Chains Unearthed

As recently as the third quarter of the 20th century, just a few substantial books existed about the history of blacks in Canada. Two scholarly works—The Blacks in Canada: A History by Yale University’s Robin Winks and The Black Loyalists: The Search for the Promised Land in Nova Scotia and Sierra Leone, 1783–1870 by James W. St. G. Walker—could not be overlooked. My own father, Daniel G. Hill, raised eyebrows with his ground-breaking PhD thesis accepted in 1960 by the University of Toronto, which was called “The Negroes of Toronto: A Sociological Study of a Minority Group.”

My father and mother (Donna Hill), who each went on to write their own books about black history in Canada and to co-found the Ontario Black History Society, had an odd, slim, well-worn French volume on their shelves dating back to my earliest childhood. My father’s French was abominable so I...