544 HISTORY 



public purse. Compared with other colonies, where there were vastly greater 

 material resources, the Bahamas set an example that was worthy of imitation."" 

 The fifst efforts in educating the negroes at public expense were 

 made by Sir James Smyth, with the liberated Africans, at the settlements at 

 Adelaide, Carmichael and Headquarters."" Buildings were erected at each 

 of these places and superintendents were placed in charge of the schools. The 

 Assembly was at daggers' points with the G-overnor and would furnish no 

 funds for these enterprises at first."" The home government supplied some 

 funds,™ however, and special grants were made for educational purposes in some 

 instances. In 1835 Parliament made an appropriation of £35,000 to be applied 

 for general educational purposes, through the agency of the various societies 

 that were undertaking the religious education of the negroes."^ Further appro- 

 priations were made by the same body in aid of the schools established by 

 the British and Foreign School Society."'" These schools were continued as 

 established, under the control of the Anglican Church, until after the passing 

 of the apprenticeship system. 



Question of the Control of the Schools. 



One of the greatest needs of this Colony arose from the scarcity of per- 

 sons competent to teach school. There had been no school for the training 

 of teachers in the Colony. In many of the Out-island communities there 

 were not only no teachers, but there was no one qualified to read the Scrip- 

 tures to the people. The few native teachers were themselves so ignorant as 

 to deter parents from sending to them at all.™ Measures were imperatively 

 necessary to provide for the training of teachers. An attempt to supply this 

 need was made by the managers of the Mico Charity Fund. A normal train- 



™ Governor John Gregory on his arrival in 1849 stated in his first address to 

 the Assembly that he " had had more than ordinary opportunity to compare what 

 the Bahamas had done for education with what other more wealthy colonies have 

 done, and notwithstanding your limited revenue and the heavy expense of the 

 various departments of the public service, you have set an example worthy of imita- 

 tion in giving the religious and intellectual training of the people a preference over 

 all other demands on the public purse." H. V., 1849, 96. Francis Cockburn wrote 

 to Lord Glenelg in 1837 that he knew of no colony where the means of education 

 had been more liberally supplied than in the Bahamas. Ds., No. 51 to Glenelg 



^ Balfour to Stanley, No. 28. 



='» Smyth's Ds., Nos. 31 and 72. 



''^'■Loc. cit, No. 72, and Ds., S. St., 1831, No. 13. 



""Ds., S. St., 1835, No. 32. On the conditions of these grants see loc. cit., 

 circ. Ds. of Nov. 16, 1835. 



'" Loc. cit., circular of Nov. 16, 1835. 



™ Colebrooke to Aberdeen, No. 5. 



