic shipping without becoming its cargo.
Historical significance
A West African free-labour tradition inside the Atlantic economy: the clearest counter-example to the assumption that African participation meant enslavement.
Timeline
- 16th c.First European notices of Kru canoe-men
- 18th c.Routine contract labour aboard European vessels
- 19th c.Kru crews on the British anti-slavery squadron
Related entries
References
- Brooks, George E. (1972). The Kru Mariner in the Nineteenth Century.
- Frost, Diane (1999). Work and Community among West African Migrant Workers.
Suggested reading
- Brooks (1972).