Virgin Islands Creole - History

History

The creole was formed when enslaved Africans, unable to communicate with each other and their masters due to being taken from different regions of West Africa with different languages, created an English-based pidgin with West African-derived words and grammatical structure. This was creolized as it was passed on to subsequent generations as their native tongue.

St. Thomas and St. John, although Danish colonies, had a European population of mainly Dutch origin, which led to enslaved Africans first creating a Dutch-based creole, known as Negerhollands (now considered a dead language, although one may find a few that still recall some of the vocabulary and may have passed it down to the next generation). Negerhollands was in mainstream usage on St. Thomas and St. John up until the 19th century, when the British occupied the Danish West Indies from 1801 to 1802 and 1807 to 1815. In addition, as English became preferred as a trade and business language in the busy port of Charlotte Amalie, Virgin Islands Creole became established in preference to Negerhollands. Some of the population continued to use Negerhollands well into the 20th century.

Unlike the European population of the other Danish West Indian islands, that of St. Croix was mostly of English, Irish and Scottish origin, which led to African slaves developing an English-based creole throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. By the 19th century, Virgin Islands Creole was spoken on St. Thomas and St. John, as Negerhollands was fading away. By the end of the 19th century, the English creole completely replaced Negerhollands as the native dialect of St. Thomas and St. John.

The creole had also been developing in the present-day British Virgin Islands. The British took over the islands from the Dutch in 1672. Enslaved Africans were brought to work on plantations on the islands of Tortola, Virgin Gorda, Anegada and Jost Van Dyke where they, like those enslaved on St. Croix over 40 miles away, also developed an English-based creole. Although the U.S. and British Virgin Islands are politically separate, they share a common Virgin Islands culture, similar history based on colonialism and slavery, and some common bloodlines.

Like those in the Virgin Islands, African slaves were also brought to the SSS islands of Saba, Sint Eustatius and Saint Martin. The prevalence of Europeans from the British Isles on these islands, as well as the SSS islands' close proximity and trade with nearby English-speaking islands, resulted in an English creole being spoken in the SSS islands. The "ancestral" inhabitants (descendants of the original African slaves and European colonists) of the SSS islands also share common bloodlines and a common culture with those of the U.S. and British Virgin Islands.