THE AMERINDIAN SLAVE POPULATION OF BARBADOS IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EARLY EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

Abstract

The first European colony in Barbados was established in 1627 when a handful of Englishmen arrived directly from the mother country. Throughout the first fifteen or so years of the colony's life its cash economy rested upon the production of tobacco and cotton which were largely grown on relatively small holdings cultivated with the help of indentured servants. The transformation of the island's economy into one based on plantation sugar production and African slave labor effectively began in the 1640s. As emphasis upon sugar increased many small holdings were obliterated thousands of Europeans emigrated, and many thousands more of African slaves were imported to take their place. Within the much better known story of African slavery in the colony lies another dealing with Amerindian slaves: although the English seldom used such slaves, they were occasionally employed in Jamaica and some of the Lesser Antillean islands as well as Barbados. What makes the case of Barbados unusual, however, is that shortly after the island's colonization a small group of Arawaks from Guiana was imported to teach the English colonists how to cultivate tropical crops and, generally, to assist in the development of their settlement. These Indians came voluntarily and as freemen (offering a rare instance

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