A story of hardship and triumph

By Isahak Basir

A tragic scenario of a second migration of more than 50 indentured Indian families, all of whom hailed from several abandoned sugar estates. This took place between the period 1860 and 1940, when they had no alternative but to migrate to the uninhabited and desolated Pomeroon River district. It was their only chance of survival, and hence abandoned all hopes of returning to India as promised by the colonial owners. Similarly, in Jamaica, the Africans made an appeal to the colonial government to have “coolies” sent back to India, since they could not survive on the Jamaican sugar plantations. Suicide mortality and hopelessness were evident and so many were sent back to India.

In the Pomeroon district, the scenario was different. Portuguese and African farmers, who resided in the lower Pomeroon River, recognised the hardship of the indentured families, being hunger, malaria and pneumonia illness. As such, they organised humanitarian groups to help the inexperienced farmers survive these ‘hardships’.

Two hundred and seventy-eight thousand indentured Indians were brought to Guyana to work on the sugar plantations in three counties. They were distributed according to the needs and choices of the respective plantation owners with the unconditional support of the Indian Immigration Officer located in their respective county. Other officers were paid by the white plutocracy and were known as the “CROSS by BABU”.

Several sugar plantations in Essequibo had their quotas. Such estates were Aurora, Golden Fleece, Affiance, Anna Regina, Lima, Hampton Court and Winsor Castle. They had 40 Portuguese families, and Devonshire Castle had their quota of Indian workers, all of whom were led to the logies once occupied by African workers.

Prior to 1904, when the British took over Guyana, the Dutch occupants were here (since 1620). By 1780, they began to close down some of the sugar plantations in preference of developing Berbice and Demerara plantations. Some of the Essequibo plantations that were closed down were Chandler (Better Success), Good Hope and Columbia.

On the right bank of the 27 odd miles of the Pomeroon River, they abandon their 30 cotton cultivations. The Dutch had an enclave at Somerset, where the Cotton Bailing Complex was located; a hospital at Siriki; and their European pine built ‘Fort’ at Calidonia, where the relic of a huge bronze bell is noticeable.

All the indentured Indians who came from India, who were contracted to serve five years, were supposed to return to India – this never happened. In Essequibo, the Indian Immigration Office was located at Plantation Onderneeming, occupying an old Dutch fortress as an office – where these edifices are still noticeable.

As sugar declined and contracts expired, Indian sugar workers were expelled from several estate logies to be replaced by new arrivals from India, since the immigration process began in 1848 and end in 1917. What was peculiar is that immigrants were brought from the different states of India, as such their dialects, traditions and tribal dispensations were noticeable. The expelled sugar workers experienced much difficulty in organising their return to India because of poor documentation and three months and fifteen days trip, confined in a ship hatch. The system was a calculated effort to have them remain in Guyana to swell the labour force as well as having extended families justify their settlement in Guyana.

The episode of this epoch became a calamity of the worst human depredation experienced on the Arabian Coast then, and to invoke the diminutive name of the ‘Cinderella Coast’.

The rapid closure of several sugar estates and factories resulted in mass unemployment, homelessness and suicide. Two huge mango trees at the back of Anna Regina, still visible, were the regular sites where Indians hang themselves. Five freed slave villages, inclusive of Dartmouth, Danielstown and Queenstown, which were at the forefront of agriculture production and homemade medicine, could not mitigate the needs of the displaced Indians to satisfy their basic needs requirements. Those villagers were able to sustain the community markets of Aurora, Queenstown, Lima and Hampton Court. One such unbelievable situation was a mass protest in 1872 at Plantation Devonshire Castle where, for the first time in Guyana’s history, five indentured sugar workers were murdered.

The River and Creek Land Act, which was installed by the Plutocracy to suppress free Africans from occupying land and farm so as to confine them to the estates, was also applicable to the unemployed indentured Indians. It was unimaginable today to believe how Indians lived in mud houses, houses made with wattles and coconut branches, manicole palm staves bonded up with white chalk mud, an existing deposit of alkaline mineral, found at Plantation Zorg.

At Anna Regina, the existing Governor of Guyana donated ten acres of land in Bush Lot and made available discarded wood from unusable logies to build sheds to accommodate 76 families. That area was known as ‘Settlement’.

However, the Portuguese workers, who were brought from Madeira to Guyana in 1835, began migrating to the Pomeroon River in 1837 and made the Land Act null and void. They recommended the development of Pomeroon by passing cotton production and produced coconuts and other crops to subsidise the existing Essequibo plantations, all transportation was by sea as there was no road to Charity prior to 1908.

It was during this period in 1860 that second phase of Indian migration begun leading to the Pomeroon River district. The first family that went to Pomeroon, via the Tapacooma inland tributaries, were the Tacoordeens, who settled in lower Jacklow, an area of 15 miles where the Dutch never occupied because of the low-flooding swamps.

The “News of No Man’s Land” reached Essequibo and it enticed Indian sugar workers, most of whom in “Jahgee tradition”. They organised their groups and commenced migration to their new homeland in the Pomeroon River. The ‘Jahgee’ concept was developed during their four months turmoil in a ship hatch, sailing from India to Guyana. The Jahgee tradition was an invisible cooperative that provided help to restore the stability of indentured Indians in the economic, cultural, spiritual and social dispensations.

The second group that migrated were the Baharallys, Badries, Poorans and Samaroo Gildhari, who settled near a Portuguese enclave at Charity, owned by the Guvueias and Surrounds.

More than 200 Indians migrated to the Pomeroon, between the period of 1870 and 1940, and began the cultivation of coffee, citrus and farming of cattle. Some of six groups were the Ramcharrans, Nandalals, Gowgos, Jagmohans, Taseers, Birbals, Barakats, Rafeedeens, Seetal Sadhu, Ramlalls, Tellacks, Khandais, Ramphals, Rams, Jannies et al.

At that time, the upper Pomeroon flourished with fish and wildlife, such as tigers and venomous snakes. However, to occupy maiden forest and to use the forest to build a shed for survival was not an easy task, it was an extreme hardship to survive on what the forest and river had to offer.

The new migrant group’s survival was due to landowners of the lower Pomeroon; who visited the new farmers and saw their plight of livelihood. The lower Pomeroon farmers of African and Portuguese ethnicity invited the indentured Indians and provided them with food, shelter and land to cultivate rice by manual labour. They then returned to their ‘palm shed’ hut, well-provided for several weeks of survival.

Some of the good Samaritans of lower Pomeroon River were the Stolls, Slyutmans, Benns, Garaways, Ribeiros, Corfields, Benjamins, Silvas, Boyce and Pereiras. The Pereiras also taught Indian farm workers management skills and purchased small farm lands for many. However, with a new population, the area saw the Austins and Evans facilitating the emergence of manual sawmills (saw pits) and the making of coal to for steam boilers and other activities. In addition, an Anglican shed was built by Pastor Jacklowe in 1860, Cabacabari Church in 1872 and St Louis RC in 1896 at Siriki.

The plight of these new Indian land owners got much relief when New Road, a progressive Indian village emerged under the leadership of one Sarjn Maharag, and food production advanced. Sarjn Maharaj was six feet tall, fair in complexion and a devoted Hindu of the Brahmin caste. He visited the Pomeroon every two weeks, teaching Hinduism and supply vegetables and paddy to the new Upper Pomeroon farmers. Sarjn Maharaj also built the first Mandir at New Road and a troolie shed resting hall for stranded Indians in 1908-1920.

The traditional midwives were of African origin and performed well without any medical training, as well infant mortality was zero. By 1920, only four of the 55 sugar plantations and two factories existed. All abandon estates could not cultivate rice or other crops since the drainage system was sabotaged. Simultaneous landlordism emerged on Essequibo when several wealthy Indians purchased abandoned sugar estates that fell into ‘receivership’. New estate owners were Sahoys, Chans, Mizirs, Sankar, Reberios, Maharaj, Bacchus, Parikan, Singh, Eliza, Tedoris Benn, Santos and Doobay. These new landlords built rice factories on previous sugar factory sites and entrenched a new type of feudal control from 1908 to 1960. However, the Tapacoma project broke this vicious cycle of servitude.

For Pomeroon Indians, much relief came when the Manicuru canal was dredged in 1923. Thus, rice lands were free of cost and were occupied by the Mangras, Barakats, Badri; all of whom cultivated rice to offset hardship on the growing community. The indentured Indians developed their traditional device to grind grains and shell paddy. Unfortunately, a four feet high flood in 1934 devastated the River district followed by an epidemic, which wiped out many families. As the community grew, social facilities followed such as schools, mandirs, mosques, saw mills, medical services, and a forth nightly steamer service.

The Pomeroon River is the deepest river in Guyana without any sand banks, and has a unique history. Over the last 250, its length was reduced by ten miles due to erosion. It is one of six rivers that discharges into the Atlantic in a North West direction — the others are North East. The first set of alien occupants were expelled Jews from Brazil who sailed up the Pomeroon and occupied Calidonia in 1520 and grew sugar cane. The ancestors of Portuguese and freed Africans laid the foundation for the development of the Pomeroon river landscape. The historical work and sacrifices cannot be omitted when the history is written.

Pomeroon citizens excelled in many ways; unity in communal life, racism and discrimination were never tolerated or noticeable. All Pomeroon residents are interrelated, interdependent and interconnected. The history put together formulated our national motto: “One People, One Nation, One Destiny”.