Mental self-defense for the nation against racial discrimination

As an African American psychiatrist with the perspective of having experienced legal racial discrimination when my family was turned away at restaurants in the 1960’s, I watched the Ken Burns documentary, “The American Revolution” on PBS last November. It’s a truly remarkable and monumental work which conveys a much more complete, gritty, and nuanced picture of the struggle which led to this nation’s birth.   

That being said, I’m very concerned about the fact that the indispensable service of James Armistead Lafayette was never even mentioned. 

Born James Armistead, an enslaved African American, he was legally considered property of Virginia plantation owner William Armistead. He volunteered to join the Continental Army, but his “owner” blocked that request and had him assigned to the service of the Marquis de Lafayette, a major figure who helped secure badly needed funds for the Continental Army from France, but also volunteered to come to America and fight the British under General Washington’s direction.

Lafayette gave James Armistead the dangerous mission of crossing enemy lines to gather intelligence on British battle plans. James posed as a runaway slave and entered the military camp of General Cornwallis, the top commander of the British forces. He gained the trust of Cornwallis, and while he served meals to the officers he listened as they discussed British battle plans. Double agent James Armistead passed those plans to the Marquis de Lafayette and on to General Washington and he passed false information to Cornwallis, enabling Washington to trap General Cornwallis at Yorktown where he was finally forced to surrender to Washington.  This was a demoralizing defeat for the British and essential to winning the war.

Lafayette considered James Armistead’s service so essential that  he wrote a letter saying exactly that.  His letter eventually helped influence the Virginia Legislature to secure Armistead’s freedom and the original document still exists. James Armistead changed his name to James Armistead Lafayette and lived the rest of his life as a free man. This is not just our history as African Americans. It’s American history and all Americans should know it. 

I have written Florentine Films, Ken Burns’ film company about the importance of this issue. The addition of the specific story of James Armistead Lafayette is essential. More Americans would be made aware of critical military intelligence courageously provided by at least one African American (among others) in the birthing of our country. And, of course, there were others like Cato Howe, Jacob Peterson, and Moses Sherwood. You can easily google them. 

As a mental health professional with forty years of experience and over fifteen years in the Episcopal Diocese of Missouri Commission on Dismantling Racism, I’m very concerned that the absence of James Armistead Lafayette’s story in the Ken Burns documentary inadvertently perpetuates the insidious and dangerous myth that African Americans only contributed to our founding with labor and brawn, but not decisively with “brains.” 

Research has shown that such false unconscious racial beliefs can cause two major dangerous results. 

One result is overt, as well as unconscious, racial discrimination with all the harms it does. The second dangerous result of false unconscious racial beliefs is internalized oppression in which the oppressed person may consciously or unconsciously accept the false racial beliefs of the oppressor, which can lead to self-doubt, despair, and even self-defeating actions among oppressed people. 

Ken Burns is a truly great documentary filmmaker and an open and fair-minded person. I encourage all readers to take time to read about the many African American heroes of the American revolution this month and reach out to Mr. Burns through Florentine Films about this matter on behalf of our nation. This is a time when all people would benefit from this message about American history.