Growing up as a descendant of Bristol’s wealthy DeWolf family, Katrina Browne thought of her ancestors as sea-faring adventurers, affluent merchants, and distinguished statesmen.
So as a teenager, when Browne learned that the DeWolfs owed their fortune to Rhode Island’s slave trade, she was horrified — so much so that for decades, she pushed the memory aside.
She wasn’t alone. “Slavery was the cornerstone of Rhode Island’s 18th-century economy,” says Richard Lobban, professor of Africana Studies at Rhode Island College. Rhode Island accounted for the largest proportion of the US slave trade, sending ships that carried some 100,000 enslaved Africans across the Atlantic. The DeWolfs dominated the business to become the largest slave-trading family in American history. “It’s not a nice story,” says Lobban. “No one’s wanted it told.”
But today, with the release of her first documentary, Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North, Browne is setting out to break her family’s silence. And she’s challenging Rhode Islanders to do the same.
First previewed at the Providence Black Repertory Company on October 30, Traces of the Trade chronicles the journey of Browne and nine DeWolfs as they embark on a trip retracing the Triangle Trade to rethink their family’s legacy. In the run-up to the film’s 2008 national release, a series of follow-up screenings and discussions, sponsored by RI for Community & Justice, are planned around the state. (For info, call Ann Clanton at 401.467.1717.)
The timing couldn’t be more propitious. Last year, the reparations debate roared with renewed vigor as a number of lawsuits targeting businesses with past ties to slavery took center stage. This spring, Virginia became the first state to express “regret” over its ties to slavery; similar moves have followed in Maryland, North Carolina, and Alabama.
Last week, the packed audience’s reaction to the film was explosive. “It was like therapy to me as an African-American man, watching this film,” says Eric Fuller, 50, of Providence, who praised Browne for her courage in undertaking the venture and who said he’s tired of whites turning away from the issue.
Though advertising Bristol’s slave-trading pedigree may tarnish the town’s reputation, only an honest accounting of history, says Browne, “can lead to real healing.” At the screening, when Browne suggested that Rhode Island become the first Northern state to apologize for slavery, her call was met with an outburst of applause.
Next year marks the 100th anniversary of the end of the US slave trade, and Browne is hopeful the occasion will prompt national action. Reparations, she says, are essential — not individual checks, but “massive investment” in social programming to help bridge the enormity of America’s ongoing racial divide.
The film closes with Browne last year making a similar petition before the Episcopalian Church Convention (which subsequently passed an apology for its role in the trade).
“When you really start to face the history and open your heart, it becomes very natural to want to make things right,” says Browne. “Not out of personal guilt, but out of grief.”
