Slave Plantations

Carribbean was the heart of the British overseas empire.

Spain claimed many of the carribbean Islands in C16th

Europeans mainly French & English came to inhabit the carribbean in C17th

The region was known as the 'West Indies'

Spanish looked for gold & silver & found litlte

The British tried growing different crops. Tobacco was not as successful as sugarcane.

Sugarcane was used to sweeten tea, coffee & chocolate and to make rum.

Planters who grew the sugarcane became very wealthy.

Sugarcane made the west indies valuable

Plantations needed large numbers of slaves to do the work.

Different plantations required different levels of skills from their slaves.

salt water

Sugar

Coffee

rice

Tobacco

Convicts & prisoners

Enslaved africans

Slave Life

Sugar plantations were both farms & factories

Work was arranged according to gangs

White owners watched over the whole process

Bought more slaves when needed

Women slaves also had children which added to the labour numbers

In Jamaica 1748-1788 1,200 ships brought 335,000 enslaved africans

The work was harsh & slaves were only expected to live for 19 years

Overseers watched & used whips to make the slaves work harder.

Enslaved drivers organised & used whips on the slaves.

1st gang

2nd gang

3rd gang

Punishments & incentives

Arrived from ships no family

Plantation gave community and family life to slaves

they typically shared home life together, similar beliefs, customs & culture

Slave life was typically one of broken families & could change in an instant.

Personal Violations were common practice

Slaves - men, women & children could be moved from one house to another separating families

Could lose family, friends & community in an instant

Sold to someone else without notice

Death of the planter

Planter fell on hard times

Sexual exploitation- sexual assault common for women, old, young, wives, sisters, daughters by masters.

Some small incentives to work harder eg extra food, clothing, free time, land to grow food & raise animals

Lash/violence was the main way to make slaves work harder

Britain & France were at war frequently during C18th & C19th with rival empires.

Jamaican census in 1788 recorded only 226,432 men, women, children including children born to slaves.

young men & women, healthy, strong, late teens

older men & women with wrecked bodies typically late 20's +

very old men & women 40+ worn out bodies & young children

Harsh work for 10-12 years

less harsh work for 20 years

lighter work until death & children grew into teens to join first gang

cane holing (back breaking work) using hoes not spades

moving baskets of manure on heads for the squares

weeding the crops, gathering weeds & grass to feed the animals & catching rats

preparation+ planting

export

Harvesting

boiling

milling

removed soil was built into a banks around each square

60-100 squares each day

marked & dug out squares (4-6 sq ft & 6-9 ins deep)

harvesting of sugar cane using billhooks

harvesting of sugar cane using billhooks & tied canes into bundles & loaded wagons

boiling & milling for 24hrs a day for 6 days week two groups 12hr day & night shifts

milling involved feeding cane into rollers to crush cane to get juice collecting in pans & piped to boiling house

boiling involved boiling & skimming for 4-5 times

very dangerous work mens arms could get drawn into rollers due to exhaustion & heaviness of canes, arms would be crushed & need to be cut off by an axe

producing brown sugar which was cooled & put into clay pots, molasses would be removed to become rum. The liquid left was refined sugar ready for export.

Inherited by planters family

There was individual & organised community resistance, opposition & running away typically met with punishment individually & as communities.

Some did escape and gain freedom eg the Maroons in Jamaica