Read The Almanac of the Dead: A Novel Online
Authors: Leslie Marmon Silko
The Almanac of the Dead: A Novel (131 page)
THE TUCSON POLICE had used SWAT teams to raid the homeless camps. They had used armored vehicles to smash down the cardboard and tin lean-tos and tents pitched under mesquite trees. The SWAT team had hit the camp with the women and children too, and the screaming
children had been taken from their mothers to “protective custody” in State foster homes. But at the war veterans’ camp, the SWAT team had stopped as if by hypnosis. They had seemed paralyzed by the sight of the homeless war veterans standing at attention in their raggedy army-surplus uniforms without any weapons. Clinton would never forget that moment. Rambo-Roy had addressed the men: “You didn’t fight and almost die for the United States to end up like this. You didn’t crawl on your belly through bullets, blood, and poison snakes in foreign countries just to starve and sleep in a ditch when you got back home!”
Other homeless men and women had witnessed the face-off between the SWAT team and the veterans; in their faces Clinton thought he had detected a flicker of recognition. Clinton had listened to the Barefoot Hopi, and he had talked day and night with the African. Both had preached patience, the patience of the old tribal people who had been humble enough not to expect change in one human lifetime, or even five lifetimes. Maybe not tomorrow or next week, but someday Clinton knew, the other homeless people would remember the defiance of the homeless vets; the dumpy, pale women and their skinny, pale men would remember the absolute surge of pride and power the veterans’ defiance had given them. Like little seeds, the feelings would grow, and the police violence that had rained down on the people would only nurture the growing bitterness.
Clinton had been headed out anyway when the police came looking for him and Rambo-Roy. Naturally the Tucson police had got the details confused and had arrested the first white man and black man they had located wearing camouflage clothing. Clinton had not been sure if it was right for him and Rambo-Roy to let two other “brothers” take the rap for Trigg’s murder. The police claimed they had genetic evidence from the crime scene that linked the two men in police custody to the killing. Clinton and Rambo-Roy both knew any genetic evidence found at the crime scene belonged to them, not the men in police custody. So actually the Tucson police had found no evidence at the scene, but after they had arrested the two men, the police detectives had taken hair and skin-cell samples from the men to put in the evidence bags with other material collected at the murder scene. Rambo said once the police had planted your hair or skin cells at the scene of the crime, you were finished. There was nothing that could be done. So even if Clinton had turned himself in, it wouldn’t be
his
hair or
his
skin cells in that police evidence bag. Rambo-Roy said the brothers were doing their part by taking the rap for them. Clinton had to get back to the big cities. He had to try to
reach the black war vets before they got misled by fanatics or extremists screaming “Black only! Africa only!” because Clinton had realized the truth: millions of black Indians were scattered throughout the Americas. Africans in the Americas had always been “home” because “home” is where the ancestor spirits are. From the gentle giants, Damballah and Quetzalcoatl, to the Maize Mother, and the Twin Brothers and Old Woman Spider, Africa and the Americas had been possessed.
Clinton was heading for Haiti after he visited some of his black Indian cousins in New York City. Black Indians living in Manhattan had long been supplying aid and arms to the Mohawk nations at war with Canada and the United States. The African had been discreet about the modest financial aid certain African nations had sent to the Mohawks. The African had called the aid a “symbolic gesture” of the solidarity between the African tribal people and the Native American tribal people. Now that black Africans had finally recovered their ancestral land the spirits would not allow the Africans to turn their backs on the tribes of the Americas as they fought to take back their land.
Clinton wasn’t going to waste time with the whiners and complainers who had made wine or dope their religion, or the Jesus junkies, who had made religion their drug. Talking to Weasel Tail and the Barefoot Hopi had given Clinton so many more ideas than he and Rambo-Roy had ever got by themselves. Rambo-Roy and he had been right about the homeless and their plan to organize the homeless poor around an army of homeless war vets. On the Indian reservations the surviving war vets were at the core of the preparations. As Weasel Tail and the Hopi said, they might kill and cripple thousands, or even millions, of us, but those who did survive would indeed become a power to be reckoned with. All around them, all their lives they had witnessed their people’s suffering and genocide; it only took a few, the merest handful of such people, to lay the groundwork for the changes.
Ignorance of the people’s history had been the white man’s best weapon. Clinton had continued to fill his notebook with fragments of the history the people had been deprived of for so long. The Hopi had given Clinton a book that the Hopi said might shine some more light on black Indians. Clinton had written in bold letters at the top of the notebook page
Thank you, Herbert Apthekerl
1526 | Pee Dee River, South Carolina: Negro slaves rise up, flee to live with the Indians. |
1663 | Gloucester County, Virginia: Indians aid black and white slaves. |
1687 | Westmoreland County, Virginia: Negro slaves rebel. |
1688 | Maryland: “Sam,” slave belonging to R. Metcalfe, leads uprising. |
1690 | Newbury, Massachusetts: Mysterious white man from New Jersey leads Indian and black slaves to French Canada. |
1691 | Middlesex County, Virginia: “Mingo” leads other black slaves on rampage. |
1702 | New York, South Carolina: Mild unrest among slaves. |
1708 | Newton, Long Island: Indian and black slaves rebel and kill seven whites. |
1709 | Counties of Surry, James City, and Isle of Wight in Virginia suffer rebellions of Indian and black slaves. |
1711 | South Carolina: Great terror among whites as “Sebastian” leads other black slaves in uprising. |
1712 | New York City: Indian and Negro slaves kill nine white men during uprising. |
1713 | South Carolina: Slave rebellion plot blamed on slave preacher recently arrived from Martinique. |
1720 | South Carolina: Slave uprising coincides with drought, economic depression, and Indian troubles. |
1722 | Rappahannock River, Virginia: Slave unrest and conspiracies. |
1723 | Gloucester and Middlesex, Virginia: Slaves plot to flee to Florida and freedom promised by Spanish officials. Boston, Massachusetts, and New Haven, Connecticut: slaves set fire to numerous buildings. |
1727 | Louisiana: Captured Indian slave reveals secret outlaw village of “Natanapalle” where runaway black and Indian slaves live. |
1729 | Virginia: Black slaves flee to Blue Ridge Mountains with guns and agricultural implements. |
1730 | Louisiana: French arm adult black slaves to fight Chonachee Indians, but blacks conspire with Indians against the white men. |
| Virginia, South Carolina, Louisiana: Unrest and rebellion blamed on rumor among black slaves that the king had freed all baptized slaves. |
1733 | Unrest among black slaves increases everywhere after the Spanish government announces all slaves of the British who reach Florida will be free. |
1738 | Charles Town, Virginia: Conditions approach guerrilla warfare as black slaves try to reach Florida, which they call “the promised land.” |
1739 | Stono, South Carolina: Uprising of black slaves blamed on Spain’s war with England. |
1740 | New York City: Slaves poison their masters’ water. |
1741 | New Jersey: Arson blamed on black slaves. |
1747 | New York City: Uprising among black slaves. |
1751 | South Carolina: Law enacted against slaves poisoning masters. |
1755 | Virginia, Maryland: the French and Indian War causes slave unrest. |
1765 | South Carolina: “Maroons” hiding in mountains grow more troublesome. |
1767 | Alexandria, Virginia: Rebellious black slaves. |
1771 | Georgia: British agent blamed for stirring up black slaves. |
1772 | Perth Amboy, New Jersey: In the center of the slave trade, a rebel conspiracy is uncovered. |
1774 | Boston: Black slaves rise up and seek aid of British and Irish. St. Andrew’s Parish, Georgia: Slaves rise up. |
1775 | North Carolina: Black slaves plot to rise up and join British forces. |
1776 | Bucks County, Pennsylvania: Black slaves rise up to aid British. |
1778 | Albany, New York: “Tom” arrested again for stirring up minds of Negro slaves against their masters. |
1782 | Spanish Louisiana: Rebellious “maroons” and Negroes led by one “St. Malo” make trouble for whites. |
1786 | Savannah River, Georgia: Negro slaves calling themselves “soldiers of the King of England” carry on guerrilla warfare from a stockaded village in Bell Isle swamp. |
1791 | Santo Domingo (Haiti): Successful black slave uprising. News does not reach U.S. slaves for a year or two. |
1791 | Western Virginia: Indians defeat General St. Clair and unrest stirs among black slaves while militia is gone fighting Indians. |
1793 | North Carolina: Cherokee Indians fight whites and black slaves threaten to rise up. |
1793 | Richmond, Virginia: Black slaves discuss successful rebellion in Santo Domingo. |
| Charleston, South Carolina: Mysterious fires sweep the city, and black slave unrest is blamed on revolt in Santo Domingo. |
1796 | Massive sell-off of black slaves by white masters such as Thomas Jefferson and George Washington due to economic hard times. |
1797 | Charleston, South Carolina: Three black slaves executed for “plots” and arson. |
1800 | Denmark Vesey buys his freedom. Nat Turner is born. John Brown is born. |
1800 | Henrico County, Virginia: “Gabriel,” slave of T. Prosser, leads a conspiracy. |
1804 | New Orleans: Slaves are restless and cruelly punished during war between France and Spain. |
1804 | Philadelphia: Whites attack blacks, but blacks rally together shouting, “Show them Santo Domingo!” |
1810 | Virginia: Slaves rise up and kill four whites. |
1811 | St. John and St. Charles Parish, Louisiana: Charles Deslondes, a free mulatto from Santo Domingo, leads a rebellion of black slaves. |
1812 | War with England stirs up slave unrest. |
1813 | Washington, D.C.: When British are near, black slaves rebel. |
1815 | Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, Louisiana: Widespread unrest among black slaves. |
1819 | Florida, a Spanish territory, is “annexed” by the U.S. to wipe out nests of hostile Indians and runaway slaves who use Florida as a base camp for guerrilla raids on plantations across the border. |
1819 | Severe droughts and starvation in Virginia and South Carolina lead to numerous slave revolts. |
1822 | Charleston, South Carolina: Denmark Vesey’s plan for a Great Revolt is betrayed. Vesey was counting on aid from blacks in Haiti and in Africa. Of 131 black slaves arrested, 38 were hanged. |
1826 | Louisville: Seventy-seven slaves being transported by five white men rise up, kill the slave traders, and escape. |
1828 | Richmond, Virginia: Nat Turner hears the voice of God tell him he must lead his people to rise up when the signs come from God. |
1829 | Virginia: Free-born Negro Christian Tompkins writes pamphlet foretelling the coming of a mulatto savior who is huge, bearded, and invincible and comes from Grenada to destroy slavery in the U.S. |
1829 | Slaves bound for sale in New Orleans from Norfolk rebel and only after great struggle are controlled. |
1829 | Rains in Louisiana damage crops and cause famine and slave revolts. |
1830 | David Walker, a free man, publishes his “Appeal,” which Nat Turner may have read. |
1831 | The signs from God come and Nat Turner leads a slave rebellion in Southampton County during which fifty-seven whites are killed. Hundreds of black slaves are killed without trials across the U.S. as whites panic and give way to hysteria. |
1835 | Texas: Black slaves escape and join Mexican forces against Texans. |
1846 | Pensacola, Florida: Martial law declared after slave rebellion plans revealed. |
1861 | Arkansas: Slaves rise up and kill enslavers on July 4. |
1862 | Richmond, Virginia: Slave named Bob Richardson executed for plotting uprising. |
1862 | Yazoo City, Mississippi: Slaves rise up and burn courthouse and homes of fourteen whites. |