Slavery in The British and French Caribbean - Conditions

Conditions

The Lesser Antilles islands of Barbados, St. Kitts, Antigua, Martinique and Guadeloupe,Saint Lucia were the first important slave societies of the Caribbean, switching to slavery by the end of the 17th century as their economies converted from tobacco to sugar production. By the middle of the 18th century, British Jamaica and French Saint-Domingue had become the largest and most brutal slave societies of the region, rivaling Brazil as a destination for enslaved Africans.

The death rates for black slaves in these islands were higher than birth rates. The decrease averaged about 3 percent per year in Jamaica and 4 percent a year in the smaller islands. The main causes for this were overwork and malnutrition. Slaves worked from sun up to sun down in harsh conditions. They were supervised under demanding masters, who gave them little medical care. Slaves also had poor living conditions and consequently they contracted many diseases. The diary of slaveowner Thomas Thistlewood of Jamaica details the extreme violence against slaves, and constitutes important historical documentation of the conditions for Caribbean slaves.

For centuries slavery made sugarcane production possible. The low level of technology made production difficult and labor intensive. At the same time, the demand for sugar was rising, particularly in Great Britain. The French colony of Saint-Domingue quickly began to out-produce all of the British islands' sugar combined. Though sugar was driven by slavery, rising costs for the British made it easier for the British abolitionists to be heard.