The Fight To Own Land In Jamaica
On August 1st, 1838, Jamaica, alongside the rest of the countries in British West Indies, achieved emancipation and thus all enslaves Black people on the island, gained their freedom. Immediately after, the topic of land became a major issue. For even though freedom day come for all black persons, land throughout the British colonies were not accessible for former enslaves. Then white planter landowners bined the former enslaved population with long labour contrasts and labour rent tenants contracts. This drove thousands of freed Blacks right back to the plantation, they were once freed from. By the 1840's, the colony government of the British West Indies took it a step further by implementing numerous legislation and taxation, that made it extremely difficult for black peasants to make a living, own and have access to land. Soon after, protest and riots took place across the region as the peasantry class realise that the promises of freedom, black people in the British West Indies were not privy to. By February 1859, residents of Westmoreland, a western parish in Jamaica, had enough. Inspired by the Rebecca Riots of Wales, some persons dressed in women clothing, joined others to demonstrate their grievances with the state.
Additional Knowledge
BOOKS
Democracy and Slavery: Black, Publics and Pesant Radicalism in Haiti and Jamaica by Mimi Sheller
Between Black and White: Race, Politics, and the Free Coloreds in Jamaica, 1792-1865 by Gad Heuman
Jamaican Place Names by B.W. Higman and B.J. Hudson
Troubling Freedom: Antigua and the Aftermath of British Emancipation by Natasha Lightfoot
Political and Social Disturbance In The West Indies by Frank Cundall
Rebecca's Children: A Study of Rural Society, Crime and Protest by David J. V. Jones
Ties that Bind: The Black Family in Post-Slavery Jamaica, 1834-1882 by Jenny M. Jemmott
The Killing Time: The Morant Bay Rebellion in Jamaica by Gad Heuman
The Rebecca Riots by David Williams
Two Jamaicas: The Role of Ideas in a Tropical Colony, 1830-1865 by Philip D. Curtin
ACADEMIC PAPERS
Aspects of the Development of the Peasantry by Woodville Marshall
British Colonial Policy and the Problems of Establishing a Free Society in Jamaica, 1838-1865 by Graham Kno
Christianity and Slavery in the British West Indies 1750-1865 by Michael Craton
From Slave Rebellions to Morant Bay: The Tradition of Protest In Jamaica by Dr. Gad Heuman
Linstead Market before Linstead? Eighteenth–century Yabbas and the Internal Market System of Jamaica by Mark Hauser
Notes on Peasant Development in the West Indies Since 1838 by Woodville K. Marshall
Paternalism and Rural Protest: The Rebecca Riots and the Landed Interest of South-West Wales by Lowri Ann Rees
Race, Class, and Resistance: The 1858 Riots and the Aftermath of Emancipation in Antigua by Natasha Lightfoot
The Name of the Father: Women, Paternity, and British Rule in Nineteenth-Century Jamaica by Persis Charles
Their Coats were Tied Up like Men’: Women Rebels in Antigua's 1858 Uprising by Natasha Lightfoot
ARTICLES
BBC: The Rebecca Riots
Historic UK: The Rebecca Riots
The Jamaica Gleaner: Roads & Resistance: The Toll Gate Riots of 1859
To The Barricades: The Rebecca Riots
PODCAST
Lest We Forget: And The Women Shall Lead Them: Antigua's 1858 Uprising
Lest We Forget: Bonus Episode with Dr. Natasha Lightfoot on The Antiguan Riot of 1858