Free and Enslaved Africans in Newfoundland and Labrador

History is seldom hidden. We simply need to look.

In 1597. Edward Swarthye - an African working for wages on an English estate - whipped a future governor of Newfoundland. (Photo: BBC History)

The first Black person – the first sub-Saharan African – to set foot in Newfoundland was probably a sailor on an English supply ship involved in the fishery sometime in the first 150 years or so after Cabot’s v…