Olaudah Equiano's Nova Scotian Interlude, 1758

This past weekend, I attended Rebellion, Resistance, and Refuge: Slavery and Border-Crossing during the American Revolution, a conference convened by Slavery North at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. This thought-provoking and well-organized event brought together scholars of Atlantic slavery from Canada, the US, and the UK. For me personally, among its many rewarding aspects were conversations about the historical and historiographic value of early African American “slave narratives.” Because accounts by figures such as Olaudah Equiano, Phillis Wheatley, John Marrant, David George, and Boston King are among the earliest published Black voices, literary scholars have engaged them most extensively, especially through compilations and editions published since the 1990s.[1] These volumes rightly position the texts as foundational works of African American literature. As a historian with a background in literary studies (my BA was in English), I've found the narratives of George, King, and Marrant especially useful for studying race, slavery, and religion in eighteenth-century Nova Scotia.[2] Yet Atlantic Canadian specialists have paid relatively little attention to these texts or their relevance. Some historians may regard them as too mediated by literary conventions and have therefore avoided using them. But by overlooking such sources, we miss opportunities to engage Black voices that described experiences in the eighteenth-century Maritimes – some with great detail, as in Marrant's Journal. Since all texts are mediated and shaped by convention to varying degrees, I suggest reading these narratives with both openness and appropriate caution, drawing from them significant insights into Atlantic Canada’s past.

Certainly, the narratives of George and King have been used selectively in some studies of enslavement and Black communities in the Maritimes.[3] Furthermore, an edition of King’s narrative was published by Halifax-based Nimbus Press in collaboration with the Nova Scotia Museum.[4] Even so, these works deserve deeper engagement from Atlantic Canadian specialists and fuller integration into studies of the eighteenth-century Maritimes. They offer historical insight not only into the legacies of slavery in the region, but also into the intersections of race, gender, and religion. Alphonso Saville IV has recently examined John Marrant’s ministry within the broader context of Black Atlantic religion, including a chapter on Marrant’s Nova Scotian interlude (1785–1790).[5] As Saville frames his book as a study of Black Atlantic Christianity, Atlantic Canadianists do not appear to have yet taken it up or recognized its relevance to the field.

Equiano in The Interesting Narrative (1789).

It is The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano that I feel remains perhaps most underutilized by historians of eighteenth-century Nova Scotia. Olaudah Equiano, born in West Africa, was an eighteenth-century writer and abolitionist. He spent much of his early life enslaved, and he eventually purchased his own freedom in 1766, when he was about twenty years old. When he was thirteen and enslaved to a British naval officer, he visited Nova Scotia in the summer of 1758. During the excursion, he stopped in Halifax and participated in the siege of Louisbourg. In his later memoir, he recounted details of those events. I reproduce here the section of Equiano's narrative that describes his time in Nova Scotia:

“We … proceeded for America [from London], which we soon made, and got into a very commodious harbour called St. George, in Halifax, where we had fish in great plenty, and all other fresh provisions. We were here joined by different men of war and transport ships with soldiers; after which, our fleet being increased to a prodigious number of ships of all kinds, we sailed for Cape Breton in Nova Scotia. We had the good and gallant General Wolfe on board our ship, whose affability made him highly esteemed and beloved by all the men. He often honoured me, as well as other boys, with marks of his notice; and saved me once a flogging for fighting with a young gentleman. We arrived at Cape Breton in the summer of 1758: and here the soldiers were to be landed, in order to make an attack upon Louisbourgh. My master had some part in superintending the landing; and here I was in a small measure gratified in seeing an encounter between our men and the enemy. The French were posted on the shore to receive us, and disputed our landing for a long time; but at last they were driven from their trenches, and a complete landing was effected. Our troops pursued them as far as the town of Louisbourgh. In this action many were killed on both sides. One thing remarkable I saw this day: – A lieutenant of the Princess Amelia, who, as well as any master, superintended the landing, was giving the word of command, and while his mouth was open a musquet ball went through it, and passed out his cheek. I had that day in my hand the scalp of an Indian king, who was killed in the engagement: the scalp had been taken off by an Highlander. I saw this king’s ornaments too, which were very curious, and made of feathers.

            Our land forces laid siege to the town of Louisbourgh, while the French men of war were blocked up in the harbour by the fleet, the batteries at the same time playing upon them from the land. This they did with such effect, that one day I saw some of the ships set on fire by the shells from the batteries, and I believe two or three of them were quite burnt. At another time, about fifty boats belonging to the English men of war, commanded by Captain George Balfour of the Aetna fire-ship, and another junior captain, Laforey, attacked and boarded the only two remaining French men of war in the harbour. They also set fire to a seventy-gun ship, but a sixty-four, called the Bienfaisant, they brought off. During my stay here I had often an opportunity of being near Captain Balfour, who was pleased to notice me, and liked me so much that he often asked my master to let him have me, but he would not part with me; and no consideration could have induced me to leave him. At last Louisbourgh was taken, and the English men of war came into the harbour before it, to my very great joy; for I had now more liberty of indulging myself, and I went often on shore. When the ships were in the harbour we had the most beautiful procession on the water I ever saw. All the admirals and captains of the men of war, full dressed, and in their barges, well ornamented with pendants, came alongside the Namur. The vice-admiral then went on shore in his barge, followed by the other officers in order of seniority, to take possession, as I suppose, of the town and fort. Some time after this the French governor and his lady, and other persons of note, came on board our ship to dine. On this occasion our ships were dressed with colours of all kinds, from the topgallant-mast head to the deck; and this, with the firing of guns, formed a most grand and magnificent spectacle.

            As soon as every thing here was settled Admiral Boscawen sailed with part of the

fleet for England, leaving some ships behind with Rear-admirals Sir Charles Hardy and Durell.”[6]

****

Three aspects of Equiano’s account of his time in Nova Scotia are especially valuable: 1) his portrayal of General James Wolfe and their interactions; 2) his description of an unidentified Indigenous chief; and 3) his relationship with his enslaver and the opportunities he had to pursue freedom.

Equiano’s portrayal of “the good and gallant” Wolfe invites consideration of eighteenth-century ideals of masculinity and gentility in military settings. His observation that Wolfe “often honoured me, as well as other boys, with marks of his notice” suggests a form of kind and gentle masculinity associated with the celebrated British officer, who would die the following year at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham during the siege of Quebec City. Shaun Regan has examined Equiano’s Louisbourg sojourn by treating him as a witness and actor within the cultural dimensions of the Seven Years’ War. For Regan, Wolfe’s intervention to save Equiano from being flogged with a cat-o’-nine-tails (a common punishment in the British imperial navy) reveals Wolfe’s “sensibility” and his desire to “uphold standards of justice and moral behaviour.”[7] Equiano’s account presents Wolfe as kind toward him and the other young crewmembers, suggesting a degree of tenderness among men.

We cannot readily identify the “Indian king” whose scalp Equiano recalled holding at Louisbourg. Still, his description provides a striking account of an African encounter with Indigenous culture – likely that of the Mi'kmaq. That the unidentified man’s scalp had been “taken off by an Highlander” points to the complex ways warfare and intercultural alliances unfolded in colonial Nova Scotia. Geoffrey Plank’s work on Scottish Highlander troops in British colonial America shows that groups renowned for their combat abilities were deployed in violent acts during imperial warfare in North America.[8] Equiano also showed cultural curiosity in this incident, describing the chief’s feathered regalia as “very curious.” It's entirely possible it reminded him of tribal regalia from his African homelands.

Finally, Equiano’s account of his relationship with his enslaver, who temporarily placed him under Captain Balfour’s authority at Louisbourg, reflects dynamics of freedom and bondage central to Atlantic slavery, especially in urban and maritime contexts. Equiano wrote that Balfour “was pleased to notice me” and asked his enslaver to “let him have me, but he would not part with me.” Equiano then added that “no consideration could have induced me to leave him.” Why might Equiano have felt so inclined to remain with his multiple enslavers? Rented out under Balfour’s command at Louisbourg, Equiano recalled having “more liberty of indulging myself” and going “often on shore.” Michael Lawrence Dickinson’s book Almost Dead, about the urban Black Atlantic, can help contextualize these remarks by arguing that enslaved men could acquire “an array of skills while serving” masters from prominent social positions, including merchants and military officers. Dickinson identifies Equiano and others as figures for whom “adaptability was crucial to camouflage, and versatility was integral to survival.” Enslavement to affluent masters, often in urban maritime settings, could provide men like Equiano with limited or sporadic mobility and, at times, “opportunities to escape the clutches of servitude and make freedom a reality [if only temporarily].”[9] At Louisbourg, Equiano gained enough personal freedom to go ashore and witness the “magnificent spectacle” of the fort’s surrender to the British.

These initial observations are based on my reading of The Interesting Narrative, which I first studied in 2019 during a British Empire seminar as part of my PhD program. A more detailed and concentrated analysis of the narrative could undoubtedly place Equiano's Nova Scotian interlude productively within broader studies of Atlantic Canada, Black biography, race, and empire.

[1] Joanna Brooks and John Saillant, eds. 'Face Zion Forward': First Writers of the Black Atlantic, 1785–1798 (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002); and Vincent Carretta, ed. Unchained Voices: An Anthology of Black Authors in the English-Speaking World of the 18th Century (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996).

[2] On King's relevance, see my article, “‘Toutes sortes de vices’: Possession, Healing, and Religious Convergences in Early Nineteenth-Century Nova Scotia,” The Canadian Historical Review 105, no. 2 (June 2024): 196.

[3] See the works of Harvey Amani Whitfield, James St. George Walker, and George Rawlyk.

[4] Ruth Holmes Whitehead and Carmelita Robertson, eds. The Life of Boston King: Black Loyalist, Minister, and Master Carpenter (Halifax: Nimbus Press and the Nova Scotia Museum: 2020 [2003]).

[5] Alphonso Saville IV, The Gospel of John Marrant: Conjuring Christianity in the Black Atlantic (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2024), 85–118.

[6] The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Written by Himself, ed. Angelo Costanzo (Peterborough, ON: Broadview, 2001 [1789]), 88–90.

[7] Shaun Regan, “Olaudah Equiano and the Seven Years’ War: Slavery, Service, and the Sea,” in The Culture of the Seven Years’ War: Empire, Identity, and the Arts in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World, eds. Frans De Bruyn and Shaun Regan (University of Toronto Press, 2014): 249. This has also been noted by Stephen Brumwell, in “‘One more card to play’: Revisiting Wolfe’s Final Stratagem at Quebec,” in Revisiting 1759: The Conquest of Canada in Historical Perspective, eds. Phillip Buckner and John Reid (University of Toronto Press, 2012), 22–23.

[8] Geoffrey Plank, “Deploying Tribes and Clans: Mohawks in Nova Scotia and Scottish Highlanders in Georgia,” in Empires and Indigenes: Intercultural Alliance, Imperial Expansion, and Warfare in the Early Modern World, ed. Wayne Lee (New York University Press, 2011), 221–250. See also Ruma Chopra’s work on the Jamaican Maroons sent to Nova Scotia in 1796: Chopra, “Maroons and Mi’kmaq in Nova Scotia, 1796–1800,” Acadiensis 46, no. 1 (Winter/Spring 2017): 5–23.

[9] Michael Lawrence Dickinson, Almost Dead: Slavery and Social Rebirth in the Black Urban Atlantic, 1680–1807 (University of Georgia Press, 2022), 69–70.