The majority of Black Canadians are descendants of immigrants from the Caribbean and the African continent who arrived in Canada during significant migration waves, beginning in the post-war era of the 1950s and continuing into recent decades.

[32] One increasingly common practice, seen in academic usage and in the names and mission statements of some Black Canadian cultural and social organizations, is to always make reference to both the African and Caribbean communities.

[42]: 89–90  Angélique confessed under torture to setting the fire as a way of creating a diversion so she could escape as she did not wish to be separated from her lover, a white servant named Claude Thibault, as her master (enslaver) was going to sell her to the owner of a sugar plantation in the West Indies.

Under pressure of the new refugees, the city of Saint John amended its charter in 1785 specifically to exclude people of African descent from practicing a trade, selling goods, fishing in the harbour, or becoming freemen; these provisions stood until 1870, although by then they were largely ignored.

Due to the failure of the British government to support the settlement, the harsh weather, and discrimination on the part of white colonists, 1,192 Black Loyalist men, women and children left Nova Scotia for West Africa on 15 January 1792.

[51] On 26 June 1796, Jamaican Maroons, numbering 543 men, women and children, were deported on board the three ships Dover, Mary and Anne from Jamaica, after being defeated in an uprising against the British colonial government.

[54] After suffering through the harsh winter of 1796–1797, Wentworth reported the Maroons expressed a desire that "they wish to be sent to India or somewhere in the east, to be landed with arms in some country with a climate like that they left, where they may take possession with a strong hand".

That same year, the new Legislative Assembly became the first entity in the British Empire to restrict slavery, confirming existing ownership but allowing for anyone born to an enslaved woman or girl after that date to be freed at the age of 25.

[41] Militarily, a Black Loyalist named Richard Pierpoint, who was born about 1744 in Senegal and who had settled near present-day St. Catharines, Ontario, offered to organize a Corps of Men of Colour to support the British war effort.

[65] There is a sizeable community of Black Canadians in Nova Scotia[49] and Southern Ontario who trace their ancestry to African-American slaves who used the Underground Railroad to flee from the United States, seeking refuge and freedom in Canada.

[66]: 35  Tubman guided her "passengers" on nocturnal journeys (travelling via day was too risky) through the forests and swamps, using as her compass the north-star and on cloudy nights seeing what side the moss was growing on trees, to find the best way to Canada.

[66]: 20  The Congregationalist minister, the Reverend Samuel Ringgold Ward of New York, who had been born into slavery in Maryland, wrote about Canada West (modern Ontario) that: "Toronto is somewhat peculiar in many ways, anti-slavery is more popular there than in any city I know save Syracuse...I had good audiences in the towns of Vaughan, Markham, Pickering and in the village of Newmarket.

The public mind literally thirsts for the truth, and honest listeners and anxious inquirers will travel many miles, crowd our country chapels, and remain for hours eagerly and patiently seeking the light".

In 1857, William Hall of Horton, Nova Scotia, serving as a sailor in the Royal Navy, became the first black man to win the Victoria Cross, the highest decoration for valor in the British empire, for his actions at the siege of Lucknow.

In reality, all records show that Mary Mink married a black man named William Johnson, had two children with him, and died peacefully in her home 25 years later, surrounded by friends and family.

The Spectator article read, "when such acts are perpetrated by colored people themselves, we cease to wonder at Mr Harvey Smith attempting to make money by an operation in which the negro is as expert as the white man".

[75] The article was then used as inspiration for a section in Scottish poet William Edmondstoune Aytoun's novel Norman Sinclair, which told the same story but made it about the mixed-race daughter of "a thriving horse-dealer, who had been located at Toronto some 30 years", a description which could only match Mink at the time.

Some Black Canadians trace their ancestry to people who fled racism in Oklahoma, Texas, and other southern states in the early 1900s as part of the Great Migration out of the rural South, building new homesteads and communities – often block settlements – in Alberta and Saskatchewan just after they became provinces in 1905.

[42]: 50–51  In 1909 and 1913, Mosher negotiated contracts with the Inter Colonial Railroad Company, where he worked as a freight handler, that imposed segregation in workplaces while giving increased wages and benefits to white workers alone.

[84]: 477–482  Morel's campaign was carried into Canada with the feminist Rose Henderson for instance warning in a 1925 article in The BC Federalist about the possibility of Blacks being raised "to subdue and enslave the white peoples".

The Black community that emerged in Montreal in the 1920s was largely American in origin, centring on the "sporting district" between St. Antoine and Bonaventure streets, which had a reputation as a "cool" neighbourhood, known for its lively and often riotous nightclubs that opened at 11:00 pm and closed at 5:00 am, where the latest in Afro-American jazz was played, alcohol was consumed in conspicuous quantities, and illegal gambling was usually tolerated.

[39]: 416  Garvey, an extremely charismatic man who inspired intense devotion in his followers, proved to be a divisive and controversial figure with his Back-to-Africa message and his insistence that black people embrace segregation as the best way forward.

[88] In general racism became less fashionable during World War II with two incidents in 1940 illustrating a tendency towards increased tolerance as feelings of wartime national solidarity made displays of prejudice less acceptable.

[41] On 5 June 2020, approximately 9,000 demonstrators gathered at the Alberta Legislature Building for the "Fight for Equity" rally which took place in response to the 25 May 2020 murder of George Floyd – an African-American who was killed during a police arrest.

Queen Mary Park has been home to a long-standing African-American population since the early 1900s, centred around Shiloh Baptist Church in Edmonton, Alberta, although today the neighbourhood is composed mostly of recent migrants from Africa.

[122] Several urban neighbourhoods in Toronto, including Jane and Finch, Rexdale, Downsview, Malvern, Weston, West Hill, Lawrence Heights, Mount Dennis, and Maple Leaf have large Black Canadian communities.

[citation needed] Since the late 19th century, Black Canadians have made significant contributions to the culture of sports, starting with the founding of the Coloured Hockey League in Nova Scotia.

In athletics, Harry Jerome, Ben Johnson, and Donovan Bailey were Canada's most prominent Black sprinters in recent decades; the current generation is led by Andre De Grasse.

Some Black Canadian musicians have enjoyed mainstream worldwide appeal in various genres, such as Drake, The Weeknd, Daniel Caesar, Dan Hill, Glenn Lewis, Tamia, Deborah Cox, and Kardinal Offishall.

[138] Nevertheless, according to Statistics Canada's Ethnic Diversity Survey, released in September 2003, when asked about the five-year period from 1998 to 2002 nearly one-third (32 per cent) of respondents who identified as Black reported that they had been subjected to some form of racial discrimination or unfair treatment "sometimes" or "often".