Abstract
For the émigré planters like St Hillaire Begorrat, who brought with them the fears, paranoias and petty jealousies that had marked their previous lives, the huge number of free coloureds in Trinidad was a source of alarm. These fears exploded in 1801 when the island was hit by a wave of suspected poisonings from among its slave workforce. Frantic planters, many of whom were new arrivals from Grenada, St Domingue and other French colonies, persuaded Governor Thomas Picton to hold brutal commissions into the practice to try and find out who was responsible. Bordering on the hysterical, their response to this perceived threat was extreme. In ways redolent of other slave conspiracies across the Atlantic world throughout the eighteenth century, slaves were burned alive, decapitated or tortured, moderate planters were brought into line with the new order and apprehensions about Obeah and witch-doctory ran rampant. In the climate of fear and retribution, the events took on a French flavour, indicative of those who had instigated the allegations in the first place. Despite their best efforts, no one could find real proof, let alone the conspiracy that many were convinced was behind the events.
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Notes
The contrast between these two poles is neatly elucidated in two books. For Spanish Trinidad, see Linda A. Newson, Aboriginal and Spanish Colonial Trinidad: A Study in Culture Contact (Academic Press, London, 1976), in particular Part 5, ‘Spanish Colonial Reorganisation 1776–1797’, pp. 177–219.
For the British world, see James Millette, The Genesis of Crown Colony Government: Trinidad 1783–1810 (Moko Enterprises, Curepe, 1970). In particular, see Part 2, ‘The Years of Experiment’, pp. 67–159. While both books have been in print for some time, the similarity of their statistical and demographic data makes them ideal for a comparison between the two worlds.
Christopher L. Brown, Moral Capital: The Foundations of British Abolitionism (University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2006), in particular Chapter 4, ‘British Concepts of Emancipation in the Age of Revolutions’, pp. 209–59 and Chapter 6, ‘British Evangelicals and Caribbean Slavery after the American War’, pp. 333–91.
There were significant differences between the two, however. See Jay M. Smith, Nobility Reimagined: The Patriotic Nation in Eighteenth Century France (Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 2005), pp. 182–222.
See also Jonathan Dewald, The European Nobility: 1400–1800 (Cambridge University Press, 1996), ‘Introduction’, pp. 1–15 and ‘Conclusion’, pp. 188–202.
This occurred in several places, most notably in Grenada in 1795. See R.P. Devas, The History of the Island of Grenada, 1650–1950 (Justin James Field, St Georges, 1964) in particular Chapter 9, ‘Twelve Troubled Years’, pp. 103–16.
See also David Barry Caspar and David Patrick Geggus (eds), A Turbulent Time: The French Revolution and the Greater Caribbean (Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1997), pp. 25–7.
Kirsty Carpenter, Refugees of the French Revolution: Emigres in London 1789–1802 (Macmillan, Basingstoke, 1999), pp. 155–75.
See also Michael Duffy, Soldiers, Sugar and Seapower: The British Expeditions to the West Indies and the War Against Revolutionary France (Clarendon, Oxford, 1987), pp. 28–33.
Patrick C. Lipscomb, ‘Party Politics, 1801–1802: George Canning and the Trinidad Question’, Historical Journal, 12(3) (1969), pp. 442–66.
See also Christopher L. Brown, ‘Empire Without Slaves: British Concepts of Emancipation in the Age of the American Revolution’, William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd Series, 576(2) (1999), pp. 273–306. See also N.A WO 1/93, War Office to Sir Thomas Picton (secret), 5 March 1798.
Zoe Laidlaw, Colonial Connections: Patronage, the Information Revolution and Colonial Government (Manchester University Press, 2005), p. 61.
‘If the Duc de Choiseul should arrive in any of the islands within your command you will consider him to be a person entitled to His Majesty’s protection, show him every civility and attention in your power’: N.A. WO 1/86/401, Henry Dundas to Abercromby (secret), 28 October 1797. See also Moreau de Saint-Mery, Description de la Partie Francaise de L’Isle de Saint-Domingue (Société de l’histoire des Colonies, Paris, 1797–9), pp. 697–8, 1325–6. See also James E. McClennan, Colonialism and Science: Saint Domingue in the Old Regime (Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1992), p. 46.
For a breakdown of the code, see P.C. Borde, Histoire de L’Isle de la Trinidad Sous le Gouvernement Espagnol, 2 vols (Maison Neuf, Paris, 1882), pp. 170–7.
Philip Morgan, Slave Counterpoint: Black Culture in the Chesapeake and the Low Country (University of North Carolina University Press, Chapel Hill, 1998), p. 35.
Douglas R. Egerton, Gabriel’s Rebellion: The Virginia Conspiracies of 1800 and 1802 (University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 1993) pp. 21–2.
See also James Sidbury, Ploughshares into Swords: Race, Rebellion, and Identity in Gabriel’s Virginia, 1730–1810 (Cambridge University Press, New York, 1997), pp. 118–51.
Susan Scott Parish, American Curiosity: Cultures of Natural History in the Colonial British Atlantic World (University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2006), Chapter 4, ‘African Magi and Slave Poisoners’, pp. 265–71.
Anthony de Verteuil, A History of Diego Martin 1784–1884 (Paria Publishing, Port of Spain, 1987), pp. 51–2.
For a classic introduction to this field, see Eugene Genovese, From Rebellion to Revolution: Afro-American Slave Revolts in the Making of the New World (Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, 1979).
Peter H. Wood, Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion (Alfred Knopf, New York, 1974), Chapter 12, ‘The Stono Rebellion and its Consequences’, pp. 308–31.
For an excellent breakdown of the kind of paranoia and fear that Obeah generated in the similar Southern Caribbean colony of Demerara, see Randy Browne, ‘The “Bad Business” of Obeah: Power, Authority, and the Politics of Slave Culture in the British Caribbean’, William and Mary Quarterly, 68(3) (2011), pp. 451–80.
Pierre Pluchon, Vaudou Sorciers Empoisonneurs de Saint Domingue à Haiti (Karthala, Paris, 1987).
See also James E. McClellan, Colonialism and Science: Saint Domingue in the Old Regime (Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1992), pp. 54–5;
Sharla M. Fett, Working Cures: Healing Health and Power on Southern Slave Plantations (University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2002), Chapter 6, ‘Danger and Mistrust’, pp. 142–68 and Chapter 7, ‘Fooling the Master’, pp. 169–93;
Jaunita de Barros, ‘Setting Things Right: Medicine and Magic in British Guiana 1803–1838’, Slavery and Abolition, 25(1) (2004), pp. 28–50.
David Patrick Geggus, Slavery, War and Revolution: The British Occupation of St Domingue 1793–1798 (Clarendon, Oxford, 1982), pp. 157–9. See also N.A. WO 1/61, 23–6, 42–57, 526 and 710.
Anthony de Verteuil, Seven Slaves and Slavery: Trinidad 1777–1838 (Scrip-J Printers, Port of Spain for A. de Verteuil, 1992), pp. 1–50 and 55–64.
Jill Lepore, New York Burning; Liberty, Slavery, and Conspiracy in Eighteenth-Century Manhattan (Knopf, New York, 2005);
Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker, The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic (Beacon Press, Boston, 2000), Chapter 6, ‘The Outcasts of the Nations of the Earth’, pp. 174–211;
Richard E. Bond, ‘Shaping a Conspiracy: Black Testimony in the 1741 New York’, Early American Studies, 5(1) (2007), pp. 63–94.
See also Ira Berlin (ed.), Power and Culture: Essays on the American Working Class (New Press, New York, 1987);
Ira Berlin and Leslie Harris (eds), Slavery in New York (New Press, New York, 2005);
Ira Berlin and Phillip D. Morgan (eds), The Slaves’ Economy: Independent Production by Slaves in the Americas (Frank Cass, London, 1991).
V.S. Naipaul, The Loss of El Dorado: A Colonial History (Picador, London, 2001, from the original published by Andre Deutsch, 1969) p. 193. A contemporary reference to this notice comes in McCallum, Travels in Trinidad, pp. 192–3.
Port of Spain Gazette, 3 February 1802; see also Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society, 1650–1838 (Heinemann, London, 1990), in particular Chapter 5, ‘The Woman Slave and Slave Resistance’, pp. 51–83.
Joseph, History of Trinidad, pp. 212–13. See also James Walvin, Black Ivory: Slavery in the British Empire, 2nd edn (Blackwell, Oxford, 2001), p. 156.
John Savage, ‘Black Magic and White Terror: Slave Poisoning and Colonial Society in Martinique’, Journal of Social History, 2 (Spring 2007), pp. 635–40.
Elaine G. Breslaw (ed.), Witches of the Atlantic World (New York University Press, 2000), p. 10.
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© 2012 Kit Candlin
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Candlin, K. (2012). Poison, Paranoia and Slavery on the Verge of Empire. In: The Last Caribbean Frontier, 1795–1815. Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137030818_5
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