PRESENT FIGHT NATCHEZ HISTORICAL FORKS OF ROADS SITE 2004

 Prepared and Submitted by

Ser Seshs Ab Heter-Clifford M. Boxley
December 12, 2003
Natchez, Mississippi

After nearly nine years of consistent advocacy and annual Ancestral Kommemoration rituals and ceremonies, including our very successful November 2003 Bound For Glory on the Bayou Underground Railroad Gathering in Baton Rouge, The Friends-of-the-Forks-of-the-Roads Society, is pleased to provide you with an update on our fight for equal history and tourism democracy in Southwest Mississippi-Central Louisiana. On June 26, 2003, one of the two historical enslavement markets sites at the historical Forks of the Road was finally brought under public domain. The City of Natchez after relentless agitation from the Friends of the Forks of the Road, succeeded in using $92,806.71 of a $200,000 State of Mississippi Department of Archives and History grant to purchase 0.388 acres of land or 16,884 square feet of land at the Forks of the Road. This particular site contains the ground, spot and spirit of Enslaved African Descendant Ancestors and Fore Fathers and Mothers who were ill-gotten at the older of the two “Negro Mart” shown on an 1853 City of Natchez street engineer hand drawn map. Roughly another $22,000 of the initial $200,000 Archives and History grant is currently being used for the development and erection of an informational broadside display interpreting a bit of the history pertaining to the long distance enslavement trafficking that took place at the Forks of the Road.

The current struggle for equal history and tourism democracy justice in regards to the Forks of the Roads is for us to see that truth history information and facts are displayed, presented and interpreted on the informational broadside panels being proposed for erection at the Forks. To succeed in doing so will help us to address forgotten offerings to our Fore Mothers and Fathers and collective Ancestors in common for their humanity suppressed and tenacity to survive so we their descendants/ascendants through their African spirit are here today standing on their and others Africans’ shoulders.

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History Director at Natchez Grand Village of the Natches Nation and Historic Jefferson College put together the “Forks of the Road Exhibits Planning Committee.” The Friends of the Forks of the Roads Society have two members on this Committee who will represent the thousands of African Descendants Ancestral Spirit who are no longer alive to speak of their collective human and enslavement experiences. 

EIGHT PROPOSED EXHIBIT PANELS TITLES AND ILLUSTRATIONS TO BE ERECTED AT THE FORKS 

We call your attention to the proceedings of the Forks of the Road Exhibits Planning Committee with the intent of soliciting the eyes of the world upon the process, content and concepts for developing the eight proposed exhibit panel titles and illustrations to be erected at the Forks. We do this to allow you and others to look into the window of the room where a few people of European and African descent will decide the history, facts and information for the exhibit panels. Your watching of the proceedings is solicited to help address the bringing forth of the enslavement truth in a City, State and Region whose collective economic, social standings, individual wealth, culture, political and governmental institutions where built on and are standing upon the backs of thousands of enslaved African Fore Fathers, Mothers and collective Ancestors in common.  But in a City, State and Region full of extant antebellum monuments that visually testify to enslavement and a long standing tourist industry that steadfastly don’t really want to talk about “slavery.” 

PROPOSED FORKS OF THE ROAD EXHIBIT PANEL TITLES AND ILLUSTRATIONS 

“Text under each title will have 100 words or less. 

Title: The Forks of the Road Slave Market

          Accompanying Graphic: Map of Natchez & vicinity 

Title: Forced Migration

          Accompanying Graphic: 18^th century Virginia plantation 

Title: Interstate Slave Traders [associated with the Forks of the Roads market]

          Accompanying Graphic: Scans of letter, bill of sale, etc. 

Title: Quotes from Eyewitness Accounts

           (Anonymous [Bancroft], Joseph Holt Ingraham, William Johnson, Will Martin, Isaac & James Franklin

            Accompanying Graphic: 

Title: Cotton and Slaves

          Accompanying Graphic: Illustration of English textile mill 

Title: Doing Business in the Slave Market

          Accompanying Graphic:  

Title: Coffles, Slave Brigs, and Steamboats

          Accompanying Graphic: Illustrations of each of these 

Title: The Slave Market and the Civil War

          Accompanying Graphic: 1864 Union Army map. 

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History Director at Natchez will write up a proposed language content draft and then the real action and interaction of the Forks of the Road Exhibits Planning Committee will commence. 

The first item to change is the oppressive European term “slave.” There is no social redeeming need to continue to refer to African, Fore Great Grand Parents and Ancestors in common as if they were some aliens, non-humans, non-people named “slave or slaves.” To do so is to continue to deny them their humanity, and thus the humanity of their present day African descendants, regardless of racial type or classification or bloodlines. 

You may have information that will be crucial and important content for the Forks exhibit panels above. If so, email or send it to forksyaroads@aol.com 

We will update and post up developing events and information as the Forks of the Road Exhibits Planning Committee move along in the development process. 

Respectfully Prepared and Submitted by Ser Seshs Ab Heter-CM Boxley, Coordinator, Friends of the Forks of the Roads Society and Forks Exhibits Planning Committee member. 

December 12, 2003 Natchez, Mississippi 

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Copyright © 2006. Ser Seshs Ab Heter-Clifford M. Boxley, Natchez, Mississippi. All Rights Reserved.