On 30 November 2021, Barbados became a republic. It was the 55th anniversary of becoming independent from the UK. Given the brutality of the colonial period this decision is not only perfectly understandable, it is the right thing to do.
Barbados is located in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region although perhaps not in the Caribbean Sea but the Atlantic, and it is the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It is 34 kilometres in length and at its widest point it is 23 km. It covers an area of 432 km2
On 14 May 1625, Captain John Powell landed and claimed the land for King James I of England, his younger borther Henry came back on 17 February 1627 with 80 settlers and 10 indentured labourers.
This settlement was funded by City of London merchant Sir William Courten, who thus acquired the title to Barbados and several other islands.
For most of the seventeenth century the West Indies was the destination of preference for emigrants from England, rather than the American colonies. Most of these emigrants were indentured.
There were four main crops, tobacco, cotton, ginger and indigo.
In 1640 sugar cane was introduced. At this time only approximately 3% of the island’s population was African but this was now to change. The smallholders lost their land and emigrated to other islands or the American colonies. Huge sugar plantations took over. There was little point in using indentured labourer who might leave when their time was up and who had certain rights whereas slaves were there for ever and had no rights. African slaves, kidnapped and transported there equalled free whites within twenty years. By 1680 there were 20,000 free whites and 46,000 enslaved Africans, by 1724, there were 18,000 free whites and 55,000 enslaved Africans and in 1750 there were 65,000 slaves. The slaves were usually treated with the utmost cruelty as overseers tried to get the maximum labour out of them for the minimum cost. The first slave code, the rules on the treatment of slaves, went into law in Barbados.
By 1660, Barbados generated more trade than all the other English colonies combined.
In 1680, there were 175 plantations producing sugar and most food was imported.
In 1807, the slave trade was made illegal and the British government set up patrols on the West African coast to enforce this. Slavery was abolished in 1833 with a transition period until 1839 when the slaves were called ‘apprentices’ and had to stay on the land for six more years doing their old jobs.
The British government budgeted GBP20m to compensate slave owners, which was quite a lot in the days when the Treasury received around GBP50m per year. This was financed by bonds and some slave owners could choose to take a 3.5% annuity instead which was paid until 2015.
So now, the slave owners got compensation for the slaves they owned thanks to the generosity of the British tax payer but now no longer needed to provide for them when they were no longer productive – they did not have to look after them as infants or when they were elderly or feed or care for them when they were sick. And with the introduction of sugar beet in Europe, cane sugar no longer could command the same prices, so they were winners all round.
What should have happened of course is that the former slaves should have been given land in order to support themselves but that would have gone against the interests of the landed aristocracy who had strong political support in the British parliament – and the former slaves had next to none.
The large plantations of the former slave owners largely exist to this day. One such former plantation belongs to Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax. His family has owned Drax Hall, a plantation in Barbados since the seventeenth century which the Caribbean Community’s Reparations Commission described as a “killing field” and a “crime scene” from the tens of thousands of African slaves who died there in terrible conditions between 1640 and 1836. Drax is an MP for South Dorset and is possibly the wealthiest landowner in the House of Commons, with 5,600 hectares of farmland and woodlands. The estate’s finances are largely opaque to the public gaze and involve at least six trusts and other disconnected financial entities. Therefore it is of no surprise to know that he was a major Brexit supporter because the last thing he would want is the EU putting a stop to tax havens and murky financial trusts. Of course Drax is not responsible for what his ancestors did and he has said that the events of the past are terrible. He does not condone his ancestors. However it was those very terrible events that not only allowed him to now own the plantation in Barbados but for his family to have bought such large landholdings in the UK.
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