About the product

Celebrate Black History Month with this Official First Day Cover honouring Chloe Cooley – a young Black woman whose brave protests against her enslavement added momentum to the abolitionist movement in Upper Canada in the late 1700s.

About the stamp and OFDC design

This stamp features an illustration by Rick Jacobson. It shows Chloe Cooley in the foreground and, in the background, her being forcibly taken across the Niagara River from Queenston, Upper Canada, to be sold in New York state. The images were created through extensive consultation with experts in local/regional history, Black history and period fashion, as well as through the use of historic maps, paintings, illustrations and other archival documents.

The cover of the OFDC features a close-up of the boat in the illustration. It also shows part of a period map of the area around Queenston, Upper Canada, where Cooley lived. The back shows an excerpt from An Act to Prevent the Further Introduction of Slaves and to Limit the Term of Contracts for Servitude within this Province, 1793, Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada.

This OFDC is cancelled in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, which includes Queenston. The cancel is a drawing of a pair of oars similar to the ones that would have been used to ferry Cooley across the river. January 30 is the issue date because it coincides with Black History Month, which takes place annually during the month of February.

About slavery in Canada

The road to freedom was a long one for the thousands of people of African descent enslaved in pre-Confederation Canada. First brought to New France in the early 1600s to be sold for forced labour, enslaved Black people were legally classified as property and denied basic rights. Over their 200 years of servitude, generations of voices gave momentum to a movement that continues today in the struggle to end racism.

About Chloe Cooley and her impact

Chloe Cooley was a young Black woman enslaved as a domestic near Queenston, Upper Canada. She had faced punishment for defiance in the past. In March 1793, amid rumours of abolition, her enslaver arranged to sell her in neighbouring New York State. Cooley put up such a fight that it took several men to restrain her and forcibly transport her across the Niagara River by boat. She was never heard from again.

Cooley’s brave protests did not go unnoticed. Just months later, an act was passed prohibiting the importation of enslaved Black people into Upper Canada. Although it didn’t end slavery, the law paved the path to freedom for at least 30,000 Black Americans, eventually leading to abolition throughout the British Empire in 1833.

Product # 414218131

Chloe Cooley: Official First Day Cover