Someone Knows My Name

Solomon Lindo and Aminata reach Manhattan in 1775. Upon arrival, they pass an area full of shacks and free Negroes called Canvas Town. Lindo warns her to stay away. They stay at The Fraunces Tavern, owned by Sam Fraunces, a Jamaican Negro. She learns from Sam that New York City has places to hide and offers many kinds of work, but that returning to Africa is madness—ships first go to England before Africa. Lindo leaves Aminata to write a letter to the governor, but she ventures outside instead. When she sees a British home attacked, the announcer tells her that the rebels have been fighting the Tories. At first she confuses the rebels for Negroes, believing that the fight for freedom is for the slaves, but she soon learns otherwise. Upon her return to the tavern, she helps Sam feed a drunken mob of rebels. Sam tells Aminata to run; the harbors are closing, and Lindo will return home immediately. He gives her food and a blanket, and tells her to go to the woods and return in a few days.

On her way to the woods, a Negro warns her against walking through Holy Ground because of ladies of “ill repute” (253). Twenty years after being seized in the woods of Africa, Aminata stands in the woods of Manhattan—frightened but finally free. She dreams of rabbits stopping mid-flight to stare at her, twin crescent moons in the sky. In the morning she is drawn to the sounds of Africans chanting in a circle. Though she doesn’t understand them, Aminata joins in their dancing. A woman in the center holds an infant’s body, which for Aminata represents “the child I had once been; it was my own lost Mamadu; it was every person who had ever been tossed into the unforgiving sea on the endless journey across the big river” (256). When Aminata returns to the tavern, she learns that an angry Lindo left on the first ship south only an hour after she left. Sam hires her to work at the tavern, and she begins teaching Negroes to read at a church. One of her students, Claybourne, helps her build a shack in Canvas Town with stolen materials from a ransacked Tory house.

Lindo does not return, so Aminata continues working at the tavern and delivering babies in Canvas Town. When war breaks out in November, the governor of Virginia promises freedom to any Negro who helps the British. Aminata reads the proclamation for the people of Canvas Town until they memorize it, and Sam reasons that the British will abandon them. A young man named Lieutenant Malcolm Waters saves Aminata from an attacker one night, saying he has heard of Aminata. In private, Waters asks her to deliver then drown the baby of his mistress, a 13-year-old Negro named Rosetta Walcott. Aminata agrees to deliver the baby for one pound of silver; instead of drowning the baby, she helps Rosetta build a shack in Canvas Town. In April 1776 the entire British military retreats from New York City.

The rebels hold Manhattan for six months before the British take it back for another seven years. Aminata’s students learn the Philipsburg Proclamation of 1779, which grants security to every Negro who deserts the rebel cause. Every capable Negro works for the British. Aminata regularly treats the British men and their mistresses in Holy Ground, delivering their babies and conducting abortions. At each rumor of change, Canvas Town residents assemble outside her shack so she can read them the news. In 1782 the British surrender, and in March 1783 the released peace treaty alarms the Negroes—specifically the statement that Britain will withdraw all its armies, without “carrying away any Negroes or other Property of the American Inhabitants” (281). In response, American slaveholders begin raiding Canvas Town.

Waters returns as a captain, asking to speak with Aminata in private. In the British military barracks, Waters introduces Aminata to Colonel Baker. He explains that the wording of the peace treaty implies that Negroes who have worked for the British are officially free—not property. The British plan to remove all free Negroes to Nova Scotia, where they will be given land. Aminata’s job is to spread the word and register Negroes’ names, ages, and how they came to serve the British in a ledger called the “Book of Negroes.” When Aminata returns to her shack that night, she is surprised once again by Chekura. He has aged, and she fears she is less beautiful. She makes sure that Chekura—now free—has room, board, and passage with her to Nova Scotia.

Aminata interviews Negroes at the tavern, collecting information and giving instructions. In recording the Negroes’ place of birth and how they obtained their freedom, Aminata learns that she is not the only one with a unique migration story. Fifty ships sail at a time in April, July, and October 1783. Aminata is surprised that the British still have slaves. When Aminata conceives in August, she tells Chekura she wants to have a real life with him. He responds that what they have is real and that freedom is not guaranteed. He shares that he lost his fingers trying to board the ship of the British who abandoned him despite his help. Waters and Baker leave without saying goodbye, and Aminata is relieved of her services and given two tickets for Annapolis Royal. When boarding the Joseph, Aminata is arrested because of a claim on her. Chekura tries to stay but is told he cannot board another ship if he does. In court, Appleby claims he still owns her before Lindo arrives to manumit Aminata to make peace with his past. Alone, Aminata finally leaves for Port Roseway on November 30—the last day of British occupation.