Treatment Of Slaves 6b3ba

NAME: Adolfo Medina SUBJECT: History DATE OF SUBMISSION: 27TH MARCH 2010 THEME: Caribbean economy and slavery TASK: Compare the treatment of slaves in Belize to that of other Caribbean Territories in the 19th Century STIMULUS: Picture SCHOOL NUMBER: 040018 INDEX NUMBER: 0170 PROFICIENCY: General 1

Table of Content Introduction

pg3

Master slave relationship

pg4

Overseeing of slaves

pg5

Feeding of slaves

pg6

View of society

pg7

Punishments

pg8

Conclusion

pg9

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References pg10

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I

ntroduction

If you think that that in the 19th century things were easy and elegant your way off because in the 19th century there were many difficulties, slavery, extreme cruelty, much racial tension, and disorder in the workplace form slaves. If you were a rich white with a lot of land things would be easier, but few of the population in the Caribbean was. I chose to do the treatment of slaves in the Caribbean in the 19th century because the way in which they were treated is a fascinating topic. In the 19th century slaves were treated worse than animals. In the 19th century slaves were unjustified and treated brutally wrong by the way in which there white master acted towards them, the way they were looked after, the way they were fed, the way they were seen in society, the way they were punished.

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M S R aster-

lave

elationship

The master of an estate had no concern towards the slaves who worked there; his main concern was his income, and the amount of sugar that was exported. The master of an estate usually didn’t deal much with the colored malesmostly the colored females by making the do demeaning sexual activities for his pleasure. The master wouldn’t care if the colored woman was married or had children, he would still make and or force the woman to pleasure him if he wanted pleasure. The women that

had pleasured the master

would vex him by singing

a song describing

things that they had done.

The master didn’t like this

because it humiliated him,

as to get back at the

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Woman hung & flogged

the

woman for what she had done he would punish her by hanging and then flogging her.

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O

verseeing

OS f

laves

Within the 19th century the people who looked after the slaves as they worked were known as the overseers. Overseers were usually a colored person himself, yet he thought himself greater than the other slaves. The overseer liked the position of overseer because they were above slavery. To keep a job as overseer the overseer would have to know how to deal with disobedience, with was dealt by instigating a punishment. When a slave became injured in the plantation they did not have proper medical facilities because the overseers didn’t care much for their help since the cost of a slave was “cheap”. In Belize, since there was no plantation, instead they when logwood cutting but then it changed to mahogany cutting which was mush more dangerous and lead to many deaths. While out Mahogany cutting there was no overseer to whip the slave and the slave who were out such as the huntsmen, and the oxen and the others who helped in the mahogany production were seen as very important.

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F OS eeding

f

laves

In the past, slaves where at the bottom of the list of priorities. Slaves were treated worse than the pets whereby they weren’t feed at times and during the time they were feed they were feed with small meals that were unsatisfactory and not nutritional. This diet that was forcefully given to the slaves caused many of them to away because of all the lack of nutrition. Masters did not want to feed the slaves with the crops being grown so instead they gave imported food; this was given in moderation and sometimes not given. Slaves realized that they needed more food so the started to plant food in their own little garden with was given to them by the master.

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V OT S iew

f

he

ociety

The majority of the populations in the Caribbean where made up of colored people, yet the ones in control were the wealthy whites. The small population as is saw the slaves as inferior and vile and also saw it normal to kill slaves. Society saw them so inferior that they didn’t care for them and wore them out working in sugar industries and by implementation of brutal punishments. The society saw them so low that they were mare objects that they could be sold at a cheap price to the society.

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P

unishments

There were many types of punishments done to the slaves such as physical punishment, mental punishment and even sexual punishment. In some cases such as in physical punishment men were punished with more brutality than women. Thomas Thistlewood clamed “Gave him a moderate whipping, pickles him well, made Hector shit in his mouth, immediately put a gag whilst his mouth was full & made him wear it 4 or 5 hours.” In Miserable Slavery by Thomas Thistle Wood edited by Douglass Hall (page 70-71).Whenever a slave misbehaved he/she was punished by being flogged, hanged, or even killed. Sometimes the slaves were just killed for the amusement of the whites. When this was done it was done with an audience watching the slave being killed. The slaves residing in Belize did not have such punishments because they had no work in plantations, yet they did have some sort of cruelty placed upon them. They had the deadly task of having to find mahogany in a danger infested forest and not only that, they also had to cut down the mahogany when found. The cutting of the mahogany was life-threatening since they had to build a that held them four to five meters high. The

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grave proportion of the cutting is that the mahogany could not be controlled when falling down and this lead to many deaths.

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C

onclusion

In conclusion, it is seen that slaves were treated with extreme cruelty even though they formed the majority of the population, did majority of the brutal labor. In the past, just by observing how the masters treated the slaves, how the slaves were overseen, how the slaves were feed, how the slaves were seen by the society, and how the slaves were punished it can be easily noted how the masters had no sort of mercy towards the slaves even though they were the ones who did all the work for him and his income. I conclusion, the Caribbean slaves of the 19th century suffered a great deal of pain and torture while in Belize slaves suffered, but they had more privileges and freedom granted to them. 12

References

Chapter 5-Slavery in Belize. Retrieved December 14, 2009, from Website: http://www.belizenet.com/history/chap5.html Green wood, R and Hamber, S. (2003 2ed).Emancipation to Emigration. Macmillan Publisher Hall, D. (1999). In Miserable Slavery Thomas Thistlewood , in Jamaica 17501786, University of the West Indies Slavery in the Settlement, 1794-1838. Retrieved December 14, 2009, from Web site: http://countrystudies.us/belize/7.htm

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