The West Indies and the Spanish Main Part 15

The Methodist ministers came forward and enrolled themselves in the militia, but they were not called upon to perform any duty. The Rev.

John Smith, however, took no notice of the proclamation, although he admitted having seen it. On the evening of the revolt he went for a walk with his wife, and on his return found that the manager's house was being attacked by a mob of slaves. He succeeded by expostulation in preventing their doing much injury, and even rescued the manager from their hands, but instead of sending notice of the rising to the neighbouring estates he went quietly home. As far as he knew no one had been warned of the revolt, and he was certainly remiss in his duty when he did nothing whatever. When, on the following day, he was visited by a militia officer, and ordered to enrol himself in accordance with the Governor's proclamation, he refused on the ground of his exemption, although he knew that all exemptions had been cancelled.

As usual the rebels had no proper leaders, and for some reason or other--the missionaries ascribed it to religious teaching--they did not burn the houses or destroy the crops. One or two whites who resisted were wounded, one at least fatally, but here again the insurgents were forbearing. Fortunately they were soon suppressed, and this no doubt prevented such atrocities as had been committed elsewhere. What with the soldiers, the militia, and crews of vessels in the river, the force brought against them was overwhelming. Only one attempt was made to fight, but the first volley of the troops sent the rioters scattering into a cotton field. In about two days the insurrection was over, and then came the hunt for fugitives, who as usual took to the swamp at the back of the estates. A large body of Indians was employed, and in the end most of them were captured, some to be hanged at once and others after sentence by court-martial.

Mr. Smith's behaviour was considered as something more than suspicious--he was believed to have had knowledge of the plot, and charged with an intention to side with the negroes if he saw any prospect of their success. On his refusal to take part in the defence of the colony he was taken prisoner, and after the negroes had been tried and sentenced, his case was brought before a court-martial. He was charged with promoting discontent among the slaves, conspiring to bring about a revolt, knowing of the plot the day before and not reporting it, and holding communication with one of the leaders after it had broken out without attempting to capture him. The case created a great stir, public opinion being universal that he was the prime mover in the whole affair.

His trial lasted over a month, at the end of which he was found guilty and sentenced to be hanged. This sentence, however, seems to have been given to satisfy the people; it was not published, nor was it intended to be executed without reference to the home Government. This is proved by the report in the "Royal Gazette" of the colony, which stated that the trial was over, but the nature of the proceedings was such as to render it imperative on the Governor to transmit them for His Majesty's consideration. The public were not informed of the verdict, but it is not to be supposed that they were ignorant of the result of the trial; on the contrary, the sentence met with their approval, and they complained of the delay in carrying it out, as compared with the hasty executions of the negroes. Mr. Smith was ultimately reprieved, on the understanding that he removed himself from the West Indies, and engaged never to come back to Guiana or go to any of the islands. But the poor missionary was sick, and under treatment before the insurrection, and it may be presumed that the worry of the trial hastened his end. He died in prison before the king's answer arrived, and was buried at night to prevent a hostile demonstration.

We have been thus particular in giving the facts of the Demerara East Coast Insurrection, because it made such an impression in England. The anti-slavery party used the case of the "Martyr" Smith as a watchword, and it was a prime factor in hurrying on emanc.i.p.ation. The immediate result was an Order in Council to enable slaves to contract legal marriage, to hold property, to buy their freedom on a valuation by disinterested parties, and to put them under a Protector, whose duty was to see that their rights were not infringed. They were now citizens, their only civil disabilities being compulsory labour and a tie to the plantation or their masters.

This, however, did not satisfy the anti-slavery party, and they went on with their struggle for total emanc.i.p.ation, in which they at last succeeded. In 1833 an Act of Parliament was pa.s.sed, by which, after the 1st of August, 1834, slavery was to give place to an apprenticeship of four or six years, according to the status of the slave, the former term for house-servants and the latter for labourers on the plantations, or "predials." Every child born after that date was to be entirely free, and here came in one of the greatest blemishes of the law. These poor infants belonged to n.o.body; their mothers cared little for them, and it could not be expected that the planters would pay to keep up the old system of superintendence. Even those who had been instrumental in getting the law pa.s.sed now began to make comparisons between the position of the child-bearing woman under the old and new systems. Hitherto they were unable to find words harsh enough to use in condemning slavery--now they began to find that it had its good points.

Then the new system required new administrators, and, to prevent any suspicion of bias, magistrates were brought from England. Yet these very same unbia.s.sed gentlemen ordered flogging for the men and the treadmill and dark cell for the women. The Quaker delegates sent out to inspect the result of their work were horrified. They said that the cat was worse than the old whip, and that the apprenticeship system caused ten times more suffering than slavery.

And such was really the case. The negroes could no longer be kept under subordination--they even claimed entire freedom at once. Several disturbances took place before they could be made to understand that they had to work seven and a half hours every day, to pay for their homes, provision grounds, and other allowances. In Demerara the Governor addressed them as erring children, telling them that they could not all be masters, and that every one must work. They had never seen a white man handle the shovel or the hoe--he was free--now they had attained to the same condition, the same coveted freedom from hard labour must be theirs also. True, there were free negroes, some of whom had learnt trades, but even they were above working in the field. Why should free negroes work? Certainly not for their wives and children.

The women got their allowances, and the planter had hitherto looked after the children. The negro had no house rent to pay, his two suits of clothing came regularly every year, and if he was sick the doctor attended to him. Except to deck himself with finery, he had no use for money; a few would work overtime when they wanted something of that sort, but the majority did as little as possible.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE FIRST OF AUGUST.

(_From Madden's "West Indies."_)]

In 1838, when the house servants were to be freed, while the predials must serve two years longer, the difficulties of such an arrangement became insurmountable. A daughter or wife might be entirely free, and the father or husband an "apprentice." Then came the difficulty of cla.s.sification, which the commissioners appointed to arrange the divisions necessarily decided against the opinion of one or the other disputant, driving him to appeal. All this rendered a continuance of the system impossible, and slavery was terminated altogether on the 1st of August, 1838, the planters receiving from the British people twenty millions sterling as compensation, being about one-third of the estimated value of the slaves.

The French had received such a lesson from the revolt of Hayti that they did little for their negroes. However, after the downfall of Louis Philippe in 1848, the revolutionary Government abolished slavery throughout the colonies, without compensation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A RELIC OF THE SLAVERY DAYS--OLD SLAVE BUYING FISH.]

After freedom had been secured in the British colonies the slaves in neighbouring places naturally became discontented. There were not many desertions from the islands, but in Guiana, where the Dutch negroes were slaves on one side of the river Corentyne, and the British free on the other, the runaways from the former caused a great deal of trouble to the Dutch. Whenever an opportunity occurred, a party of slaves stole a boat and made off to the British side, until the Surinam planters became much alarmed. Ultimately a Dutch gunboat was stationed at the boundary river, and this put an end to the migration.

Some of the islands were much affected, especially those of the Danes, which were frequented by British vessels, and were largely English in their sympathies. Here the negroes soon learnt what had happened, and began to express dissatisfaction with their own position. However, Denmark saw that something had to be done, and in 1847 enacted laws for gradual emanc.i.p.ation in her islands. From the 28th of July of that year all children born of slaves were to be free, and at the end of twelve years from that time slavery was to cease altogether.

This did not satisfy the negroes, who became more discontented, and in 1848 an insurrection took place on the island of St. Croix. On the 2nd of July it was rumoured that the slaves would refuse to work next day, and in the evening the whites were alarmed by the ringing of bells and blowing of conch sh.e.l.ls. At first it was considered as an alarm of fire, but on inquiry the whites found that the negroes had revolted, and were demanding their freedom. Later, people came in from the country districts with the news that there were noisy demonstrations, but that as yet no actual violence had been committed. So little alarm was as yet felt that no precautions were taken, although some persons became uneasy.

Next morning the negroes streamed into Christiansted in great numbers, and commenced to demolish the police office. An officer coming into town was attacked by a woman with an axe, which fortunately missed him, but the crowd was so good-humoured that, on his treating the matter coolly he was allowed to pa.s.s: this apparent good feeling made the authorities hesitate in taking extreme measures, even when the mob came round the fort, shouting and calling for freedom. Now, however, they began to collect trash for the purpose of setting fire to a house, and the Stadthauptman and a Roman Catholic priest went among them to try remonstrances. All the answer they got was that the slaves could not fight the soldiers, but they intended to burn and destroy everything if freedom were not given them. One of the mob carried a British flag as an emblem of liberty, and several English sailors were reported as forming part of the crowd. Soon all their good-humour was gone, and they commenced plundering the stores, the whites running away to vessels in the harbour.

About three o'clock in the afternoon the Governor arrived from St.

Thomas, and went among the crowd telling them that they were free, at the same time ordering them to disperse quietly. For a few hours there was a lull, but next morning they rea.s.sembled in the country districts as if in doubt whether the Governor really meant what he had said. Some planters now brought their families to town, leaving their houses to be plundered. Parties of soldiers were sent out, and hundreds of prisoners were taken, the mobs, which in some cases numbered two or three thousand, dispersing at their appearance. Martial law was declared, Porto Rico sent six hundred Spanish troops, the insurrection was at last quelled, and peace restored. The Governor stood his trial in Denmark, to be acquitted, and to have his declaration of complete emanc.i.p.ation confirmed.

Slavery still continued in the Dutch possessions until 1863, and even then it was only replaced by compulsory labour for ten years, leaving the final emanc.i.p.ation until 1873. Yet with all that there were no disturbances to hurry on the process or cause trouble. In Cuba a law was pa.s.sed in 1870 to give freedom to all above the age of sixty, as well as to children born after the pa.s.sing of the Act. This, however, was not enforced on account of internal dissensions, and although Porto Rico gave her slaves their liberty on the 23rd of March, 1873, the Cuban Emanc.i.p.ation Bill was not pa.s.sed by the Spanish Senate until February, 1880, and under that law slavery only came to an end on the 6th of October, 1886.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

XV.

RESULTS OF EMANc.i.p.aTION.

The slave emanc.i.p.ation was a terrible blow to the West Indies, and one from which many of the islands have not yet recovered. It was, the planters said, the second attempt to ruin them, the first having been the abolition of the slave-trade. The party who brought it about looked to see their _protegees_ become a contented, hard-working peasantry, in place of driven cattle, as they called them. The planters, on the contrary, were morally certain that as free men they would not work, and without a labour supply their estates would be utterly ruined. The British taxpayer grumbled at having to pay twenty millions, but this was a mere sop for the estate owners. With the loss of their human chattels the plantations in many cases became utterly valueless; for the negroes congregated round certain centres, leaving most of the outlying places without enough people to keep up the cultivation. Labour had been degraded by the system, and now the full effects of such influence began to be felt.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NEGRESS, GUIANA.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: NEGRESS FISH-SELLERS, GUIANA.]

The compensation money, in many cases, went towards paying off mortgages and other claims, the holders of which saw the impending ruin and hastened to save themselves as far as possible. But it was not enough even for that, for many plantations had liens of half the appraised value of the land, buildings, and slaves. The last security being entirely gone the others became worthless, and, as no one cared to advance money on such risks, the nominal owners could not even get as much as to pay wages. A plantation valued at perhaps 60,000 a few years before, and easily mortgaged for half that amount, received 16,000 for compensation with which to pay off the claim, and then wanted cash to carry on as well. Banks were established, but only solvent estates could get help from them, and consequently hundreds were abandoned in the larger colonies, and hardly one, with the exception of those in Barbados, could produce as much sugar as formerly. West Indian Nabobs, who had been getting their ten thousand a year and living in England, went out to see what could be done. Their incomes were entirely gone, and with them all hopes for the future. Widows and children lost their only means of support, and ruin fell on hundreds of families in England as well as in the West Indies. But not only did this downfall affect the owners and their relations, but merchants as well. Old firms shook to their very foundations, while many became bankrupt, to bring suffering to the homes of thousands who had hardly known of the sugar colonies beyond the invectives of the anti-slavery society. Many who had been strong advocates of emanc.i.p.ation now wished they had never said anything about it, but the die was cast, and there could never again be anything like the shilly-shallying of the French at Hayti.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHINESE WOOD-CARRIER.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: EAST INDIAN COOLIE.]

The negroes would not work, and there were no means of forcing them to do so. The anti-slavery party still had their delegates in the West Indies to see that the "poor negro" was not oppressed in any way, and their representatives in Parliament to call the Government to account if they allowed any vagrancy laws, or even the shadow of a coercive measure in the colonies. One ordinance after another for this purpose was disallowed, until every planter was in despair.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EAST INDIAN COOLIE FAMILY.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: COOLIE BARBER.]

To retain their labourers was a matter of life or death. Some continued the old slave allowances to put them in good humour, but as these made the negroes independent of wages, the privilege was abused. They took everything and did nothing in return. Some went so far as to say that the Queen had promised that their late masters should supply them as usual, entirely regardless of the amount of work they did. This made the planters sore. What with one trouble and another the few who survived the wreck hardly knew how to act. They must not do anything to drive their people away, for there were many inducements offered by others in the same predicament. The negro was master, and he knew it. So much depended on him that he was enticed to labour, by high wages and greater privileges, until this bidding of one against another produced the very result which it was intended to avoid.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EAST INDIAN COOLIE GIRL.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: COOLIE WOMEN, BRITISH GUIANA.]

Something had to be done. First, the allowances of those who would not work were stopped; then their houses and provision grounds were taken away. Thousands of fruit-trees were destroyed to prevent their living on mangoes and bananas during the season. Then the planters attempted to combine to bring wages to a paying level, and this led to strikes of the negroes. Everything tended to further estrangement until employer and labourer drifted far apart. In British Guiana the negroes bought some of the abandoned plantations and established villages; in some cases they even attempted to carry them on as sugar estates, but as all wanted to be masters they in every case failed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COOLIE VEGETABLE SELLERS, BRITISH GUIANA.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: EAST INDIAN COOLIES, TRINIDAD.]

As if this were not enough, the British Government went in for free trade, and allowed foreign slave-grown sugar to compete with that of the colonies. It seemed as if the French revolutionary cry of "Perish the colonies!" had now been introduced into the British Parliament. From one point of view the planters had been amply paid with the compensation money. Some went so far as to say that twenty millions could have bought all the estates in the West Indies, implying that the colonists had no further claim upon them. Even the anti-slavery party would not see that they were encouraging the slave system in other countries by opening their markets. This completed the ruin begun by emanc.i.p.ation, but as long as the principles were adhered to it did not matter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EAST INDIAN COOLIE, TRINIDAD.]

Most of the remaining plantations now fell into the hands of those who had liens upon them, and they, not liking to lose their money altogether, commenced the uphill work of again bringing them into cultivation. Even a few colonists continued the struggle in hopes of better times. In Demerara there were two cases where eminent lawyers--the legal profession, by the bye, doing well when everything else was on the verge of ruin--spent all their profits in keeping their sugar estates from utter abandonment. One of these got so heavily in debt that at one time he could not pay his house rent, and as the landlord dared not sue him, he had metaphorically to go on his knees and beg him to quit.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TRINIDAD COOLIES.]

However, the st.u.r.dy English spirit survived in a few, and they set to work to obtain labourers from other parts of the world. At first they thought of Africa, but the anti-slavery party would not hear of immigration from the "dark continent," for fear of abuses. Then India was tried, with the result that a few coolies were brought over by private parties, notably to Demerara by John Gladstone. But again the cry of slavery went forth, due to the managers leaving the new-comers in the hands of their headmen or sirdars. It was charged against them that they beat their underlings, and of course the planters had to bear the responsibility. The result was that East Indian immigration was prohibited for a time. After a hard struggle on the part of the planters it was renewed, and in the end prevented Trinidad and British Guiana from utter abandonment.

Besides Hindoo coolies, Chinese were also imported, as well as Maltese, Madeirans, and a few Germans. At first the negro thought little of this compet.i.tion, but when he gradually dropped into the background, with his missionary friends, he commenced to protest against it. His friends said, and it was the truth, that there was enough labour in the colonies to carry on the estates, but the difficulty was that it could not be depended upon. Then the wages demanded by the negroes was entirely beyond the means of the planters--the price of sugar would not admit of them. It was a case of cheap labour or the alternative of giving up the struggle, and with the East Indians, British Guiana, and Trinidad recovered from the brink of ruin to become more flourishing in some respects than in the years immediately preceding emanc.i.p.ation. Jamaica, the greatest of the British colonies, suffered the most as she got but few immigrants, and it is only during the last decade that she has again begun to hold up her head. Without healthy compet.i.tion with other races, the negroes sunk back, until they became even more degraded than those of British Guiana and Trinidad.

In Barbados, on the contrary, the population was so dense that the freedman must either work or starve. There were no waste lands and few absentee proprietors, nor were any of the estates abandoned. Labour was plentiful and cheap; it followed, therefore, that the island soon recovered from the check and went on prospering. The compulsion of the whip gave way to the force of circ.u.mstances, and the struggle for existence which ensued has made the Barbadian negro the most industrious in the West Indies. Not only is he this, but he is, like his former masters, intensely loyal to Great Britain and "Little England." All the black, coloured, and white people in the other islands call themselves Creoles, but he is "neither Crab (Carib) nor Creole, but true Barbadian born."

In the French, Danish, and Dutch colonies labour laws were enforced after emanc.i.p.ation, and generally with good results. They felt the change, but not to such an extent as their neighbours, and recovered all the sooner. Then they were not utterly disheartened by the unhealthy compet.i.tion of slave-grown products like the English. Possibly, however, the British freedman would not have borne coercion, for even the Danes resented it.

We have seen already that the negroes of the island of St. Croix were by no means willing to submit to what they considered injustice, and how they forced on their own emanc.i.p.ation. However, down to 1878 they were bound to the soil as it were under annual engagements, from which they were not released without proper notice, even after the term had expired. They had houses, provision grounds, allowances, and very low wages, and were bound to work five days a week. The engagement expired annually on the 1st of October, and on that day those who did not renew their contract a.s.sembled in the two towns of the island for a jollification, where something like the old "mop" or hiring fair of England took place.