Marcus Garvey dies a dejected and disappointed man in London

IN APRIL 1919 Garvey announced plans to launch a steamship business, known as the Black Star Line Shipping (BSL) Company, as a way to transport cargoes of African produce to the United States. He held a mass meeting inside Carnegie Hall, New York to promote the sale of BSL shares. And, on June 27, 1919, the Black Star Line of Delaware was incorporated.

By the end of 1919, Marcus Garvey had built up UNIA branches all over the world. By August 1920, over four million people had joined the movement. And the UNIA was to have eight conventions in Garvey’s lifetime.

Yet, almost from the beginning the corporation faced deceit and trickery from merchants, crew, and even some UNIA officers. By April 1922, the Black Star Line Shipping Company was dissolved due to financial difficulties, mainly.

The growth and influence of the UNIA did not sit well with many people, including US government officials. An anti-Garvey campaign ensued from the wider community and people within his own organisation. In July 1919, the Bureau of Investigation, a forerunner to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), began to monitor the activities of Garvey and other black radicals.

In January 1922, Marcus Garvey and three officers – Orlando Thompson (vice president); Elie Garcia (secretary) and George Tobias (treasurer) from the Black Star Line Shipping Company were arrested and charged with mail fraud. Garvey had nine counts against himself.

The charges stemmed from allegations that they fraudulently collected money through the US mail services to purchase a ship, the SS Phillis Wheatley, that was never acquired. Garvey was later released on a US$2,500 bail.

After a four-week trial, on June 18, 1923, the jury that had retired for 10 hours returned with a guilty verdict. Garvey was convicted of one count of mail fraud, and sentenced to a maximum of five years in prison. He was also fined US$1,000, and ordered to pay the entire cost of the trial. His three co-defendants were cleared of all charges, and eventually released.

The court refused to give him bail, but granted a stay of execution pending appeal. He was held for three months. On September 10, 1923 Garvey was finally granted bail to the tune of US$15,000. There were many complaints of bias and irregularities at the trial.

There was no concrete evidence to support the charges and Garvey’s conviction. On November 18, 1927 after serving two years in prison, Garvey did, however, have his original sentence commuted by President Calvin Coolidge. Upon his release, Garvey was immediately deported to Jamaica.

Before he left on December 2, he gave his farewell speech to a group of disappointed supporters at the Port of New Orleans, Louisiana who had gathered to see him off as he passed through on the SS Saramacaen route to Jamaica. He was not allowed to leave the ship, but he delivered an impassioned address to them.

In Jamaica a massive crowd greeted him when he arrived in Kingston, on December 10, 1927. The Daily Gleaner called it “the most historic event” in Kingston, up to that point. From then he was to establish entities, such as Jamaica’s first modern political party – the People’s Political Party – in December 1928; newspaper businesses; a trade union; and Eidelweiss Park Amusement Company at Slipe Road in St Andrew, where on August 6, 1929, the Sixth International Convention of Negro Peoples of the World was held.

With all his efforts after he return to Jamaica from leading the UNIA in the USA, financial setbacks, some by way of lawsuits, caused Garvey to lose his printing press, Edelweiss Park, and his family home. He was also frustrated by the aggression and general negative attitudes towards him and the lack of support from some black and brown people.

Garvey decided to leave Jamaica,once again, and set sail for England aboard the SS Tilapa on March 16, 1935 in an effort to rebuild the global influence of his deflating organisation. He left Jamaica a “broken man, broken in spirit, broken in health, and broken in pocket” in his own words, and vowed never to return.

On his return to England, Garvey rented a flat not too far from the UNIA headquarters in London. His wife, Amy Jacques Garvey, and their two sons joined him in 1937. But, Garvey could not keep still, and soon he was off to tour Canada and the Caribbean.

Because of his older son’s serious illness, his wife and the boys returned to Jamaica in 1938. Garvey was devastated and heartbroken. Though he communicated with his children over the next year, the relationship between himself and his wife was strained. He felt quite lonely in London and more isolated than ever. By then, membership in his organisation had dwindled significantly.

Marcus Garvey had a stroke in January 1940, which seriously affected his speech, and left him partially paralysed. Not too long after, George Padmore, a writer for the Chicago Defender erroneously reported Garvey as dead. Newspapers around the world picked up on that article, and falsely announced his death.

Garvey was not amused. He suffered a second debilitating stroke, and subsequently fell into a coma from which he did not recover. Marcus Mosiah Garvey died on June 10, 1940 at age 52. He was buried in St Mary’s Catholic Cemetery in London. Through the initiative of Edward Seaga, then culture minister of Jamaica, the two Garvey wives, and the UNIA, Marcus Garvey’s remains arrived in Jamaica on November 10, 1964, exactly 60 years ago.

His body lay in state for five days at Holy Trinity Cathedral in Kingston, where thousands came to pay their final respects. Following a state funeral, his remains were re-interred in National Heroes Park. An estimated 30,000 people gathered to witness the reburial of the man that Seaga once referred to as the greatest black man who ever lived.