Black Migration
Important dates in the establishment of Black communities in the Maritimes:
1782-85 About 3,500 Blacks fled to what is now Nova Scotia and New Brunswick at the close of the American Revolution. They had fought for Britain in return for freedom. Once in the Maritimes, they were cheated of land, forced to work on public projects such as roads and buildings and denied equal status.
1792 Exodus to Africa: 1,190 men, women and children left Halifax on 15 ships for the long voyage to Sierra Leone. Sixty-five died en route.
1796 Nearly 600 Trelawney Maroons exiled from Jamaica arrived in the Maritimes. They faced miserable conditions and opted for Sierra Leone. They left Halifax in 1800.
1813-15 Roughly 2,000 U.S. Blacks, refugees from the War of 1812, settled in the Maritimes.
1833 Slavery officially abolished in the British Empire.
1920s Hundreds of Caribbean immigrants, called the “later arrivals,” flocked to Cape Breton to work in coal mines and the steel factory.
Download map (1.2 MB PDF)