Speech #790050955

Before the organization of the American Colonization Society one other man. an American Negro by the name of Paul Cuffe. became interested in Negro repatriation In 1811. and succeeded in obtaining the consent of Sierra Leone. a small country on the west coast of Africa. to a program for receiving free American Negroes. Paul Cuffe was a native of Massachusetts. and at the age of 16 was a sailor on a whaling vessel. He organized a crew of Negro seamen and sailed to Sierra Leone and made arrangements with that government for the reception of Negro emigrants. His plan. however. was not begun until 1815. when. at his own expense. he carried a shipload of free Negroes from Massachusetts to Sierra Leone. He died in 1817. the very year in which citizens of the United States organized the American Colonization Society in the city of Washington. The purpose of this organization was to carry out a program of Negro repatriation. This society. soon after its organization. appreciated the fact that land would have to be acquired upon which to settle the Negro emigrants and that ways and means for their settlement and temporary maintenance would have to be devised. The organization realized further that the task was far beyond their powers to cope with unless it should be aided by the Federal Government. It was their purpose to begin the work of repatriation and thereafter enlist the cooperation of the Federal Government in their praiseworthy undertaking.