The History of Jamaican Slavery :: American America History

Jamaicas history is full of social unrest. The island was origin everyy inhabited by the Arawaks. The Arawaks were a peaceful, pleasant race. In his History of the British West Indies, Sir Alan Burns says, all accounts credit them with being generous-minded, affectionate and good-humoured (37). Once Jamaica was discovered by Spain in 1494, however, the Arawaks, who had inhabited the island for centuries, quickly died off due to the harsh sermon of the Spaniards. Spain never really developed the land, however, and thus when British forces invaded in 1655, Spain chose non to focus much energy on defending the island. The British open up Jamaica to be much more profitable than the Spanish had. It eventually became maven of the most lucrative colonies in the British empire due to its confidence in sugar exports from the mid 1700s until the close of the slave pot in Jamaica in the 1830s, Jamaica accounted for 42 percent of sugar imported into Britain (Burnard and Morgan 3). Unfortun ately, these benefits for the British empire came at a significant cost to the hundreds of thousands of Africans who became unwillingly caught up in the trade triangle between England, Africa and the Caribbean. In their essay The kinetics of the Slave Market and Slave Purchasing Patterns in Jamaica, 1655-1788, Trevor Burnard and Kenneth Morgan say Jamaica had the largest quest for slaves of any British colony in the Americas (2). By the end of the ordinal century there were more than 300, 000 slaves in Jamaica and the fact that the slaves outnumbered the plantation owners was unsettling for umpteen of the wealthy, white inhabitants of the island. The political system basically consisted of a governor who represented the Crown and the Assembly of Planters, who both were against the slaves. Adding to the unrest of the island was the existence of the Maroons. When the British invaded the island they demanded that the Spaniards surrender. In miscalculation, however, they gave them time to consider the offer. The Spaniards fled the island, but not before setting well-fixed their cattle and freeing their slaves. These freed slaves then retreated to the mountains and developed their own ominous communities in the wild mountain interior of Jamaica (Hamshere 140). Often they terrorized the English by setting fire to homes and buildings or by murdering soldiers. The Maroons were not truly a vicious people, however they did feel the need to defend their freedom from the British by any means necessary.