MUSIC IN THE COLORED CONVENTIONS
ANTI-SLAVERY SONGS
The Anti-Slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-Slavery Meetings. comp by Brown, William Wells, 1814?-1884 Boston, B. Marsh, 1849. Image. Retrieved from the Library of Congress.
At least two delegates sang their original compositions at the Colored Conventions. Writers Joshua McCarter Simpson and William Wells Brown both wrote and compiled collections of anti-slavery songs. At the 1851 Ohio State Convention of Colored Citizens, Joshua McCarter Simpson proposed that delegates opened and closed each session with anti-slavery music. John Mercer Langston gave Simpson the task of preparing the music. Subsequently, delegates sang several anti-slavery songs throughout the convention. The next year, Simpson published Original Anti-Slavery Songs (1852), a pamphlet with thirteen of his compositions. As scholars note, it is possibly the only anti-slavery music collection written by a single Black author. The pamphlet includes the poem “Old Liberia is not the place for me,” which he sang at the 1851 Ohio convention. The song explicitly repudiates the schemes of the American Colonization Society, which aimed to remove Black people from the United States.
The poems in the pamphlet were meant to be sung to the tune of minstrel songs. As Simpson writes in the preface, “My object in my selection of tunes, is to kill the degrading influences of those comic Negro Songs, which are too common among to our people, and change the flow of those sweet melodies into more appropriate and useful channels…”[1] As VIcki Eacklor writes, Simpson used familiar abolitionist techniques and arguments, countering pro-slavery arguments and invoking the pain of family separations. [2] Simpson attended at least two more conventions, the 1865 Convention of the Colored Men of Ohio in Xenia, Ohio, and the 1871 Ohio State Convention of Colored Men in Columbus. Although the minutes do not indicate whether or not delegates sang his anti-slavery songs in these conventions, he was still actively composing poems. In 1874, he published The Emancipation Car Being an Original Composition of Anti-Slavery Ballads. One of songs in the collection was adapted “to the case of Mr. S, Fugitive from Tennessee.”[3] “Away to Canada” is a satirical rendition of the popular minstrel song “Oh Susanna,” whereby the singer tells an enslaver that he has had enough and is heading to Canada. Susanna, in this song, is the freedom seeker’s wife. He asks her not to cry for him as “I’m going up to Canada, / Where colored men are free.” Read the lyrics of “Away to Canada” below.
"Old Liberia is not the place for me" by Joshua McCarter Simpson
Come all ye Colonizationists,
My muse is off to-day—
Come, listen while she’s singing
Her soft and gentle lay.
Before she’s done you’ll understand
Whoever you may be,
That Old Liberia
Is not the place for me.
Although I’m trodden under foot,
Here in America—
And the right to life and liberty,
From me you take away.
Until my brethren in the South
From chains are all set free—
The Old Liberia
Is not the place for me.
Although (as Moses Walker says,)
There, children never cry:
And he who can well act the hog,
For food will never die;
For there the yams and cocoa-nuts,
And oranges are free—
Yet old Liberia
Is not the place for me.
You say it is a goodly land,
Where milk and honey flows,
And every “Jack” will be a man,
Who there may choose to go.
You say that God appointed there
The black man’s destiny—
Yet old Liberia
Is not the place for me.
The sweet potatoes there may grow,
And rice in great supplies;
And purest waters ever flow,
Which dazzle quite your eyes.
Though there they have the sugar-cane,
Also the coffee tree,
Yet old Liberia
Is not the place for me.
Three millions slaves are in the South,
And suffering there to-day:
You’ve gagged them, yes, you’ve stopped their mouth,
They dare not even pray!
We, who in art and enterprise,
Are trudging on our way,
You’d have us all to colonize,
In old Liberia.
Give joy or grief—give ease or pain,
Take life or friends away;
I deem this as my native land,
And here I’m bound to stay,
“I have a mind to be a man
Among white men and free;
And Old Liberia!
Is not the place for me!”
My muse has chanted now too long,
And spent her breath in vain,
In singing of that “Negro Den,”
Across the raging main.
Our blood is now so far dispersed
Among the Anglo-race,
To rid the country of this curse,
Would need a larger space,
And old Liberia
Is rather far away;
I’d rather find a peaceful home
In old America!
SOURCE
McCarter, Joshua Simpson. Original Anti-Slavery Songs, Printed for the author, 1852, pp. 24-26.
"Away to Canada" by Joshua Simpson Carter
“Away to Canada”
Adapted to the case of Mr. S.,
Fugitive from Tennessee.
I’m on my way to Canada,
That cold and dreary land;
The dire effects of slavery,
I can no longer stand.
My soul is vexed within me so,
To think that I’m a slave;
I’ve now resolved to strike the blow
For freedom or the grave.
O righteous Father,
Wilt thou not pity me?
And aid me on to Canada,
Where colored men are free.
I heard Victoria plainly say,
If we would all forsake
Our native land of slavery,
And come across the Lake.
That she was standing on the shore,
With arms extended wide,
To give us all a peaceful home,
Beyond the rolling tide.
Farewell, old master!
That’s enough for me—
I’m going straight to Canada,
Where colored men are free.
I heard the old-soul driver say,
As he was passing by,
That darkey’s bound to run away,
I see it in his eye.
My heart responded to the charge,
And thought it was no crime;
And something seemed my mind to urge,
That now’s the very time.
O! old driver,
Don’t you cry for me,
I’m going up to Canada,
Where colored men are free.
Grieve not, my wife—grieve not for me,
O! do not break my heart,
For nought but cruel slavery
Would cause me to depart.
If I should stay to quell your grief,
Your grief I would augment;
For no one knows the day that we
Asunder might be rent.
O! Susannah,
Don’t you cry for me—
I’m going up to Canada,
Where colored men are free.
I heard old master pray last night—
I heard him pray for me;
That God would come, and in his might
From Satan set me free;
So I from Satan would escape,
And flee the wrath to come—
If there’s a fiend in human shape,
Old master must be one.
O! old master,
While you pray for me,
I’m doing all I can to reach
The land of Liberty.
Ohio’s not the place for me;
For I was much surprised,
So many of her sons to see
In garments of disguise.
Her name has gone out through the world,
Free Labor, Soil, and Men;
But slaves had better far be hurled
Into the Lion’s Den.
Farewell, Ohio!
I am not safe in thee;
I’ll travel on to Canada,
Where colored men are free.
I’ve now embarked for yonder shore,
Where man’s a man by law,
The vessel soon will bear me o’er,
To shake the Lion’s paw.
I no more dread the Auctioneer,
Nor fear the master’s frowns,
I no more tremble when I hear
The beying negro-hounds.
O! old Master,
Don’t think hard of me—
I’m just in sight of Canada,
Where colored men are free.
I’ve landed safe upon the shore,
Both soul and body free;
My blood and brain, and tears no more
Will drench old Tennesse.
But I behold the scalding tear,
Now stealing from my eye,
To think my wife—my only dear,
A slave must live and die.
O, Susannah!
Don’t grieve after me—
For ever at a throne of grace,
I will remember thee.
SOURCES
The 1859 New England Colored Citizens’ Convention was also filled with anti-slavery songs. William Wells Brown, in attendance as a delegate, asked that one of his original compositions, “Fling out the Anti-Slavery Flag,” be sung at the convention. Delegates and attendees sang more songs from The Anti-Slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-slavery Meetings, compiled and published by Brown in 1848. As Aaron D. McCledon notes, Brown’s “strategy in The Anti-Slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-Slavery Meetings (1848), was to rely on the antebellum American association between music and affect to generate antislavery sentiment among those who read, listened to, or sang to the lyrical narratives that he wove together in his text.”[4] Read the lyrics of the songs at the 1859 convention and listen to the tunes they were sung to below.
"Right On"
“Before the transaction of any business, the audience sang a hymn commencing:—”[5]
Ho! children of the brave,
Ho! freemen of the land,
That hurl’d into the grave
Oppressions bloody band;
Come on, come on, and joined be we
To make the fettered bondman free.
Let coward vassals sneak
From freedom’s battle still,
Poltroons that dare not speak
But as their priests may will;
Come on, come on, and joined be we
To make the fettered bondman free.
SOURCE
Brown, William Wells. “Fling out the Anti-slavery Flag,” The Anti-Slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-slavery Meetings, compiled by William Wells Brown, Bela Marsh, 1848, p. 36.
"Fling out the Anti-slavery Flag" by William Wells Brown
An original song, by Wm. Wells Brown, was then sung in a fine manner, to the tune of ‘Auld Lang Syne.’ The following is the first stanza;–[6]
Fling out the Anti-slavery flag
On every swelling breeze;
And lets its fold wave o’er the land,
And o’er the raging seas,
Till all beneath the standard sheet,
With new allegiance bow;
And pledge themselves to onward bear
The emblem of their vow.
Fling out the Anti-slavery flag,
And let it onward wave
Till it shall float o’er every clime,
And liberate the slave;
Till, like a meteor flashing far,
It bursts with glorious light,
And with its Heaven-born rays dispels
The gloom of sorrow’s night.
Fling out the Anti-slavery flag,
And let it not be furled,
Till like a planet of the skies,
It sweeps around the world.
And when each poor degraded slave,
Is gathered near and far;
O, fix it on the azure arch,
As hope’s eternal star.
Fling out the Anti-slavery flag,
Forever let it be
The emblem to a holy cause,
The banner of the free.
And never from its guardian height,
Let it by man be driven,
But let it float forever there,
Beneath the smiles of heaven.
SOURCE
"Free the Bondman From His Chains" by James H. Dean
Second Session
The Convention re-assembled at 2½ o’clock. A song entitled, ‘Free the Bondman,’ by James H. Dean, was sung to the air: “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled.”[7]
“Free the Bondman From His Chains” by James H. Dean
Air—‘Scots wha hae wi Wallace bled.’
I.
Sons of sires who Freedom bought,
Nourish now each glowing thought.
Gather round the hallowed spot, Sacred to their name ;
Let not shouts of Liberty,
Let not tears your offering be;
Rather bring a soul that’s free—
Free, and knows no shame.
II.
What’s the Freedom they have won,
Though bequethed from sire to son?
Freedom’s battle is not done
With the triumph cry:
Victory’s field the hero reaps—
Valor conquers—Virtue keeps;
Tis the craven soul that creeps
Back to slavery.
III.
Oh, ye sons of patriot sires,
Light again the battle fires;
Freedom’s sacred life requires
Heart, and soul, and hand;
There’s a nobler strife for you.
Foes, more subtle, to subdue;
There’s a grander triumph too!
Stand! like freemen, stand!
IV.
Strike! for those who pine in pain,
Free the bondman from his chain,
Cleanse your land from every stain,—
Bid her rise and shine:
Then, with truest freedom free.
Fixed stars our States shall be,
Beaming still, o’er land and sea,
With a light divine.
SOURCES
REFERENCES
[1] McCarter, Joshua Simpson. Original Anti-Slavery Songs, Printed for the author, 1852, p. 3.
[2] Eaklor, Vicki. “Introduction to Joshua Simpson’s Original Anti-Slavery Poems,” The Journal of Black Sacred Music, vol. 3, no. 1, pp.14-21, 1989, Retrieved from <https://read.dukeupress.edu/black-sacred-music/article-pdf/3/1/14/791910/14eaklor.pdf>.
[3] Simpson, Joshua McCarter. The Emancipation Car Being an Original Composition of Anti-Slavery Ballads, Sullivan and Brown, 1874, p. 64–65.
[4] McClendon, Aaron D. “Sounds of Sympathy: William Wells Brown’s ‘Anti-Slavery Harp’, Abolition, and the Culture of Early and Antebellum American Song.” African American Review, vol. 47, no. 1, 2014, pp. 83–100. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24589797. Accessed 19 May 2023.
[5] New England Colored Citizens’ Convention (1859 : Boston, MA), “New England Colored Citizens’ Convention, August 1, 1859,” Colored Conventions Project Digital Records, accessed May 18, 2023, https://omeka.coloredconventions.org/items/show/269.
[6] “New England Colored Citizens’ Convention, August 1, 1859,” Colored Conventions Project Digital Records.
[7] “New England Colored Citizens’ Convention, August 1, 1859,” Colored Conventions Project Digital Records.
CREDITS
Written by Samantha de Vera.