The Memoirs of Bruce Watson
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1 The Memoirs of Bruce Watson Contents Foreword............................................................................................................2 Awakenings .......................................................................................................4 The River Ferries .............................................................................................11 The City ...........................................................................................................24 Place names......................................................................................................33 “Swizzles”........................................................................................................41 The Nanny........................................................................................................44 Kites.................................................................................................................50 Getting There ...................................................................................................55 Albion: The Plantation.....................................................................................69 William Henry Watson ....................................................................................77 Chronology ....................................................................................................111 Photographs ...................................................................................................112 Note These memoirs were transcribed by Roger B. Austin during May 2005 from the original typescript. Only minor changes were made to correct spelling and punctuation. Notes on the typescript indicate that the author had not edited all the text to his satisfaction. 2 Foreword For the romantic historian the Caribbean Sea - its northern and Eastern limits defined by the necklace of West Indian Islands - was a time and place of active colonising. Three hundred years of swashbuckling heroes, of ships spreading and filling their sails between hot tropical sun above, and the deep blue Caribbean sea beneath their keels. Or nights under clear countless stars, and a full tropical moon above. The names that fill the pages of my boyhood history books, were those of the then young Nelson, of Drake, Rodney and Raleigh. Of Cortez and Bolivar, Bluebeard and Morgan. There were treasures plundered, found, buried and never found again. Of boarding parties and swirling cutlasses and thick smoke from cannon and musket fire. Those men and their countries, England, France, Holland and Spain, claimed, lost and often reclaimed, territories in the names of their Kings and Queens. Three hundred years of wars and treaties of settlements and trade agreements, pacts made and pacts broken; until at last the dust settles early in the 19th century. National flags flew over territories that were finally acknowledged, grudgingly or otherwise. While the colonisers shared more or less equally in claims of the islands, it was the British, Dutch and French in that order from west to East that staked out the three Guianas on South Americas north eastern shoulder. The western most and largest of the three Guianas, officially and legally became the colony of British Guiana in 1815. The transaction was made as a purchase at the peace settlement that ended the Napoleonic wars. The formation of the new country was made up by combining a districts of Essequibo, Demerara and Berbice. On a subsequent voyage in 1498, Columbus sighted at the country’s coastline as he sailed past the massive estuaries of the Berbice, Demerara and Essequibo rivers. He did not bother to stop. And it was Sir Francis Drake who came there are looking for the mythical El Dorado, whose streets were said to be paved with gold. Ironically, modern-day Guyana (the spelling of changed when it became a Republic in 1966) does produce gold and diamonds. The indigenous natives of the country had given the name Guiana to that whole area, Guyana and meaning ‘Land of Many Waters’, referring to the many rivers, large and small, that conjoined or individually made their natural ways from the hinterland to the Atlantic Ocean. The Demerara River is geographically central to the country and 3 the coastline either side of it define places as ‘East Coast’ and ‘West Coast’. Nine- tenths of the population lived along that ten mile strip of coastline. During the wars from 1780 to 1815, mostly between the French and the British, it was the French that started a settlement on the East bank of the Demerara River, where its more than three-mile wide estuary meets the Atlantic. They named the place Longchamps. But their occupation was to be brief, due to a successful invasion by the British who promptly named the budding town, Georgetown. Not to be left out of things the Dutch took their turn at occupation and succeeded in booting the British out. They in turn and changed the name yet again to Stabroek. But the tenacious British returned in 1796 and once more reclaimed the territory, resurrected the name Georgetown and that was finally that. It was during a Dutch and British occupations, that some order of planning for the city-to-be began. Georgetown from a then to now evolved sensibly with streets and avenues running north to south and east to west. Many Dutch place names survive to this day. Stabroek remains as the name of the large and lively market at the southern end of the city’s main commercial street. The native and Amerindians called ‘bucks’ (derivation unknown) have survived into modern times, but all others such as the Arawaks and Caribs, was decimated from the time of Columbus, as much from the invader’s diseases as from their swords. The conquering colonisers have left their marks in their own distinctive ways. The British legacy has been justice, education and the parliamentary system of government. The legacy from the French was mainly language and culture. The Spanish left their severe Roman Catholicism while the Dutch established banking and commerce. In 1815 the district of Essequibo included today’s Pomeroon, though my limited research us sources are vague about that. Before 1815 Stabroek was a vast area that reached from present day Surinam in the east, to the Essequibo river itself in the west. 4 Awakenings About the time of my second birthday, my mother took up residence in the city. She had by then borne eleven children in fifteen years, the fourth and fifth births being twin girls. Large families were not uncommon in those days, though I would say that eleven was well above the average. There were events that happened just after that time that are imprinted on my mind and memory that serve my recollections to this day. Experiences that stirred my virgin senses. The first seems to have been the sensation of joy analogous to the first bleep of the electronic heartbeat readout. The friendly man was tossing me in the air and catching me again. This took place in the gallery of the East Street house. There was the sound of laughter and the general excitement of many people present. I had touched base with conscious emotion for the first time. I have researched this incident with one of my elder sisters who pinpoints the friendly man as my Uncle Cecil, who was about to emigrate to Canada and the year was 1928. My birth date being at the very end of the year, this happening took place when I was not yet three years old; an early time for conscious recall but apparently not impossible. Later, when I was about four or five years of age the experience was that of melancholy. It was my first experience of how quickly emotions can be stirred by music, and in this instance accompanied by sympathetic words. The house to the south of us was a smaller single storied one, elevated off the ground on the usual pillars. A wedding reception party was in progress with dance music coming from gramophone From one of the passage windows of our upper bedroom floor, I was able to look down on the crowded dance floor where the dancers were packed shoulder to shoulder. The sound of their shuffling feet wafted up to my young ears. The melody was mournful and in heavy waltz-time and I can still remember the opening lyrics:- Oh I’m dancing with tears in my eyes For the girl in my arms isn’t you 5 Dancing with somebody new…. I was moved by the singer’s heartbreaking sorrow and the sadness of the moment lay on me like a heavy blanket. No doubt there was gay music to follow but I don’t remember, so overwhelming was the poignancy of that sad waltz. My brother Geoffrey was party to my next memorable experience. Geoffrey was twenty-three months my senior, which seemingly, gave him license to those privileges that superior beings enjoy over their inferior siblings. I had enough experience of life at the time to know that this state of affairs was a fact of life. This is not to say that he was a bully, but on those occasions when I was obnoxious he felt it necessary to be the enforcer. These were the days of being seen and not heard, and although I’m sure I exploited situations when they seemed gainful from being the baby of the family, I was more often than not wiser to keep my mouth shut. Geoffrey was half a head and half everything else taller than me, a disadvantage I was never able to overcome. But I must have heeded his senior-ness most of the time because our growing up together was quite amicable. Once again the wedding house next door is the focus of attention. As the two ‘babies’ of the family, we were not allowed