Slavery in the British and French Caribbean

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Slavery in the British and French Caribbean refers to slavery in the parts of the Caribbean dominated by France or the British Empire.

The Lesser Antilles islands of Barbados, Antigua, Martinique and Guadeloupe were the first important slave societies of the Caribbean, switching to slavery by the end of the 16th century as their economies converted from tobacco to sugar production. By the middle of the 17th century, British Jamaica and French Saint-Domingue had become the largest and most brutal slave societies of the region, rivaling Brazil as a destination for enslaved Africans.

The death rates for black slaves in these islands were higher than birth rates. The decrease averaged about 3 percent per year in Jamaica and 4 percent a year in the smaller islands. The main causes for this were overwork and malnutrition. Slaves worked from sun up until sun down in harsh conditions and supervised under demanding masters, with little medical care. Slaves also had poor living conditions and consequently they contracted many diseases. There is another possible reason, it may have been that females simply didn't want to bring new life into their harsh world. Author Jan Rogozinski briefly mentions this in his book, "A Brief History of the Caribbean." He states that "Perhaps slave mothers simply did not see much point in raising children solely to provide labourers for their masters" (p. 142). This would have been a way for slaves to rebel against their masters. Slaves sang songs insulting their white masters and, in some cases, they would pretend to be ignorant or stupid to avoid punishment and further work. These factors may suggest that an unwillingness to bear children was a further act of resistance.

For many centuries slave trade and sugarcane production were irrevocably linked. This was because a low level of technology made production difficult, and sugar demand was rising, particularly in Britain. The French colony of Saint-Domingue quickly came to out-produce all of the British islands sugar combined. Though sugar was driven by slavery, rising costs for the British made it easier for the British abolitionists to be heard.

With the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, the new British colony of Trinidad was left with a severe shortage of labour. This shortage became worse after the abolition of slavery in 1833. To deal with this problem Trinidad imported indentured servants from the 1830s until 1917. Initially Chinese, free West Africans, and Portuguese from the island of Madeira were imported, but they were soon supplanted by Indians. In addition, large numbers of ex-slaves migrated from the Lesser Antilles to Trinidad.

The first announcement from Whitehall in England that slaves would be totally freed by 1840 was made in 1833. In the meantime, slaves on plantations were expected to remain were they were and work as "apprentices" for the next six years. On 1st of August 1834, a unarmed group of mainly elderly negroes being addressed by the Governor at Government House about the new laws, began chanting: "Pas de six ans. Point de six ans" ("Not six years. No six years"), drowning out the voice of the Governor. Peaceful protests continued until a resolution to abolish apprenticeship was passed and de facto freedom was achieved. Full emancipation for all was finally legally granted ahead of schedule on 1st August, 1838, making Trinidad the first British colony with slaves to completely abolish slavery.

After British abolished slavery, they began to pressure other nations to do the same. France, too, abolished slavery, but by this point St. Domingue had already broken away to form the independent Republic of Haiti. French islands were limited to the Lesser Antilles.