27 August 2026 will mark 185 years since slavery was abolished on the Corn Islands, an archipelago on the Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua. When slavery was abolished, the islands were under British colonial influence. They were part of the now-extinct Mosquito Kingdom, which was later called the Mosquito Reserve following the 1860 Treaty of Managua, or Zeledón-Wyke, where Britain recognised Nicaraguan sovereignty over the region. The territory was later fully incorporated into Nicaragua in 1894, following the military actions led by General Rigoberto Cabezas by order of former President José Santos Zelaya.
The emancipation of slavery came to the Corn Islands almost 8 years after the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 was approved by the English Parliament, which came into effect on 1 August 1834 and marked the end of slavery in most British colonial territories. In the Caribbean of the Americas, such territories included Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Barbados, and Antigua. The Corn Islands were not emancipated under such Act as they were not legally a British colony. At that time, the islands and the entire Mosquito Coast were being claimed by some nearby countries. Despite these claims, the Mosquito Crown and Council continued to govern the coast under the influence and support of the British.
For this reason, in compliance with the British Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, on 1 January 1839, King Robert Charles Frederick of the Mosquito Kingdom proclaimed the abolition of slavery on the Mosquito Shore. He ordered that by 1 January 1841, slavery was to be entirely abolished. Nevertheless, slaveholders were reluctant to follow this mandate and did not yield to the King’s proclamation. For this reason, after a meeting in Bluefields on 10 August 1841 with Colonel Alexander MacDonald, who travelled from British Honduras (present-day Belize), military and government officials of the Mosquito Coast agreed that this mandate was going to be reinforced.
On the evening of Thursday, 26 August 1841, Colonel Alexander McDonald, Superintendent of British Honduras and Chief Commissioner for the Government of the Mosquito Nation, accompanied by King Robert Charles Frederick of the Mosquito Kingdom, Secretary Patrick Walker, Stanislaus Thomas Healy, Secretary to the King, Commandant and Sheriff of the Middle District; Peter Shepherd, Commandant and Sheriff for the Southern District; Captain Gordon, the Doctor; and several other officers, arrived on an English warship and anchored at Insurance Harbour, off the shores of Southwest Bay, Great Corn Island.
McDonald asked all slaveholders and enslaved men and women to assemble the following day at Southwest Bay at 10:00 A.M. for an announcement.
The following day, on Friday, 27 August 1841, at 10:00 A.M., McDonald, in the presence of the Miskito King and other officials, slaveholders and enslaved people, announced the following:
“I am come here to make you all free; therefore in the name of H.M. Queen Victoria, and in the name of the King of the Mosquito Shore, I pronounce you all free…”
That day, 98 enslaved men and women were emancipated from slavery, according to official records.
What follows next has been told through oral history for generations: that the newly freed women and men celebrated their freedom with a communal supper and music. They went to the swamps and seashores and captured land crabs, and to the fields they tirelessly planted and harvested breadkind. They prepared a pot of crab soup, which was served in calabash bowls. They celebrated around a flaming fire and sang ancestral songs while playing rustic instruments. This marked a new beginning for them.
Many of the newly freed ventured off the Corn Islands, while others remained, slowly incorporating themselves into their new lifestyle and working for something of their own. For a while, celebrating emancipation might have drifted away, but it was in 1852, with the arrival of Reverend Edward Kelly from British Honduras (present-day Belize), a son of formerly enslaved people and founder of the Ebenezer Baptist Church and school, the first of these institutions on the islands, that the community annually started celebrating Emancipation Day.
Our oral history tells us that in the North End vicinity, at Benard Bank, under a big fig tree, in the courtyard of Mrs. Teresa Lampson, was the stage for such communal celebrations, where young and old would gather for a thanksgiving service and later share traditional food, including crab soup, and play games.
The fact that islanders started to learn to read and write thanks to the first church and school allowed many to read Bible verses during the celebration and recite poems. From every corner of Great Corn Island: Sandfly Bay, Little Hill, Sally Peachie, South End, Quinn Hill, Southwest Bay and Brig Bay, the few people who lived scattered all around would gather to remember the struggles of their ancestors and celebrate their freedom, the freedom that they inherited.
With the years and decades, and as the Corn Islands began to fully integrate into the national sociopolitical system, the celebration began to evolve. Following the 1979 Sandinista Revolution, Emancipation Day became officially a locally declared holiday and is organised by the local government and neighbourhoods through local committees.
The celebration was also extended to three days, beginning on 27 August with Emancipation Day, followed by Coronation Day, where a pageant to elect the Queen of the Islands is held on 28 August, and since 2009, on 29 August, on Little Corn Island, the Cross Over is held to celebrate the emancipation from slavery.
These three days annually attract hundreds of national and international visitors who visit the islands to witness and be part of the different activities and programmes that take place around this time and to experience much of the Caribbean shores.
Emancipation Day is both a commemoration and celebration. It should be commemorated to remember those who died in the barbaric conditions of slavery; those who were killed or beaten to death trying to escape these conditions; those who died overseas being transported from Africa, or within the Caribbean islands, to be sold and to work in the households or plantation grounds of colonisers. Those who died chained, working or abused in every form possible.
Emancipation Day should also be celebrated as a way of looking forward. Freedom was not a gift granted to our ancestors or a favour, as colonial narratives intend to portray such events, but it was a right that should have been enjoyed from birth but was stripped away under the inhuman system that unfortunately existed and was legally allowed at that time.
Celebrating emancipation should be about reconnecting with our cultural heritage, our food, our clothes, our language, songs, stories, and all that makes us who we are.
Emancipation Day is not about the chains. It is not about slaves, or about “those who granted us freedom.” It is about embracing who we are. It is about renewing our commitment to ourselves, our community, our culture, history and identity.
It is a time to remember to be proud of being Black, Brown or mixed, to be from the Caribbean, from our homeland. This day should always be a synonym of unity, a time that brings the entire community together, near and far, and reminds us that we are all one.
From our past, we find the strength and courage to continue moving forward as our ancestors did, so that in our present, we can recognise and remember who we are, where we are and where we come from, where we are heading, and what our rightful place in this world is.