Pursuing Freedom: Enslaved Revolts in Trinidad and Tobago

Central to the revisionism which has taken place in Caribbean historiography from the second half of the twentieth century is the agency of the enslaved in their own emancipation. While the older historiography on British abolitionism highlights the role of white abolitionists such as William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson and Thomas Fowell Buxton, scholars of Caribbean history such as C. L. R. James in The Black Jacobins, Michael Craton in Testing the Chains, Richard Hart in Slaves Who Abolished Slavery, Gelien Matthews in Caribbean Slave Revolts and the British Abolitionist Movement and Claudius Fergus in Revolutionary Emancipation have argued convincingly that freedom from slavery came not only by law but also by war. Despite the solid scholarship on this subject, there still remains notable gaps in the discourse. Much attention has been given to the two maroon wars in Jamaica in the 1730s and the 1790s, Tacky’s Revolt in Jamaica in 1760, Cuffy’s Rebellion in Berbice in1763, The Haitian Revolution of 1791, Bussa’s Rebellion in Barbados in 1816, the Demerara Revolt of 1823 and the Baptist War in Jamaica from 1831 – 1832. The uprising of the enslaved in several of the smaller territories remain underexplored. For this reason, it is necessary to revisit enslaved revolts of the Caribbean paying particular attention to their manifestation in British colonies such as Trinidad and Tobago. In chronological order, four plots to revolt and two actual rebellions erupted in the island of Tobago from 1770 to 1807 while two similar incidents took place in neighboring Trinidad. This chapter in the History of Trinidad and Tobago interrogates the narrative of servile rebellions in the two colonies through an analysis of their causes, manifestations and significance in undermining the enslavement system and securing ultimate freedom for Africans enslaved on the islands.