Zabette Decoteaux – an enterprising free black Grenadian woman. The African blood ran deep in her. No one needed to remind her of that. With 4K pounds left for her and 12K pounds each left for her two children of Clozier Decoteaux, her loving slave master, it was time to go shopping to secure the economic future of her children. No time left to feel sorry for herself and race. With the help of God and her proud Grenadian roots, she started by purchasing Real Estate, a fuel to economic prosperity. Change was on the Horizon. The horrors of slavery she knew well – she lived it. But dwelling on those horrors changed nothing for she and her peoples. It was time to leave the fancy talking and posturing behind and go to work.
Just after her master passed, Zabette was advised by her brother – in law and financial advisor Clozier D'Arceuil Logistic Officer of the - Fedon we love, and a former Slave Master too, to fight the power by becoming self-sufficient. She approached William Smith who owned Belleview Estate in parish of St Mark and purchased 38 Acers of land for her children in the year 1788. For the next 100 years, it served the Decoteaux family of St Mark’s and St. John’s well! That land paid to educated generations of Decoteauxs who became renowned Doctors of the Caribbean Islands and beyond, and many other professionals who served their people with action and not just words of pitiful self-glorifying grandstanding. Let us bow our heads in honor of this wonderful African Grenadian woman who made the best of a difficult life and time.
The Will of the wonderful Zabette. May we not forget her enterprising soul which brought forth fruits from the seeds she sowed.
