Onward to New Orleans: A reenactment of the Slave Rebellion
4th November 2019 · 0 Comments
By C.C. Campbell-Rock
Contributing Writer
Black Americans are struggling in 2019 to preserve the respect, dignity, and homage that is due to a people who have contributed much to the U.S., both during and after enslavement, and who are now being depended on, through their votes, to liberate the nation from the destruction of democracy being carried out by white nationalists that occupy the White House and the U.S. presidency.
It is especially prescient, then, that the 1811 Slave Rebellion, the largest in U.S. history, will be enacted November 8-9, 2019, not just for the sake of this Sankofa moment nor merely as a memorial, but to celebrate and inspire the unity and desire for independence and freedom the slaves had that can be harnessed today to confront the suppression Black Americans continue to confront in 2019. 
“The Slave Rebellion Reenactment (SRR) is a community-engaged artist performance and film production that will reimagine the German Coast Uprising of 1811, which took place in the river parishes just outside of New Orleans is the brainchild of artist Dread Scott, the event is sponsored by Antenna, a New Orleans nonprofit, and will be documented by filmmaker John Akomfrah.
“The SRR will animate a suppressed history of people with an audacious plan to organize and seize Orleans Territory, to fight not just for their own emancipation, but to end slavery. It is a project about freedom,” according to slave-revolt.com.
“The freedom and emancipation of the 1811 Slave Rebellion is as much about the present as unearthing the heroes of the past to help people understand how we can change the violence and suppression and murder of Blacks by the police, displacement, and problems with the environment,” says Dread Scott.
The SRR begins outside of New Orleans, along the River Parishes on Friday, November 8, in the locations where the 1811 revolt occurred – in the rural communities and industrial corridor that have replaced the sugar plantations. Hundreds of reenactors, many on horses, flags flying, in 19th-century French colonial garments, singing in Creole and English to African drumming. The event culminates on Saturday, November 9, with reenactors marching from the Old Mint (formerly Fort St. Charles) to Congo Square. SRR will take place upriver from New Orleans
On January 8, 1811, 500 enslaved African Americans from St. Charles and St. John the Baptist parishes marched down River Road (then called the German Coast, along the Mississippi River), determined to take their freedom. They killed two white men and did considerable damage in the plantations they crossed.
“They carried cane knives (used to harvest sugar cane), hoes, clubs and some guns as they marched toward New Orleans chanting “Freedom or Death. The sacrifices of these brave women and men were not in vain. The revolt reasserted the humanity and redeemed the honor of the people,” wrote New Orleans-based author and historian, Leon A. Waters, publisher and manager of Hidden History Tours, chairman of the Louisiana Museum of African American History, and a descendant of the 1811 rebels.
“At that time, New Orleans was the capital of what was called the Orleans Territory. The revolt sought to capture the city of New Orleans and make New Orleans the capital of the new republic,” Waters wrote in an article published by the San Francisco Bayview National Black Newspaper.
Charles Deslonde, a Creole mulatto slave driver for the Andry Plantation, was credited with organizing the rebellion. According to Waters, Deslonde’s plan was to meet up with enslaved African Americans at the Old Mint, formerly Fort St. Charles, liberate tens of thousands of slaves, capture New Orleans and create an African Republic run by freed slaves.
On January 10, a detachment of troops under the command of General Wade Hampton confronted the revolutionaries at Fortier Plantation in Kenner, Louisiana. At 4 a.m. Saturday, January 12, 1811, in the swamps behind the Picou and Trouard plantations, Charles was captured and brutally killed by detachments led by Deslondes, his owner, and Picou,” according to the Destrehan Plantation website.
Among the dead were two whites, 66 slaves killed in battle, 16 executed, and 17 were reported to have escaped or died. Several of the murdered slaves’ heads were stuck on pikes and set along River Road as a message to other slaves seeking freedom.
“Remember the Ancestors! Remember the women and men who carried out the largest African uprising on American soil,” Waters suggests.
The SRR is embracing Waters’ admonishment in real time. It may be the first such event held in the U.S.
“We’re interrupting the timeline,” says Scott. “The enslavers were truly brutal and medieval. That the things white people did were terrible and shady is not news,” Scott says explaining that the reenactment is a celebration of a military operation, planned for years, where they (slaves) overcame language differences to come together with courage and a vision. “These people were heroes, we should learn from that,” Scott explains.
Luther Gray, a local percussionist, will lead the drum corps during the reenactment and he is producing the SRR’s culminating celebration in Congo Square.
“The purpose of the African drums in the Slave Rebellion Reenactment is to set the spiritual rhythm, energy, and cadence of the march,” Gray says. The Congo Square portion of the SRR takes place on November 10, from noon – 6 p.m. “Delfaeyo Marsalis is writing a piece for the SSR,” Gray adds. Others on the line up include Sunni Patterson; Free Agents Brass Band; FIYI & The Mandingo Warriors; Silhouette Dance Company; Kumbuka Egungun Ancestral Procession; Slangston Hughes & Fo on the Flo; Truth Universal; SESS 4-5; Congo Square Drummers; and vendors.
Gray’s goal is to inspire New Orleanians to create an agenda for the future. “We want to ask, what’s next? Each one has a role to play. Let’s transform the African Diaspora in New Orleans,” he explains.
The co-founder of the Congo Square Preservation Society (formerly the Congo Square Foundation), Gay brought drumming and cultural activities to Congo Square. In 1993, the Congo Square Foundation was successful in placing Congo Square on the National Register of Historic Places and the Foundation led the effort to erect the Congo Square historic marker. The Congo Square Preservation Society continues the weekly Sunday drum circles in Congo Square that date back to 1988.
Alison L. Parker, the costume designer for the SRR, is leading weekly sewing circles of artisans who have been creating the period costumes for the reenactors. Parker’s designs for the SRR’s period costumes is the result of her research of what slaves wore in Haiti and the Caribbean, and period clothing from France. “The tignons (head-wraps) styles came from the way women wore them in Haiti, Africa, and the Caribbean,” Parker says. “I couldn’t find any pictures of slaves in clothing that represent what revolutionaries would wear during a rebellion.” Joining her in the sewing circles are several Mardi Gras Indians, who are helping to sew the period costumes.
Parker has designed costumes for theatrical, film and tv productions, including “I Am Legend,” starring Will Smith. She recently started ricRACK, which offers costuming skills to neighborhood children in New Orleans.
The SRR project is inviting everyone who may be interested in participating to join the SRR project by signing up at www.slave-revolt.com.
This article originally published in the November 4, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
