ST. CROIX AFRICAN ROOTS PROJECTLaunchedin 2002 by theVirgin Islands Social History Associates(VISHA), a non-profitorganization based on St. Croix (see below), theSt. Croix African Roots Project(SCARP)is a unique historical documentation and research project involving Virgin Islanders, Danesand Americans in a collaborative effort intended to enhance knowledge and understandingof the population, families and individuals on the island of St. Croix during the period ofDanish rule through systematic utilization of historical documentation, computertechnology, applied research and educational outreach. SCARP's primary goal is toencourage a balanced, nuanced historiography of the Danish West Indies in whichindividuals of African descent are accorded identity, humanity, agency and assume acentral place in Virgin Islands' history.SCARPis being carried out under the direction of historian George F. Tyson of St. Croix,who is the Project Director, anthropologist Dr. Svend E. Holsoe of Philadelphia,historian/archivist Poul Olsen of Copenhagen and educator Roland Roebuck of St. Croixand Washington, who are the founders and Directors of VISHA. The Project Team has alsoincluded twenty-four data entry specialists in Denmark, St. Croix and the United States.Funding for SCARP, in excess of one million U.S. dollars, has been provided by the CarlsbergFoundation of Denmark, the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Solar Foundation ofDenmark. Additionally, VISHA has contributed over US$ 300,000 in goods and services.SCARP's first major product is theSt. Croix Population Database 1734-1917,anextraordinary educational resource that will profoundly transform the way that Danes andVirgin Islanders understand their common Past, their ancestral heritage and themselves.Focusing on the West Indian island of St Croix while it was a Danish plantation colony, theDatabase is a searchable, virtual archive, currently consisting of 1.84 million biographicalentries, each with multiple pieces of information, transcribed from a vast array of historicalrecords found in Danish, American, and Virgin Islands archives (see below). This treasuretrove of information, which will ultimately contain over two million records, constitutes apowerful research tool that will provide scholars, educators, students, genealogists andothers with easy access to widely dispersed historical documentation relating to thehistory of St. Croix and its multi-ethnic, multi-racial population. It will facilitate newhistorical and anthropological research. It will allow Danes, Virgin Islanders, Americansand Africans to reconstruct life stories and family histories of forgotten ancestors, therebyadding a rich human dimension to our understanding of a shared History. It will enableVirgin Islanders to investigate, analyze and reconstruct the Past from an indigenousperspective. And, very significantly and uniquely, it will permit thousands of families onboth sides of the Atlantic to trace their ancestral roots to individual Africans and to specificAfrican homelands (See the attached story of Venus Johannes as one example).1

The Database has been hailed as having significant potential for historical research byprominent American and Caribbean historians. In the Virgin Islands, it has been stronglyendorsed by Governor John de Jongh Jr., Delegate to Congress Donna Christiansted,members of the Virgin Islands Legislature and enjoys enthusiastic support from a broadcross-section of the community.The Database remains a work in progress. Some 160,000 records must still be entered, andone million entries await verification and standardization. This work will be completed byMarch 2011.Meanwhile, VISHA has begun making the Database publicly accessible. Public launcheshave been held in St. Croix and Denmark, and VISHA officers have made presentations togroups and organizations in Denmark and the Virgin Islands.In July 2009, VISHA - in partnership with Ancestry.com, the world's largest family historywebsite - began publishing the St. Croix Population Database online, starting with theeleven Danish West Indian censuses prepared between 1835 and 1911. This importantcollection can be searched for free at VISHA's website found athttp://www.visharoots.org,or it can be searched for a fee athttp://www.ancestry.com/virginislands.Collectively, thetwo Websites have already had more than one-half million visitors. The entire Databasewill progressively go online over the next eighteen months.Also in partnership with Ancesty.com, VISHA is digitizing thousands of documents used tocompile The Database, so that they too can be viewed online. This digitization work will becompleted by the end of 2009.Starting in November 2009, VISHA will be collaborating with the University of SouthernDenmark to upgrade the VISHA website into an interactive WEB 2.0 format, so that it canbe equipped with a more powerful search engine and be used to support a diversity ofeducational, research and tourism related projects. The new Website should be ready byFebruary 2010.VISHA is also partnering with the Virgin Islands Department of Education and the UNESCOTrans-Atlantic Slave Trade (TST) Project in Denmark in implementing a pilot project thatwill make the Database available for classroom use in 2010.Starting in 2011, VISHA and its partners plan to expand the scope of the project (which willbe renamed the “Danish West Indian Roots Project”) to include the following activities:1) Initiate a 3-year project to produce databases for St. Thomas and St. John. This workwill be carried out in collaboration with the Virgin Islands Genealogical Society on St.Thomas, the St. John Historical Society, Ancestry.com and the Rigsarkivet.2) Initiate comprehensive program of collaborative demographic research focusing on theformer Danish West Indies. This work will involve Virgin Island, American and Danishscholars and institutions.

3) Initiate a multi-year education enrichment project that will incorporate databasematerial and research findings, as well as historical maps and images, into Virgin Islandsand Danish schools. This initiative will be carried out in close collaboration witheducational institutions and educators in Denmark and the Virgin Islands.4) Initiate a multi-year project that will utilize database material, research findings, mapsand images to promote and enhance heritage tourism in the Virgin Islands and Denmark.This project will be carried out in collaboration with the Virgin Islands Department ofTourism, the soon to be established St. Croix Heritage Area, the Virgin Islands National Parkand the Innovative Tourism Program of Southern Denmark University.5) Help establish mutual heritage research and documentation centers in the VirginIslands that would house project documentation, databases and other research material,and would facilitate cultural dialogue and exchanges. VISHA has identified the old,government owned, rum factory ruins at La Grange as an ideal location for such a center onSt. Croix, and is working closely with government agencies and private sector organizationson that island, as well as with interested parties in Denmark, toward marking a suitablerenovation of that facility a reality as soon as possible.VISHA is seeking financial assistance within Denmark, as well as elsewhere, to help carryforward all of the above initiatives.Accordingly, we are requesting that the CulturalCommittee incorporate VISHA's St. Croix African Roots Project into whateverprogramme may ultimately emerge to commemorate the hundredth anniversary ofthe transfer of St. Croix, St. Thomas and St. John from Denmark to the United States.The creation of the St. Croix Population Database already constitutes a remarkableinternational achievement, thanks in large part to the major contributions of the peopleand resources of Denmark. It is hoped that Danes and Virgin Islanders will continueworking together to expand its enormous potential to promote the knowledge, mutualunderstanding and good will so essential to overcoming the bitter memories of an oftendark and tragic collective Past.

THE ST. CROIX POPULATION DATABASE 1734-1917has been compiled fromdocuments found in the Danish National Archives (Rigsarkivet), the U.S. National Archivesand Records Administration (NARA) and various collections in St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands.The records found in the Database consist of:1.Slave Trade Shipping Records 1749-1802.This data set consists largely of names andprices of enslaved Africans sold from slave ships to named purchasers and plantations onSt. Croix.2.St. Croix Slave Lists 1772-1847.The Slave Lists are annual head tax returns for allenslaved and free individuals submitted by all urban and rural slave owners on St. Croix tothe government bookkeeper from 1772 through 1847. Essentially, these returns compriseisland-wide censuses of the enslaved population. There are near complete data sets for theyears 1772-1780; 1784-1787, 1790-1796; 1798-1800, 1818 and 1847. Partial sets exist forthe years 1802-1811.Each Slave List contains the names of all slaves and free individuals on the property.Additional information varies. Between 1772 and 1792, enslaved individuals are classifiedunder the following headings: "capable", "infirm", "12-16 years" of age, "under 12 years" ofage. Newly acquired Africans (bosals) are listed by name, and frequently the vessel fromwhich they were purchased is identified. Deaths and births are also recorded by name, asare runaways (maroons). Occasionally, cause of death and still births are specified. From1793, individuals are also classified by occupation (field workers, craftsmen, domestics).From 1804, individuals are also classified as "African" or "Creole". Family relations areoften indicated.3.Property Inventories 1755-1848.Over 6,000 town property and plantationinventories, listing enslaved individuals by name, gender and price. Generally children aredistinguished from adults. Frequently, newborn children are listed with their mothers.Drivers, tradesmen, domestics, sick nurses, invalids, watchman and runaways areidentified. Many nineteenth century inventories record recent deaths.4.Population Censuses 1835-1917.Official censuses of the entire St. Croix populationwere compiled for the years 1835, 1841, 1846, 1850, 1855, 1857, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1890,1901, 1911. All but the 1835 and 1890 censuses are complete. The censuses record eachindividual by name, age, gender, occupation, religion, birthplace, marital status, andresidence. The 1841 and 1846 censuses also contain information on health, character andpunishments of the enslaved. From 1855, families/households and family relationships areusually designated.5.Free Persons of Color Records 1777-1834.These records consist of periodiccensuses, lists and manumission records for the free colored population. Included aredetailed censuses prepared in 1816, 1824, 1831-1832.6.Church Records 1744-1917.Records of baptisms, marriages, births and deaths ofslaves and free persons belonging to the Lutheran, Dutch Reform, Anglican, Roman Catholicand Moravian churches. Among other items, the baptismal records of the Moravian5

congregations (which encompassed between forty and fifty percent of the island's Blackpopulation) list the individual's place of birth and, in the case of Africans, their "nation" orethnicity.7.Vital Statistics 1820-1917.This data set, with gaps, records individual births, deathsand marriages on an annual basis between 1820 and 1917. Most entries contain additionalinformation about family relations. About two-thirds of this data was extracted from thechurch records, some of which no longer exist. The remaining one-third, covering theperiod after 1865, was compiled from data obtained directly by various governmentoffices.8.Vaccination Records 1823-1853.This data set includes smallpox vaccination recordsfor all plantation slaves for 1824, and annual lists people vaccinated in the towns andplantations between 1829 and 1853. These records list name, age, gender and place ofresidence. Family relations are often noted.9.Emancipation Records 1848.This set of records was compiled for all plantation slavesfreed in 1848 in order to establish compensation amounts for the owners. One set is forthe Christiansted District including the town of Christiansted; the other covers onlyplantations in the Frederiksted District. The set for Frederiksted District contains muchmore biographical data, including name, date and place of birth, occupation, familyrelations, as well as information about movements, marriages and deaths in the post-emancipation period.10.Movements of Plantation Workers 1848-1870.These records trace the movementsof ex-slaves between the plantations and towns of Christiansted and Frederiksted, duringthe years immediately after emancipation. They contain information about age,occupation, births, deaths and family relations.11.Immigration Records 1850-1917.These records document the place of origin andbiographical information for over 10,000 persons from other Caribbean islands whoimmigrated to St. Croix after 1848. They contain information about age, occupation, births,deaths and family relations.13.Laborer Lists 1849-1917.This data set includes lists of laborers and land renters(called "squatters") working on individual plantations after emancipation.12.Miscellaneous 1740-1917.This assemblage consists of police records, court records,auction records, runaway slaves, criminal lists, mortgage records, notary records, wills,probates, pension fund applications, property tax records, voter lists, militia rolls and listsof school children and their parents.

VENUS JOHANNES – A WOMAN FROM SENEGAL ON ST. CROIX

VENUS,according to her own declaration, was born along the Saloum River in modern daySenegal. She was captured as a young girl and taken to the island of Gorée, an active port inthe trans-Atlantic slave trade. There she was sold to Anne Roussine Pepin, a prominent freecolor woman and wife of the mustee Nicholas Pepin, who owned and built in the infamous"house of slaves." She served as a domestic in the Pepin household until the arrival in 1800of John George Maddock, captain of a slaving vessel from St. Croix.Captain Maddock took lodgings with the Pepins, and there became so infatuated with theservant girl Venus that he offered to purchase her. Anne Roussine refused to sell Venus, butagreed to take one slave in exchange if Maddock would free Venus unconditionally and gothrough the motions of marrying her. The following morning the arrangement was publiclyvalidated with a traditional Gorée marriage ceremony.Venus lived with Captain Maddock on Gorée for about 2 months. When time came forMaddock to return to St. Croix she agreed to go with him on condition that he would giveher bond to carry her back again to Gorée. Maddock consented and the signed bond wasleft by Venus in the hands of Nicholas Pepin.Along with 61 enslaved Africans, Venus reached St. Croix in October 1800, with CaptainMaddock. On her arrival at Frederiksted she was sold by Maddock to Jehodan Yates,daughter of his friend Captain John Yates. Venus resided with and worked for, JehodanYates in Frederiksted between 1800 and 1815, during which time she had four children -Charlotte, Elvira, John Frederick and Rosalina.In 1815, Venus brought her illegal enslavement to the attention of the Danish magistrate,who conducted a detailed investigation into the matter. A decision was reached wherebyVenus and her youngest child Rosalina were declared free, but her other 3 children were toremain enslaved until freed either by Venus or Jehodan Yates. By 1820, they too hadbecome free.Once free, Venus married John Johannes, a barber, and they had three children – Perla,Mary Ann and John Richard. She and her family lived in a small house belonging to JohnJohannes located at 36B Hospital Street in Frederiksted. John Johannes died in August of1825. Prior to his death, he and Venus gave their three children a deed of gift to theHospital St. property. Members of Venus' family retained possession of this property untilthe early 20th Century.Like most free people of color on St. Croix, Venus struggled to sustain herself and herchildren. But it was not easy. She was so impoverished in 1839, that she was exemptedfrom paying taxes on the Hospital St. property. During the last decades of her long life shewas being supported by her children. Venus died of consumption in March of 1851. Herexact age is unknown, but several sources suggest that she was over 80 years old.