The Coromantee Wars of 1760 in

Contents • The short story • Wealth and the triangular trade • Africa • Jamaica in 1760 • The Coromantees • 1760 wars • Aftermath

Introduction

These notes were created as input to a presentation for Stand Up To Racism Dorset following the campaign around the racist plaque in St Peter’s Church, Dorchester. They are also intended as input to further work locally around the 1760 uprisings in Jamaica.

My main source is Tacky’s Revolt by Vincent Brown, Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. Harvard University Press, 2020.

Also his presentation to the Museum of the American Revolution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G74WDexeevU

His interactive map is a comprehensive story of the history and geography of the wars: Slave Revolt in Jamaica, 1760-1761 A Cartographic Narrative http://revolt.axismaps.com/

Brown uses contemporary books by Edward Long and (near contemporary) Bryan Edwards.

The short story

The plaque is in St Peter’s church, Dorchester. It’s quite prominent on the north wall, straight opposite you when going in the usual entrance. Concern about the plaque is years old, but it was

The Coromantee Wars of 1760 David Rhodes 1 brought into focus by the Black Lives Matter movement in May 2020. A campaign of letters and features in the media led to the Parochial Church Council deciding that the plaque would be covered, pending its removal. It will be offered to a museum. The Council agreed to this action without opposition – we were really pushing against an open door, but a door that may not have been pushed open without us. The plaque – before and after – is above.

Here’s the short story: In 1760 Jamaica was the wealthiest colony in the British Empire, on the basis of slave based sugar plantations. In revolt against , many enslaved people rose up. The revolt, led by a man called Tacky, was put down and the leaders were punished with great brutality. This shows the desperation of enslaved people, their fight for freedom, and the evil of slavery.

That’s a kind of morality tale, and is true, of course. It was the story used in the campaign to remove the plaque. But there is a lot more to say if we want to understand the events, including some of the ambiguities. Wealth and the Triangular Trade

Just a reminder, as I think most people are aware of the basics of the Atlantic Triangular Trade, that most European countries bordering the Atlantic were involved in. By the 18th Century, Britain had become the major force.

Over three centuries, 12 million Africans were transported to the .

In 1627 was occupied by the English, followed by the development of large scale sugar plantations.

In 1672 the Royal African Company was founded to maintain the supply of slaves.

Imperial rivalry for slave trade led to skirmishes, piracy and war.

Britain (and other nations) maintained forts on coast of West Africa – originally for gold but by the 18th century slaves were by far the primary commodity.

Sugar

The main export from Jamaica was sugar – and it made it the wealthiest colony in the Empire – though not as wealthy as the French colony of St Domingue.

A plant from Asia, sugar cane started to be cultivated in Barbados in the 1640s using indentured labour from British Isles (convicts and prisoners) – but then moved to slave labour.

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The whole process of sugar, molasses and rum production was done on the plantation. Plantations were industrial enterprises as well as farms. This is because the cane has to be processed very soon after harvesting, otherwise the sugar can’t be extracted. These pictures show the good side, trying to show people back in Britain that things weren’t too bad.

Jobs: Cane-holing in autumn. Mark out squares 1.5 metres square, and dig out to a depth 25 cm. Canes were planted in the holes surrounded by loads of animal manure. Continual weeding and rat- catching. Harvest in spring. Cut down and cut off the leaves. Plants grow up to 2 metres, and are cut by billhooks. Transport to mill and boiling house – running 24 hours a day. Crush canes through wind-powered rollers (dangerous work). Boil and skim (skilled job). Molasses are used for making rum in the spirit house, or left to form semi-refined sugar.

It’s hard and dangerous work, one big planter (Edward Littleton) expected all slaves to die in 19 years. Some research puts life expectancy of slaves in the fields at 7 years. So the planters needed a continuous supply. From 1748 to 1788 (40 years around 1760), 1,200 ships brought 335,000 enslaved Africans to Jamaica. Africa

The story starts in Africa, but includes Empire and the conditions in the Americas.

As war on the fed the slave trade, it shaped territories and alliances that informed the patterns of slave revolt in the Americas. Both for the subjects and foot soldiers of African states and for the many people living in the interstices of empire, West African warfare was a consequential historical experience. The seeds of insurrection surely germinated in Africa, but they sprouted in the fertile soil of American slavery’s brutal violence. And they flowered in the light of imperial warfare, as Britain vied with France and Spain for supremacy in the North Atlantic and Jamaica’s imperial managers struggled to maintain the security of a society dependent on the importation of wretched and hostile workers by the thousands. Brown, p85

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The summary by Brown, above, is worth reading a couple of times. Interstices = gaps, cracks (I had to look that up!). In order to understand the 1760 wars (further than the morality tale mentioned above), we must at least look at the African roots, the context of empire (especially the 7 year wars between Britain and France and Spain for global imperial domination), and the nature of society in Jamaica. Not room to do all that here though.

Where to start the story?

This image was extensively used in the abolition movement, showing a supplicant black man in bondage appealing to our humanity and reliant on our help. This, in modern language, is the white saviour view of things.

Brown is insistent about starting the story in Africa, and we should be too.

This is more or less the opening of the book:

Beginning the story of American slave revolt with West Africa’s entanglement with European empire allows a shift in perspective, taking in the wider geography that shaped the course of the insurgency and the political imagination of its participants. Starting with the image of slaves in Jamaica, or elsewhere in the Americas, encourages us to fixate on their suffering black bodies and see only their reactions to bondage. By contrast, recalling their roots in West Africa reminds us to consider their goals, initiatives, and manoeuvres. Slaveholders cited black militancy as a justification for their brutality. In response, eighteenth century abolitionists would rally around the image of a kneeling supplicant begging to be recognised as a man and a brother, as if the condemnation of evil required the meek innocence of its victims. That icon of abjection has shaped the prevailing understanding of bondage and race to this day. But the caricature bore no resemblance to the black fighters who stood toe-to- toe with whites in encounters all across the war-torn world of Atlantic slavery, from West Africa to the Americas.

Brown, pp17-18

The map shows the area of West Africa that was the home of most of the 1760 fighters. The Gold Coast runs from Abidjan to River Volta. Part of Ivory Coast, and . The Slave Coast is the Bight of Benin –Togo, Benin and part of Nigeria. Together 400 miles of coast.

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The whole of West Africa was affected by the slave trade, but the Gold Coast and Slave Coast were prime places for the British in 18th century.

Forts, and towns around them, were built all along the coast to facilitate trade. Centralised states (with aristocratic elites) such as Oyo, Dahomey, and Asante became involved heavily in trade in slaves, and valued firearms as way of increasing their power over other states, overwhelming less militarised areas and reaching further inland. The area was becoming increasingly militarised and in continual condition of war in 18th century. Dahomey became prominent in the Slave Coast area. In the Gold Coast (Ivory Coast and Ghana) were a number of states of the Akan people, described by academics as a ‘meta-ethnicity’ – a group of ethnicities with significant commonality, who identify with each other. The Asante emerged as a regional superpower in the mid 18th century.

The Akan wars contributed 375,000 slaves to the transatlantic trade. War captives were the biggest source of slaves. This meant that people of all social statuses could end up as slaves (unless a ransom could be paid by the richest). Asante society was itself a sort of slave society – it included a bottom class of unfree people with some traditional rights, but these could easily end up being traded to Europeans as slaves. Life was precarious, as shown by what is known of the life of Tacky, the leader of the first 1760 war. He was part of an elite, and traded in slaves with the British, until military defeat resulted in his being sold as a slave.

So, the area is characterised by militarised hierarchical states, a culture of militarism, and a lot of people in armies. And rivalries were always changing.

The people who became enslaved were not suppliants on their knees. They have a culture grown in the West African wars – social hierarchies, military discipline, military prowess and experience of fighting wars in a terrain quite similar to Jamaica’s. Jamaica in 1760

Jamaica is split into fertile coastal plains and a mountainous forested interior. The biggest settlements are in the south east – Spanish Town, replaced as capital by Kingston. There are two mountain ranges – Hanover Mountains in the west, and Blue Mountains in the east. These areas are difficult to navigate and can be impenetrable to outsiders.

There were three main groups of people.

 Planters and administrators (the whites)  Black people, some free but mostly enslaved 

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There were also soldiers and sailors, white business people, a significant Jewish community, and a community of pacifist Moravians.

Planters and administrators. What dominated society was that this was a fortress – a ‘garrison society’. It was heavily fortified and run by a military governor. The elite consisted of white men in the militia or regular army. The society was always in fear of rebellion by slaves, and also of imperial rivals such as the French and Spanish. The Maroons continued to pose a threat too. This fostered a hyper masculine, belligerent character amongst the mostly male white population. Brutality was part of the culture – one report says that white people must whip a black slave themselves so they know what it’s like. Sexual assault was something to boast about. All white men had to be in the militia, which itself was an arena for violence and competition for status. The militia was not an effective military force, and was mocked by the Swiss observer P E du Simitiere for its hierarchy reflecting social status with no concern for military experience or ability. But the white elite did have a reputation for generous hospitality with loads of food and drink.

A bit of a note on the brutality. We are horrified by the extent of brutality, especially in the way it contributes to our morality tale. Looked at from a historical point of view, slavery is war, and it must be maintained through brutality. It was a sort of social imperative. The way people act is a result of the social relations they find themselves in, though not in a deterministic way. We will see later that the extent of the brutality was questioned after the revolts, with some arguing that if the whites weren’t so beastly to slaves then they wouldn’t rebel so much.

Enslaved black people. Over half of Jamaica’s black slaves worked on the sugar plantations – the world’s largest private agricultural enterprises at the time. They were organised into gangs – those doing heavier work and those, such as children and weaker ones, doing lighter work. There was a strict hierarchy and brutal discipline. Plantation owners (or their proxies) gave orders to overseers, who supervised white managers (known as bookkeepers). Enslaved drivers commanded the field gangs. Drivers received special privileges, with a tense and ambivalent relationship with their white superiors. Creoles (those born on the island) generally had the higher status – native Africans overwhelmingly laboured in the fields.

Maroons. The word Maroon is derived via French from the Spanish word cimarrón, meaning "wild" or "untamed".

When the British invaded Jamaica in 1655, most Spanish colonists fled. Many of their slaves escaped and, together with free blacks, coalesced into a number of ethnically diverse groups in the Jamaican interior. They built towns in the impenetrable interior, often raiding plantations as well as trading. The towns became a refuge for escaped slaves. Guerrilla fighting had gone on for decades, followed by a war 1728-39 – the . This war was ended by treaty in 1739, the main provision being that the Maroons would return runaway slaves, and fight with the colonial forces in the event of a foreign invasion or a . They would also build and maintain roads to facilitate the movement of colonial troops. In return the Maroons held sovereignty in the two inland regions. The Maroons played a significant role in supressing Tacky’s revolt, including the killing of Tacky himself. In the interior they were the most effective fighting force: they understood the terrain, had good intelligence of the rebels, and had developed effective fighting tactics for their environment.

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The Coromantees

The 1760 uprisings are also called the Coromantee wars. Who are they?

The term comes from a settlement on the Gold Coast called Kormantse, and it was originally used by slave traders for someone of the Akan people from the Gold Coast. They were renowned as strong workers, and a premium price was paid for them. But they were also seen to be rebellious because of their military background. In the 1750s 40% of Africans from the Gold Coast came to Jamaica.

Coromantees had an almost legendary status. The understanding at the time was that they were ‘essentially African in character’, the multiple rebellions were aiming at the recreation of an ‘Akan style autocracy’. (Edward Long) They shared a common culture and developed a common language – ‘the Coromantee language’. They used as a religious glue. They organised into companies with military captains. They had a reputation as formidable fighters, facing execution with fortitude, and often preferring suicide to capture. The Wars of 1760

The best description of the events of 1760-61 is the interactive map: Slave Revolt in Jamaica, 1760- 1761 A Cartographic Narrative http://revolt.axismaps.com. That goes through the events in a great pictorial way. Here is the introduction to it:

In 1760, some fifteen hundred enslaved black men and women— perhaps fewer but probably many more— took advantage of Britain’s Seven Year’s War against France and Spain, to stage a massive uprising in Jamaica, which began on April 7 in the windward parish of St. Mary’s and continued in the leeward parishes until October of the next year.

Over the course of eighteen months the rebels killed as many as sixty whites and destroyed many thousands of pounds worth of property. During the suppression of the revolt over five hundred black men and women were killed in battle, executed, or committed suicide. Another 500 were transported from the island for life. Colonists valued the total cost to the island at nearly a quarter of a million pounds.

“Whether we consider the extent and secrecy of its plan, the multitude of the conspirators, and the difficulty of opposing its eruptions in such a variety of places at once,” wrote planter- historian Edward Long in his 1774 History of Jamaica, this revolt was “more formidable than any hitherto known in the West Indies.”

Long was convinced that the rebellion was the culmination of an island-wide plot by Coromantee compatriots from the Gold Coast of West Africa who hoped to conquer the colony and create a series of principalities “in the African mode.”

We won’t go in to the details of the revolt here as there is no point in repeating what’s in the interactive map.

Briefly, the wars consist of three main uprisings:

• Tacky’s Revolt • 7 -14 April (Easter) • St Mary (North East) • Led by Tacky and Jamaica • Westmoreland Insurrection (the Coromantee War) • 25 May – 17 June (Whitsun)

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• Westmoreland (West) • Led by Apongo (Wager) and Simon • Simon’s March • September – January 1761, with skirmishing till October 1761 • Westmoreland, St Elizabeth, Clarendon (West and South West)

Two things about the first revolt.

Who was Tacky? He has become a legend. The name means ‘royalty’ in the Ga language. He was clearly a man of political and military importance from the area near Accra, Ghana. He sold defeated rivals to the British as slaves, until he was himself defeated and captured. He was enslaved in the Frontier estate in St Mary. His perceived loyalty and command of English had led to him being made a driver (a foreman).

The final pitched battle of the first uprising (Tacky’s War) was in a Rocky Gulley south of Downes Cove, on 14 April. Go to the interactive map for more details. Here the Maroons and the militia defeated the rebels, the Maroons killing the leaders Tacky and Jamaica. Just south east of Downes Cove was Green Castle, the plantation of John Gordon. Some surviving fugitives from the Rocky Gulley sent a delegation to John Gordon, whom they felt they could deal with. They offered to surrender if their lives were spared. John Gordon negotiated sales, to Honduras (Belize) and elsewhere. In this way the owners got some money for their slaves. To the owners, slaves are not people, they are property. And there is a dilemma - killing your property doesn’t make economic sense. There was controversy over executing slaves – the colonial government later agreed £40 compensation to be paid for executed slaves.

John Gordon, a significant slave owner, is the man commemorated in the St Peter’s plaque. The Aftermath

Jamaica continued to be the most profitable colony in the empire.

The immediate aftermath was the increasing fortification of the island: more barracks, more troops, and a permanent Royal Navy presence. The Jamaican planters, in a permanent state of fear, needed the military might of the empire – much more so than the colonies on the North American mainland who, of course, soon fought for their independence from Britain. To pay for the fortification, a poll tax was introduced, and also a Stamp Act (a payment on any paper or parchment). This was the model for the 1765 Stamp Act applied – and resented - in all American colonies.

There were more attempts at control. Obeah was made illegal. Movement was more restricted – free non-whites were required to wear a blue cross on their right soldier – a ‘badge of freedom’. Large gatherings involving drums and other musical instruments were banned.

Slave imports from the Gold Coast continued though – 190,000 in the next two decades.

A major result was a change, and heightening, of attitudes in British people both at home and in the colony. There was some panic about the future of slavery, and some sympathy boosting the abolitionist movement, seeing Africans as victims of brutal tyranny. But questions were also raised about the nature of the slaves themselves. It was widely thought that the Coromantees were the problem, and that too many of them were being imported into Jamaica.

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This is from a poem by James Grainger:

Yet, if thine own, thy childrens life, be dear; Buy not a Cormantee, tho’ healthy, young. Of breed too generous for the servile field; They, born to freedom in their native land, Chuse death before dishonourable bonds: Or, fir’d with vengeance, at the midnight hour, Sudden they seize thine unsuspecting watch, And thine own poinard bury in thy breast.

The Sugar Cane Dr James Grainger 1764 (A Georgic poem)

For many, including Edward Long (our main contemporary source) in Candid Reflections, 1772, the answer lay in ‘creolisation’.

Creolisation means: • Fewer imported slaves • Avoid working them to death • Keep them on one estate (don’t sell off) • Create conditions for child-rearing • Use English (ban other languages) • Encourage (ban other religions)

In short, the model for slave plantations was to change. Before, the simple approach was to buy slaves, work them to death for eight to ten years, and then buy some more. The ‘creolisation’ approach was to create a self-sustaining slave community, exemplified by the plantations in the southern states of the US; it became a necessity after Britain and America abolished the slave trade in 1808.

The last African revolt?

Some final thoughts. It may be simplistic to describe 1760 as the last African revolt, and I’d be open to different interpretations on this (or anything really). But it certainly seems that the nature of revolt changed somewhat. However the overwhelming point is that slavery in the Americas is a state of war, maintained by violence, and is inherently unstable.

Contemporary sources, and historians, generally agree that the 1760 wars were led and mainly fought by Coromantees; the involvement of other black people and creoles is not clear. There was a unit of black slaves allied with the army and free blacks were expected to be part of the militia. The objectives of the rebels are also not clear, but contemporary sources say the aim was the establishment of ‘African principalities’, presumably with similar social structures to West African societies. There is no evidence, as far as I can find out, that Enlightenment ideals, especially the ideals that inspired the up-coming American and French revolutions, played any part in the thinking of the rebels.

In 1776 a revolt in Jamaica, as troops were leaving for the American mainland, was betrayed. This was led by Creoles, though Coromantees were part of a confederation that planned the uprising.

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1831 saw the largest slave insurrection in Jamaica, known as the Baptist War, led by Sam Sharpe. The leaders were native-born Christians, educated partly by white abolitionist Christians, inspired by ideas of justice and freedom in a Christian context. This revolt, brutally put-down, was a big contributor to the ending of slavery in British Empire 1833.

The 1791 – 1804 led to a state free from slavery. The charismatic leader, Toussaint L’Ouverture, was an educated Catholic, inspired by enlightenment ideas of liberty, equality and representative government. Enslaved black people were the driving force, but its success was helped by the support of people from all ethnic groups in the colony.

NOTES: Copyright for pictures: Images of plaque in St Peter’s taken by local activists.

Other images have commons licences.

Triangular trade: Taken from the book by Schneider and Schneider 2014, this picture portrays the slave trade-route https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Slave_route.jpg

Images taken from “Ten Views in the Island of , in which are represented the process of sugar making, and the employment of the negroes”...From drawings made by W. Clark, etc. (With descriptive letterpress).Originally published/produced in London : Thomas Clay, 1823. Held and digitised by the British Library, and uploaded to Flickr Commons

Am I not a man and a brother medallion https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Am_I_not_a_Man_and_a_Brother,_medallion_modelled_ by_William_H._Hackwood,_Wedgwood,_Etruria,_England,_c._1786,_tinted_stoneware_- _Brooklyn_Museum_-_DSC09289_(cropped).JPG

Jamaica Map https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jamaica_relief_location_map.jpg

Africa map https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gulf_of_Guinea_Nations.png

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