Treaty of Waitangi signed / Organized immigration of free Black people from U.S. to Africa - February 6

Maori chiefs and representatives of the British Crown signed the Treaty of Waitangi on this day in 1840. / On this day in 1820, the American Colonization Society organized a migration of freed enslaved people from the United States to Africa.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey y'all, we're rerunning two episodes today. Enjoy the show
Hi um Eves. Welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that reveals a little bit more about history
day by day. The day was February six. Representatives of

(00:29):
the British Crown and more than forty Maori chiefs or
rangatira signed the Treaty of Waitangi on this day at
Waitangi in the Bay of Islands on the North Island
of New Zealand. The treaty was supposed to be an
agreement that established Britain sovereignty over New Zealand, ensured protection

(00:51):
of Maori lands and other possessions. Said the Queen had
the sole right to purchase land and gave Maory the
rights of Britain subjects. But even though the document was
meant to protect the interests of the Maori and the
British Crown, differences in language and culture caused a lot

(01:12):
of confusion over the meaning of the treaty. Europeans had
been in contact with the Maori since the seventeenth century.
By the eighteenth century, Europeans were immigrating to New Zealand
and trade was good. Europeans exchanged guns, clothing and other

(01:32):
trade goods for food and other natural resources. The Maori
had access to. European missionaries also came to the islands,
and many Maori even converted to Christianity and came to
respect the missionaries. But New Zealand was not a British territory,
so British law did not govern the British subjects living

(01:54):
in the country, including the convicts that had come to
New Zealand from New South Wills. So over time the
region became pretty unstable because of violence and disease. When
the Maori feared a potential French invasion in eighteen thirty one,
several Marory chiefs acts King William the fourth of the

(02:17):
United Kingdom to help protect their land. So the Colonial
Office in London, the government body that managed Britain's colonies,
sent James Busby to the proverbial rescue. Busby was appointed
the so called British Resident in New Zealand and in
eighteen thirty three. He arrived in the country with the

(02:40):
intent to look after the Maori and Europeans living on
the islands. Bust Be drafted up a declaration of independence
for New Zealand in eighteen thirty four, mainly to keep
other nations from staking a claim to New Zealand. Many
Maori chiefs later signed the declaration, but it didn't go

(03:00):
over too well with the Colonial Office, and Busby wasn't
even able to carry out his duties fully because he
didn't have a police force or any support from the
British government. Maori tribal wars had broken out, lawlessness from
immigrants and adventurers was still an issue, and the New
Zealand Company was aggressively attempting to grab as much land

(03:23):
as possible in New Zealand. The Europeans and Mary alike
wanted to put an end to all the disorder, but
Britain recognized New Zealand as independent under Maory rule, so
after years of being disinterested in annexing New Zealand, Britain
sent Royal Navy officer William Hobson to New Zealand to

(03:47):
negotiate a treaty with the Mary in eighteen thirty nine.
Hobson was set to become Lieutenant Governor of New Zealand
or any parts of New Zealand the Maori agreed to
give up. Hopson arrived at Waitangi in January of eighteen forty.
Buzby helped Hopson draft the treaty, and the treaty was

(04:08):
translated into the Maori language, but there was a problem.
Some English words and concepts did not have equivalence in Maori,
so at the last minute, the translators had to make
up new Maori words, like the word kama natanga, which
means governorship. This hasty translation would go on to cause

(04:32):
disagreement over how the Maori interpreted the treaty and whether
the treaty really transferred sovereignty to the British crown. On
February five, the Europeans and Maori met and the treaties
were read aloud. The Maori discussed the proposal into the night. Missionaries,
who thought the deal would be good for the Maori people,

(04:55):
encouraged the mary to agree to the treaty, and though
many Maory chiefs objected to the treaty, several chiefs stepped
up in support of British rule. The next morning, hone
heck A was the first of dozens of chiefs to
sign a treaty. A missionary named William Colenso did interject

(05:16):
at the signing to ask if the Maory really understood
what they were signing, and he later wrote his own
account of the signing. But over the next several months,
more copies of the treaty were sent around the country
for others to sign. Even though many mayory chiefs refused
to sign the treaty, Hopson still took the title of

(05:39):
Lieutenant Governor of all of New Zealand, and soon after
New Zealand became a Crown colony. But it didn't take
long for things to start going wrong. Europeans flooded into
the country, Britain failed to protect maory land and possessions,

(06:00):
Intentions over unfair land purchases, and sketchy legislation became violent.
The treaty was never ratified by Britain, and the government
often completely ignored the terms of the treaty. Anyway, the
Maori ended up losing a lot of their land. By

(06:20):
the nineteen hundreds, the Maori began fighting to secure their
treaty rights and protesting the British government's violations of the treaty,
and in nineteen seventy five, the government finally recognized the
Treaty of Waitangi and New Zealand law. Some treaty claims
did reach settlements. But today the treaty is still not

(06:43):
part of New Zealand municipal law, and the debate over
the true meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi continues. I'm Eves,
Jeff Coote, and hopefully you know a little more about
history today than you did yesterday. If you'd like to
learn more about the Treaty of White Tangi, you can

(07:04):
listen to the episode of stuff you missed in History
class called the Treaty of White Tangi. You can subscribe
to This Day and History Class on Apple Podcasts, the
I Heart Radio app, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Come back tomorrow for another tidbit from history. Hi everyone,

(07:32):
I'm Eves. Welcome to This Day in History Class, a
show that will convince you that history can be fascinating
even when you expect it not to be. The day
was February six The American Colonization Society organized a migration

(07:55):
of freed enslaved people from the United States to Africa.
By the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning
of the nineteenth slavery was being outlawed around the world,
though it continued in practice in many places. In seventeen eighties,
seven free black people from Britain set out to establish
a colony in Sierra Leone. Five years later, more than

(08:17):
a thousand free black people, unhappy with life in Nova Scotia,
built Freetown in Sierra Leone. In eighteen o four, as
the Haitian Revolution ended, Haiti became the first independent black
republic in the world. By that same year, all the
northern states in the US had voted to abolish slavery
within their borders. That did not mean that all people

(08:41):
who were enslaved were immediately freed, but many people were
released after they reached a certain age or worked for
a certain amount of time. This meant that many Black
Americans began to live as free people in the first
part of the nineteenth century. They created communities and institutions,
and they organized to help free other black people, but

(09:02):
they still faced racism and discrimination. As the number of
free black people grew, white supremacists and others who deemed
black people undesirable were unhappy with their newfound freedom. Others,
including free black people themselves, believed they would fare better
outside of the United States. A colonization movement emerged as

(09:24):
people proposed the idea of moving freed enslaved people to Africa.
In eighteen fifteen, Paul Cuffey, a free black entrepreneur and
sea captain, initiated the Back to Africa effort and transported
thirty eight black people from the United States to Sierra Leone.
They arrived in Sierra Leone in early eighteen sixteen, and

(09:45):
the years after that others took up the cause of
black immigration. In this climate, the American Colonization Society formed.
It was largely made up of white people, including clergyman, abolitionists,
and slave owners. The society purchased and freed enslaved people
and paid their way to Africa. In eighteen nineteen, U s.

(10:07):
Congress passed an act that authorized the President to send
a naval squadron to African waters to intercept people engaged
in illegal slave trading. It also appropriated one hundred thousand
dollars to return displaced Africans to Africa. On February six,
eighteen twenty, delayed days by low temperatures and ice, a

(10:29):
group of around ninety free black people and a few
a CS members left New York and set sail for Freetown,
cra Leone. Little is known about the immigrants who were
on the ship. Adults and children were on board. Most
of them were residents of New York or Pennsylvania. Many
of them were farmers and artisans, and there was a
nurse and a minister. They arrived at Freetown in March.

(10:53):
Within the next couple of years, Liberia was founded as
a settlement for free black people, and thousands of free
black Amerkins began immigrating to the area. Adjusting to the
new environment wasn't easy, but some of the black immigrants
did strive for wealth and subjugated and oppressed indigenous people.
As more free black people immigrated to Liberia from the US,

(11:16):
they continued to bring US culture and practices with them.
Liberia declared its independence in eighteen forty seven, though the
US did not recognize its independence until eighteen sixty two.
I'm Eve Jeff Coo, and hopefully you know a little
more about history today than you did yesterday. Give us
a shout or a share on social media at c

(11:38):
D I h C podcast. Our email address is this
day at I heart media dot com. Thanks for listening.
We'll see you again tomorrow with another episode. For more
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(11:59):
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