Read The Empire of Necessity Online
Authors: Greg Grandin
The Empire of Necessity
The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way.
Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at:
us.macmillanusa.com/piracy
.
For Eleanor
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In the early 1920s, the British war journalist and novelist H. M. Tomlinson let Americans in on a secret. There existed an obscure book that certain people used as an “artful test” to identify like-minded souls. If they gave it to you to read, Tomlinson wrote in the
Christian Science Monitor
, and you “showed no surprise,” you’d be deemed “no good.” But, being that they “were half afraid of the intensity of their own conviction,” they wouldn’t tell you you were no good. They’d keep quiet. If, however, Herman Melville’s
Moby-Dick
possessed you, you would have proved yourself worthy, able to “dwell in safety with fiends or angels and rest poised with a quiet mind between the stars and the bottomless pit.” Ninety years later, I felt that I had my own password into a knowing world of fiends and angels. When asked what I was working on, I’d say I was researching events that inspired a Herman Melville story. “Not
Moby-Dick
,” I’d say, “another one.” Less than half had heard of
Benito Cereno
and fewer still had read it. Those who had, though, knew it was different. It was Corey Robin who first let me in on the secret and I owe the idea of this book to him.
Over the years, I’ve kept a running list of people who helped in large and small ways move this work along, and if I’ve left anyone out, I apologize. Though I cite their scholarship throughout, special credit is due to the historians Alex Borucki and Lyman Johnson. They have been extremely generous taking time to respond to my questions and read the manuscript. I also want to thank the friends and colleagues, at NYU and elsewhere, who listened, suggested, corrected, and indulged, including Barbara Weinstein, Ada Ferrer, Sinclair Thomson, Michael Ralph, Gary Wilder, Laurent Dubois, Donna Murch, Chuck Walker, Mark Healey, Karen Spalding, Gerardo Rénique, Jennifer Adair, Debbie Poole, Kristin Ross, Harry Harootunian, Eric Foner, Emilia da Costa, Ned Sublette, Constance Ash-Sublette, Walter Johnson, Fred Cooper, Ernesto Semán, Bob Wheeler, Julio Pinto, Peter Winn, Gil Joseph, Stuart Schwartz, Tom Bender, Matt Hausmann, Amy Hausmann, Robert Perkinson, Christian Parenti, Laura Brahm, Jack Wilson, Gordon Lafer, Josh Frens-String, Christy Thornton
,
Aldo Marchesi, Ervand Abrahamian, Carlota McAllister, Marilyn Young, Deborah Levenson, Liz Oglesby, Molly Nolan, Lauren Benton, Cristina Mazzeo de Vivó, Henry Hughes, Jorge Ortiz-Sotelo, and Chris Maxworthy. Jean Stein graciously read the manuscript and offered constant encouragement. Eleanor Roosevelt Seagraves kindly took the time to discuss Delano’s memoir. Susan Rabiner has helped guide the work along since the beginning. In the middle of the project, between the archival research and the writing, I fell into a Melville obsession, from the depths of which one thing kept me going: knowing that Richard Kim would understand.
Many, many people assisted in the research of this book, including Roberto Pizarro, Seth Palmer, Liz Fink, Kyle Francis, Matthew Hovious, Flor Maribet Pantoja Diaz, Emiliano Andrés Mussi, Yobani Gonzales Jauregui, Andrés Azpiroz, Christy Mobley, and Adam Rathge. Rachel Nolan put her many skills, including an unanticipated knowledge of Catholic saints, to proofreading and fact-checking. In Mendoza, Luis César Caballeros conducted key research and Diego Escolar was a gracious host. Boubacar Barry helped me speculate about the origins of the names of the
Tryal
rebels; Al Cave passed on information about the Pequot War; Clifford Ross allowed me to look at one of Melville’s family Bibles; at the NYPL, David Rosado facilitated the reproduction of a number of illustrations and Jessica Pigza put together a list of extant first editions of Delano’s memoir; BJ Gooch, the archivist at Transylvania University Library, confirmed that Horace Holley was indeed the author of Amasa Delano’s biographical sketch; Michael Dyer, at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, identified illustrations; Jennifer Lofkrantz cleared up certain points of Islamic law; in Concepción, Alejandro Mihovilovich Gratz shared his deep knowledge of the region’s history, as did Manuel Loyola and Magdelana Varas, members of a dance and theater troupe, Teatro del Oráculo, dedicated to the recuperation of popular, or “people’s” history: after happening on a reference to the 1805 execution of Mori and the other West Africans, they began to research the events of the
Tryal
, staging, in 2006,
La Laguna de los Negros
. Information on this and other productions can be found on the group’s website:
http://www.teatrodeloraculo.cl/
. Elizabeth Bouvier, head of the archives of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, passed on and helped interpret documents related to Amasa Delano’s various debt cases; Ron Brown, at the New York University School of Law Library, compiled a list of legal cases that cited
Hall et al. v. Gardner et al
. I’d also like to thank Ibrahama Thioub and Ibra Sene for sharing their knowledge of Dakar’s archives with me.
Carolyn Ravenscroft, the archivist at the Duxbury Rural and Historical Society, deserves special mention. Carolyn was with this project from nearly its beginning and though there are only so many times one can use the word
generous
in acknowledgments, that she was, and more so. Hershel Parker was once kind enough to respond to an unsolicited e-mail inquiry and I hope he doesn’t regret it! Ever since, he has been exceptionally charitable in answering questions and sharing his unmatched knowledge of Herman Melville’s life and work.
I was privileged to be able to finish a final draft of the manuscript while a Gilder Lehrman Fellow in American History at the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. As if time to write and access to the library’s collections weren’t benefit enough, the year also allowed the rare opportunity to discuss all sorts of things with the wonderful people who keep the Center and Library running, especially Jean Strouse, Marie d’Orginy, Paul Delaverdac, Caitlin Kean, and Maira Liriano, and a terrific cohort of fellow fellows: Mae Ngai, Betsy Blackmar, Philip Gourevitch, Said Sayrafiezadeh, Valentina Izmirlieva, Gary Panter, Jamie Ryerson, John Wray, Luc Sante, Shimon Dotan, Katie Morgan, Tony Gottlieb, Ruth Franklin, and Daniel Margocsy.
I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to all the people at Metropolitan Books, including Rick Pracher, and Kelly Too but especially Riva Hocherman and Connor Guy. They helped in more ways than can be counted here. Again, it has been a pleasure to work with Roslyn Schloss. And Sara Bershtel: whenever I’m asked to compare the differences between having a manuscript reviewed by a university publisher and having one reviewed by a trade press, my thoughts revert to Sara. There’s no comparison. She brings a formidable commitment, precision, and intelligence to thinking about the content and form of a book, beginning with the first conversation and not ending until the acknowledgments are being written. I’m lucky to have her as an editor and even more so as a friend. Thank you.
In the past, I’ve thanked Tannia Goswami, Toshi Goswami, and, of course, Manu Goswami. I get to again, but this time also Eleanor Goswami Grandin, born on, depending on what calendar one is using, either the 20th of Rabi-al-thani 1435 or the 23rd of Ventôse 220, but in any case starting the world anew.
CONTENTS
5. A Conspiracy of Lifting and Throwing
Interlude:
I Never Could Look at Death without a Shudder
Interlude:
Black Will Always Have Something Melancholy in It
12. Diamonds on the Soles of Their Feet
Interlude:
Abominable, Contemptible Hayti
Interlude:
The Machinery of Civilization
24. Lima, or The Law of General Average
Epilogue: Herman Melville’s America
A Note on Sources and Other Matters
Seeking to conquer a larger liberty, man but extends the empire of necessity.
Author unknown. Used as epigraph to Herman Melville’s “The Bell-Tower.”
INTRODUCTION
Wednesday, February 20, 1805,
shortly after sunrise, in the South Pacific
Captain Amasa Delano was lying awake in his cot when his deck officer came to tell him that a vessel had been spotted coming round the southern head of Santa María, a small, uninhabited island off the coast of Chile. By the time Delano had dressed and come topside the “strange ship,” as he later described it, had slackened its sails and was now drifting with the wind toward an underwater ledge. To his puzzlement, it flew no flag. It looked to be in want and, if it drew closer to the shallows, in danger. Delano hastily had water, pumpkins, and fresh fish loaded in a boat. He then ordered it hoisted down and went on board.
The weather that morning was thick and breezy but the sun rose to reveal a calm bay. The other side of the island, from where the mysterious ship had appeared, was rough. Endless breakers, sharp-toothed underwater reefs, and steep rock-faced cliffs made its coastline unapproachable, providing sanctuaries for the seals that elsewhere had been hunted to near extinction. But the island’s east, where the
Perseverance
harbored
,
was peaceful, the Southern Hemisphere’s waning summer offering a harmony of lulling earth tones, brown, rich dirt, green sea, and cloudless blue skies. High bluffs blanketed by wild red thistles shielded a sandy, safe haven used by sealers and whalers to socialize, pass mailbags to ships bound home, and replenish wood and water.
As he came closer, Delano could see the ship’s name, the
Tryal
, painted in English in faded white letters along its bow. He could also see that its deck was full of black-skinned people, who looked to be slaves. And when he climbed on board, the alabaster-skinned New Englander discovered himself surrounded by scores of Africans and a handful of Spanish and mulatto sailors telling their “stories” and sharing their “grievances” in a babel of languages.
They spoke in Wolof, Mandinka, Fulani, and Spanish, a rush of words indecipherable in its details but soothing to Delano in its generalities. Earlier, as his men rowed toward the ship, he could see that its sails were tattered. What should have been an orderly web of rigging and tackle was a wooly mash. Its hull, calcified, moss covered, and pulling a long trail of sea grass, gave off a greenish tint. But he knew it was a common pirates’ ploy to make ships appear distressed in order to lure victims on board. Napoleon had just crowned himself emperor of the French, Madrid and Paris were at war with London, and privateers were raiding merchant ships at will, even in the distant South Pacific. Now, though, hollow cheeks and frantic eyes confirmed that the misery was real, turning Delano’s fears into “feelings of pity.”
