Bethesda (Antigua)

Bethesda
Bethesda
Coordinates	17 ° 3 ′  N , 61 ° 45 ′  W Coordinates: 17 ° 3 ′  N , 61 ° 45 ′  W
Basic data
Country	Antigua and Barbuda
island	Antigua
Parish	St. Paul
Enumeration District	71400 Bethesda-East, 71500 Bethesda-West
Residents	488 (2001)
founding	Turn of the 18th / 19th century

Bethesda is a small town in Saint Paul's Parish on the Caribbean island of Antigua , in the state of Antigua and Barbuda . It is known as the site of the historically significant strike in 1951/52, a milestone on the island state's path to independence.

Location and landscape

Bethesda is located on Willoughby Bay , the large bay on the eastern south coast of Antigua. To the northeast, the area extends flat inland into the central plain of the island, the Central Plain . To the southwest are the hills of Monks Hill towards Falmouth Bay and English Harbor . The region is only sparsely populated and characterized by agriculture.

The town has around 500 residents and stretches on the road from St. Phillip's Parish , southeast Antigua, to English Harbor.

Inland lies the Bethesda Dam , which is important for the water supply , the second largest after the Potworks Dam located about 2 km to the north . On the coast is the Christian Cove wetland , one of the largest remaining mangroves on the island.

Neighboring locations or locations:

All Saints (St. Paul, St. Peter )		Long Lane ( St. Phillip )
Table Hill Gardens		Newfield ( St. Phillip ) St. Phillips ( St. Phillip )
	Christian Hill

History, infrastructure and sights

In 1812 the Methodists , who had been proselytizing in Antigua since 1760, founded a school here for the workers of the Blake estate . It was the first school in the West Indies built for slaves. After the abolition of slavery in 1834, the pastoral care office received support and a place was formed. The congregation and chapel was initially located in Bridgetown on Willoughby Bay, in 1841 the mission moved to Bethesda, which takes its name from the new church in honor of the Bethesda Garden . After the great Antilles earthquake in 1843 , the settlement at Willoughby Bay was abandoned, the residents there moved mostly to Freetown , Antigua's most important freedmen settlement, and some to Bethesda. The church was enlarged in 1847 and a new church with a school was built in 1871. The Methodists continued teaching until 1962, when a state school was established, and in 1975 today's church was built as a solid structure dedicated to the glory of God.

Bethesda also played an important role in the history of the Antiguan labor movement. Here in January 1951 the labor dispute took place with the landowner Alexander Moody-Stuart over the wages of the sugar cane workers. Vere Cornwall Bird , who would later become the first prime minister of the sovereign state of Antigus and Barbuda, gave the speech from which the winged word comes to eat mussels and widdy-widdy and drink pond water (“ We will eat cockles and the widdy widdy bush. We will drink pond water ”) if there was nothing to eat because of the strike. That was the extra income freely available around Bethesda even in the time of slavery. The workers held out the strike for exactly one year and forced the higher wages. The inconspicuous but significant tamarind tree under which the words were coined is still standing.

Today the place has a clinic, an elementary school, and branches of the Methodist Church in the Caribbean and Americas , the Church of God Antigua ( Bethesda Zion Church , founded 1951), and the St. John's Pentecostal Church (1950s).

literature

• Joy Lawrence: Bethesda and Christian Hill: Our History and Culture . Siboney Publications, 2008, ISBN 978-976-95202-1-9 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} National Statistics Office: Census 2001 , Volume I Summary Social, Economic, Demographic, and Housing Characteristics , St. John's, July 2004, Table 8 Population by Enumeration District and Sex , 2. St. Paul . P. 32 ( ab.gov.ag (PDF) ab.gov.ag, there p. 43 - longer loading time).
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Walter Lawrence: Bethesda. Congregations. Methodist Church of Antigua & Barbuda, accessed on March 19, 2014 (English, further details also Freetown and History: Part 3 The work takes shape ). 
3. ↑ Desmond Nicholson: Cultural heritage. Villages: Village facts: Betseda . In: antiguahistory.net: Museum of Antigua and Barbuda. Susan Lowes, accessed March 22, 2014 . 
4. ↑ Hewlester A. Samuel: The Birth of the Village of Liberta, Antigua . Self-published, 2007, ISBN 978-1-59526-725-2 , pp. 99 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
5. ↑ Christopher Beale: Antigua and Barbuda: Island Guide (=  Other Places travel guides ). Other Places Publishing, 2008, ISBN 978-0-615-21837-3 , Tamerind Tree , pp. 77 f . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
6. ↑ About us ( Memento of the original from March 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Bethesda Zion Church of God ( Memento of the original from March 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , both Church of God Antigua  
7. ↑ Our History . houseofrestorationministries.org