Black Loyalist museum was prepared to save artifacts by 'any means' during wildfire

When a massive wildfire started moving north toward the Town of Shelburne last week, Andrea Davis couldn't help but think back to another fire that had traumatized the community.

Davis, the executive director of the Black Loyalist Heritage Society, operates its museum in Birchtown, only a few kilometres southwest of Shelburne.

She said its predecessor, the society's old administration building, was the subject of arson in 2006.

The blaze destroyed "valuable, precious artifacts and documentation" of Black Loyalist history, she said.

"It was traumatic," Davis said Friday. "It still is traumatic and there's still this healing ... that is happening, especially with what's happening with the forest fires here in Shelburne County."

The wildfire, now being held, started near Barrington Lake nearly two weeks ago, growing to be about 25,000 hectares at its peak.

During that time, it spread east as far as Shore Road, forcing thousands to evacuate their homes. 

The museum was not in the evacuation zone, but Davis said the fire "was close enough" for her to take action. 

"When you see the smoke that close and you're getting alerts and you're hearing just information from the community, what I knew I had to do was ... contact the board of the society and say we should take some action on that immediately to get us out there in case we're not able to get out if we are evacuated," she said.

The museum houses the only artifacts and documentation from Black Loyalist sites across Nova Scotia, many of which are stored in plexiglass cases in the walls and under glass floor panelling. 

Davis said volunteers from the community, organizations and the municipality offered to help remove artifacts as the fire continued to grow.

She said they were able to remove the plexiglass from the wall cases, but she quickly realized there is no direct access to the items under the floor.

But, she said, she was ready to get them out by "any means possible."

"I wouldn't have been able to do it alone, but I would have been prepared to break the glass, smash the glass, if possible, to get those artifacts out," Davis said.

Davis said she contacted the board again, and Museum Nova Scotia, who both gave her their blessing to do just that — if that's what needed to happen.

It didn't come to that as fire crews beat the blaze back. All evacuation orders have been lifted in Shelburne County as of Friday.

Davis said the board will review how artifacts are managed and stored, in case of another wildfire or other disaster. 

"It took something like this for us to kick in and say to each other, we need a plan. We need a plan on how we're going to do this moving forward," she said, adding that she was also able to save genealogical and financial paper records.

She said the museum will be looking to have those records digitized.

"We have to continue to maintain those because we are a distinct community," she said. 

"And these artifacts are of significant importance to us because they tell us that there was a community here at one time, before all of the buildings and houses as they are now, that there was a live community here, and that the Black Loyalists were on the land."

For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.