Only a small proportion of whites who monopolized almost all the fertile land in the island, benefited from the system. And these, no sooner had they secured their fortunes, abandoned the land which the production of their own wealth had made unbearable to live in, for the comforts of the mother country.
The question which one inevitably asks on confronting this unnatural situation is how was it that it managed not to fall into total anarchy? How was such a system able to survive for nearly two centuries? This work is an attempt to answer this question. Posed in this way, it is clear that while the data employed is largely historical, the treatment of the subject is, of necessity, sociological. The society during the period of slavery presents a remarkable case study of the nature of social values and of social change. More important, it is of marked relevance to the fundamental sociological problem of social order and control. Few systems indeed have ever come closer to the brink of the Hobbesian state of nature and, as such, the sociologist researching this society is faced with the fascinating situation of examining on a concrete level the most basic question of his discipline; one which, nearly always, has been posed in the most abstract of terms.
But this is not to say that the work is intended solely for sociologists. On the contrary, it is hoped that it will fill a vital gap in the history of Jamaica and the other English speaking West Indian Islands. So far, with a few noteworthy exceptions, the historiography of the West Indies has developed in two directions. On the one hand there are the large number of works by scholars of imperial history to whom the islands are of significance only in so far as they represented the platform upon which the European powers thrashed out their imperial differences. On the other hand, there are the scholarly, though often tedious works of those historians who have concentrated almost exclusively on the constitutional development of the islands.
It is easy to understand why the historians of the colonizing society and those of the local white plantocratic and settler élite should have so narrowed their perspectives. As Fannon so rightly observes: ‘The settler makes history and is conscious of making it. And because he constantly refers to the history of his mother country, he clearly indicates that he himself is the extension of that mother-country. Thus the history which he writes is not the history of the country which he plunders but the history of his own nation in regard to all that she skims off, all that she violates and starves’. Thus, one looks in vain throughout the volumes of the Jamaican Historical Review for any paper of significance on the negro population of the island, (which, since 1700 always constituted more than 90 per cent of the total population) either during slavery or afterwards.
Nor is it difficult to understand why this tradition should have been so faithfully preserved by the recently emerged bourgeois intelligentsia of the formerly enslaved negro population. This is merely an indication of the effectiveness of the process of mystification which has had three-hundred years of British colonial rule within which to consolidate and impose its crippling influence.
This is the first attempt therefore, to analyse, in all its aspects, the nature of the society which existed during slavery in Jamaica, and in particular, to concentrate on the mass of the Negro people whose labour, whose skills, whose suffering and whose perseverance and, at times, defiance, managed to maintain the system, without breaking – like the Arawaks under their Spanish masters before them – under its yoke.
This work is a revised version of a doctoral thesis which was written at the London School of Economics under the supervision of Professor David Glass. It is difficult to over-estimate the debt I owe to Professor Glass; the guidance, encouragement and criticisms which he made throughout the various stages of the writing of the original manuscript were invaluable. I am, of course, entirely responsible for whatever inelegance of style or misinterpretation of data that may exist in the final version.
I must also acknowledge my gratitude to the librarians and attendants of both the Manuscript Department and the Reading Room of the British Museum; to the officials and attendants of the Public Records Office, London; to the Librarian of the Royal Commonwealth Society; to the Secretary of the Library of the West India Committee, London; and to the Librarian and attendants of the London School of Economics. Thanks are also due to the Librarian and attendants of the Institute of Jamaica; to the Archivist of the Jamaica Archives; to the Librarian and attendants of the University of the West Indies, Jamaica; and to Mr Pat Rousseau, The Accountant and Manager of Worthy Park Estate, Jamaica, who not only arranged for me to read the private historical documents of the Estate, but very kindly provided me with a guide to the slave ruins of the plantation. To Mrs Leonie Amiel and Miss Kathrin Phillips who typed, respectively, the original and revised versions of this work, my warmest thanks.
During the three years in which I carried out the research for this work I was supported by the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission. It is hardly necessary to state that without their assistance this work would not have been possible. I would also like to thank the British Council for the kindness and efficiency with which they performed their functions as representatives of the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission.
Finally, for her unflinching patience, interest and encouragement, and for the innumerable valuable suggestions relating to all aspects of this work, and in particular, for her elucidation of the more esoteric aspects of African kinship systems, I am greatly thankful to my wife.
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