Baptist War
In the mistaken belief that emancipation had already been granted by the British Parliament, Sharpe organised a peaceful general strike across many estates in western Jamaica at a critical time for the plantation owners: harvest of the sugar cane. The Christmas Rebellion (Baptist War) began on 25 December 1831 at the Kensington Estate. Reprisals by the plantation owners led to the rebels burning the crops. His peaceful protest turned into Jamaica's largest slave rebellion, killing hundreds, including 14 whites. The rebellion was put down by the Jamaican military within two weeks and many of the ringleaders, including Sharpe, were hanged in 1832. Just before he was hanged for his role in the rebellion, Sharpe said "I would rather die among yonder gallows, than live in slavery." The rebellion caused two detailed Parliamentary Inquiries which arguably contributed to the 1833 Abolition of Slavery across the British Empire.
Read more about this topic: Samuel Sharpe
Famous quotes containing the words baptist and/or war:
“I am perhaps being a bit facetious but if some of my good Baptist brethren in Georgia had done a little preaching from the pulpit against the K.K.K. in the ‘20s, I would have a little more genuine American respect for their Christianity!”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“Since the war nothing is so really frightening not the dark not alone in a room or anything on a road or a dog or a moon but two things, yes, indigestion and high places they are frightening.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)