In May 1788 Taylor continued his defence of Jamaican slavery in response to the upsurge of abolitionist activity in Britain. He told Arcedeckne his opinions about the treatment of enslaved people and the prospect of a rebellion. He also promised to send his friend a detailed plan of Golden Grove sugar estate, which suggests that Arcedeckne was interested to know how his property was being arranged and managed, particularly with regard to innovations in pasturage and provision grounds. These were features of the estate that Taylor developed in response to needs for increased self-sufficiency and more reliable food sources following the disruption of trade with North America and famine conditions created during the early 1780s by bad weather and poor planning.
[…] As for cruelty there is no such thing practiced on estates, I do not believe that the mad men at home wish to hurt themselves, but they should endeavour to regulate their own police, and shew humanity to their own poor, before they think of making regulations for our slaves, who think themselves well of as matters are at present situation, and do not wish for their interference. God knows if they were treated as the miscreants report, they would have cutt all our throats allready, from what they have allready heard from home. There is a man now at Golden Grove doing the views, and I will gett a plan of the estate made out to send you home by him, or another good one, who can do it, and mark all you want, but as for wood land you have none but brush, but he shall mark out where the guinea grass pastures are to be, which will be hilly land, and where your provisions are. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1788/10, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 29 May 1788)
Category Archives: Food/provisions
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 1 May 1787
Taylor’s discussion of breadfruit relates to the infamous 1787 expedition of the HMS Bounty, commanded by Captain William Bligh, to collect plants in Tahiti and introduce them to the West Indies, where it was anticipated that they would help provided food for the enslaved people on sugar estates and other properties. Taylor’s discussion on this point leads into a discussion of his continuing mistrust of the British government’s policies towards the British-Caribbean colonies and speculation about the degree to which Jamaica might achieve self-sufficiency in food and clothing.
[…] The bread fruit would certainly be an addition to our negroe provisions, but a hurricane would certainly blow of [sic] the fruit, as well as either break the trees, or blow them up by the roots, but tho they are liable to that, they still would be of very essential service to us, tho I do not believe Mr Pitt cares a farthing if all Jamaica the Windward Islands and the inhabitants of them were annihilated so that he could but gett a revenue from them. […] [I] am afraid to buy any new negroes untill the hurricane months are over and we see how the blast affects the young canes and sprouts. […] there seems to be a system adopted by the British legislature to extirpate the cultivation of the cane in the British West India colonies, and consequently to force us to live upon our internall resources, and have recourse to the manufacturing our own cloathing from our cotton, and to have no connexion with the mother country at all, if it is so, the late hurricanes have cooperated wonderfull well with its plan, and they will in the course of the next seven years see their scheme so farr carried into execution that this island will hardly be able to be considered as a sugar colony, as the proprietors will not be able to carry that manufacture on, and the iron foundries copper smiths and manufacturers whose dependence is on the trade to the West Indies and the coast of Africa will have leisure to employ themselves otherwise. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1787/5, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 1 May 1787)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 14 December 1786
Here Taylor discusses the quality of sugar shipped to England from Chaloner Arcedeckne’s estate, Golden Grove, and discusses the poor health of enslaved people, particularly in western Jamaican parishes, linking this to the unusually bad weather and restrictions on trading with the United States. Taylor provides some detail on his strategies for providing sustenance for enslaved people on Golden Grove, indicating that ground provisions (such as yams and cassava – or cassada) were more resilient to hurricanes and therefore a more secure option than plantains. He has also sent food to Arcedeckne in England, including turtles, a Jamaican delicacy.
[…] I am pleased the quality of the sugar pleased you the thing that made it tolerable was the dry weather in March April & May there is no year or season that does not bring some calamity to us, very great numbers of negroes especially in Trelawney St James’s Hanover & Westmoreland perished for real want they are very dry there now & if they do not get rains soon there will be another famine there again as soon as the miserable crops the will make there are over for in crop they chew canes & drink the hot liquor which helps to fill their bellies but after that is over I believe they will be very bad off indeed, if the Governor even should dare to open the ports in case of a famine the miscreants of custom house officers would seize the vessels and in case of a warr, we must starve. The pease were of great service, but the coco piece of much more. I have inclosed [sic] 60 acres, 20 of which I have planted in young cocos, I have some old ones to serve after crop. I shall putt in 20 acres a year untill the whole of the sixty acres are in, if we have no storm for three years to come, so as to have the whole in, it would maintain double the number of negroes that you have, for after they are six months old, and have had their cleanings, they ought to be suffered to run into a ruinate, and in that case will keep 10 or 15 years in the ground. I will also putt in 8 or 10 acres of seed yams, which after the first digging with little trouble will last many years, and give many rattoons. I have a good deal of cassada also planted, so that I am not very apprehensive you will ever in future want if we can but have a cessation of storms for a very few years, as I will not ever again depend on plantains, but on ground provisions, but these storms coming so fast one on the back of the other, does not give us time to have a years stock before hand. I am glad the sweet meats arrived safe, as well as the castor oil, it does not keep good very long here after it is opened, and if you cannot use it, your friends can. I am very sorry you gott none of the turtle I sent you, there was one by Capt. Watt, and two by Ayton. I have spoke to some from the Port Royall people to lett me know when they have any good ones. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1784/23, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 14 December 1786)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 10 October 1783
By the end of 1783, Taylor expressed his satisfaction with work at Golden Grove, under the supervision of the overseer, Madden. Taylor described his plans for improving the cultivation and productivity of Golden Grove, which included the purchase of more enslaved workers and the avoidance of ‘jumping crops’, which were years of heightened productivity created by managers and overseers who overworked enslaved people more than Taylor thought was advisable in order to impress absentee proprietors with a large and lucrative crop.
[…] Madden seems to me to go on very well, you have as industrious, and good sett of white people there as at any estate in the island, and your negroes are healthy and well and abounding in provisions, there are 40 acres in cocos untouched, which I reserve for new negroes, and in case of a hurricane, the next thing I must begin on is to fence off some land next Hampton Court to put into guinea grass as a beginning to keep up your cattle & by & bye [sic] when I have enough to keep what steers I shall reserve for the plough to hole your land with that instrument shall begin that method, and do away with jobbing, the new negroes I have lately bought for you are well, after buying one more lott of men, I must then think of buying some Eboe women, the estate is now coming on into its proper train, and I think that it will hardly in future make less than 600 hdds provided that no jumping crops are made, which by distressing, and harassing both negroes and stock, as well as throwing the estate back, takes three years again to bring matters into their proper channell again […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1783/38, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Lyssons, 10 October 1783)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 1 June 1783
Economic prospects for Taylor and Arcedeckne improved with the ending of the war. Taylor laid out his plans for buying more enslaved workers from the next ‘Guinea man’ (slave ship) to arrive from ‘a good’ part of Africa and indicated that slaves from Africa were in much demand across the Caribbean. He noted that the enslaved people living on Arcedeckne’s property were in good health (before commenting on the state of the livestock), and his letter details some of the many tasks and jobs involved in maintaining a sugar estate.
[…] there will not be any danger or your negroes wanting a belly full, and there is plenty for new negroes as soon as any Guinea man from a good country arrives, many ships have been expected but there has as yett but few arrived from their having stopped at St. Thomas’s and there disposed of their cargos for to supply the French and Spaniards […] as soon as negroes come in I must buy as many as I can for you, untill I gett 30 this year, and when I can buy payable in 1785 I must again gett 30 more for there is really plenty of work for them in clearing and billing your pastures which are really foul at the estate, and making fences and planting the rocky parts into Guinea Grass, for it is absolutely necessary to have pasturage as canes, from the looks of your people a man would hardly know them they are so much altered in their looks for the better, the cattle are in good working order but not so fatt as I could wish, the mules are in good order and from every appearance there ought to be a good crop […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1783/19, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 1 June 1783)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 24 February 1783
Taylor argued that admitting sugar into Britain from St Kitts, which had been conquered by France, at an equal duty to sugar from British territories would provide a vent in the metropole for French sugar. His threat to stop growing sugar appears to have been a symptom of his anger, rather than a serious proposal, although Jamaican planters did seek to make their estates more self-sufficient in some regards in the years after the American Revolution, particularly with regard to food production.
I expected from the time that I heard of the bill passing to admit St Kitts sugars being imported into England lyable to the same duties as from this island Antigua and Barbados that the most iniquitous use would be made of it, which I now see has come to pass, and I do not doubt but that they will also pass the other bill you mention, for there seems to me to be a determined resolution to ruin the remainder of our islands & to drive them into rebellion, for my own part I do not intend in future to open another acre of land to raise any article that is taxable at home, but to raise cattle, provisions, and cotton which in case of need may be spun and made into a coarse cloth, for the covering of my negroes, and to endeavour to have as little to do with the mother country as possible.
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1783/9, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston 24 February 1783)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 26 November 1781
Taylor saw enslaved people as little other than units of production but understood the necessity of enforcing routines that were conducive to efficient and sustained work. Here he talks about the value of having a medical doctor resident at Arcedeckne’s Golden Grove estate and critiques the practices of the white overseers who superintended the daily management of estates, many of whom used their position to find work for their own ‘jobbing’ gangs of slaves and to claim large bonuses to their salaries for producing large crops in the short-term, while subjecting enslaved people to such abuses that the estate was unable to keep up the output.
[…] I am glad you approve of my having let the doctor have the house, and you will be very wrong again ever to let an overseer have any land from you but for a specified number of years. Buying of more negroes is certainly the way not to have jobbing, but it is ruin to buy negroes to have them immediately killed and worked to death to aggrandise an overseer’s name by saying he made such and such a crop for a year or two, and then for the estate to fall off and the real strength gone to the devil, as for words or writing it is only whistling to the wind. I assure you your negroes are not what you have a right to expect or what they ought to be and there is no probability at present of any that may be put on thriving, it is very easy to destroy a good gang of negroes but very difficult to raise one and requires a great deal more pains than has been or will be taken of them, the first thing to be done for new negroes is to get them plenty of provisions to let them make grounds and build houses and to be easily worked untill they are seasoned but to work them immediately hard only breakes [sic] their hearts. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1781/28, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 26 November 1781)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 28 August 1781
Taylor’s callous disregard for enslaved people as anything other than commodities and units of labour is evident in his reaction to the effects of the storm at Arcedeckne’s Golden Grove estate, which he managed as Arcedeckne’s attorney. The shocking human cost of the hurricane is nevertheless apparent, although Taylor conflates this with a diatribe about the various hardships that Jamaican planters are facing as a result of the war, including high sugar duties and a lack of security for transporting produce and supplies around coast of the island. We can only imagine the feelings (or motivations?) of those enslaved people ‘carried off’ by ‘Spanish pickeroons’ raiding the Jamaican coast or of those they left behind on Taylor and Arcedeckne’s plantations.
[…] I did apprehend that there would have been orders come down to have sent up some provisions to Golden Grove by this time, tho’ I do not see any, and the negroes were crying out very much before I came down, and I saw their negroe grounds exceedingly damaged and little or no ground provisions, as I before wrote you, your negroes were but very weakly and not in a condition to make the crops that you had a right to expect from the numbers you have put on the estate. There is a large Guinea man at present in but from the extreme scarcity of provisions it would be the height of imprudence to buy negroes to put on the estate untill there is something for them to eat, and besides the times are so very precarious a person must be afraid to risque any part of his capital but what he cannot help in the West Indies where our foes are so potent, the minds of people much disatisfied [sic] and growing more and more so daily from the new duty on sugar and the contrivances of the refiners should the latter take place we must throw up our estates and remove our negroes to some other government where we may be able to make a shift to live and not to be held in Egyptian bondage. Our fleet is sailed our admiral is retired to his mountain to plant cabbage and potatoes, and our governor to his estate, while the Spanish pickeroons are dayly committing ravages on our coasts and no such thing as any vessell attempting to scour the coast about fourteen days ago they took two negroes belonging to me who were fishing close off our reef, and three days after landed at the east end and carried off two negroes belonging to me, three to you and four to Duckenfield Hall, the carelessness of our commanders is scarce believable and except they are removed and some more careful ones sent it will not be in our power next year to ship our produce. Your Irish provisions are at last arrived and to be delivered at Morant Bay, it is intolerable there is more risque to carry them from Morant Bay or Port Morant than to bring them from England or Ireland to Morant Bay. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1781/21, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 28 August 1781)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 18 August 1781
On 1 August 1781, another hurricane hit Jamaica. It was less severe than the hurricanes of 1780, and again much of the damage was in the west of the island. However, as Simon Taylor’s letter mentions, shipping was driven ashore in Kingston Harbour, and there was damage in eastern districts, where Simon Taylor’s Lyssons estate and Chaloner Arcedeckne’s Golden Grove estate were located. Taylor went from Kingston to inspect the damage.
[…] we had a very sever gale of wind which has drove ashore a great many ships that were at anchor at Port Royall some of which are lost and others greatly injured but I can give you no further information of them further than the papers as I sett out for this part of the country as soon as ever the river was fordable and have employed my whole time in going to the different estates I am concerned for and doing what i can to assist the negroes who really want it. It has ruined all the provisions on every estate. The storm last year threw down a great many plantain tress the very dry weather putt those that escaped back so the negroes were obliged to live on ground provisions which were just out as the storm happened and in a few weeks they would have been very well of everywhere with respect to plantains and corn had not this unfortunate matter happened what they are to do now I know not flour is at a most exorbitant price and there are no pease to be had neither is there any ground provisions any where or will be for some time. I was at Golden Grove and your plantain walk and negroe grounds are quite down and very foul and your negroes are weakly indeed and it will require a prodigious deal of work to bring the estate in order […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1781/20, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Lyssons, 18 August 1781)
Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, 8 April 1781
Jamaica was prone to natural disasters such as hurricanes, earthquakes, and droughts. The 1780s witnessed a succession of hurricanes. These, mixed with other factors, such as the scarcity of food provisions as a result of the American Revolutionary War, led to ill-health and starvation among enslaved people in Jamaica. Here, Taylor recounts to Chaloner Arcedeckne the effects of a storm that hit the western end of the island during 1781, noting that Arcedeckne’s sugar plantation, Golden Grove, and Taylor’s neighbouring plantation, Holland, escaped its worst effects.
[…] we at the east end of the island were truly happy in escaping the fury of it. I believe no place felt it so violent as Barbadoes and the west end of this island, several of the Windward Islands felt nothing of it, nor did Hispaniola suffer. Mr Long writes me Parliament has given £40000 to the sufferers in this island besides that there will be a large subscription which I am glad of, for they are in a dreadfull situation, indeed we are so all over the island, from the excessive drougth [sic] we have had which has created a very great scarcity indeed, and if we do not very soon gett rain, we shall certainly have a famine every where, the mountains are as much burned up as the low lands and sea coast, and our prospect is really horrid as there is but little flour or any other but salt provisions in the country and no place to gett them from but England or Ireland. you will be lucky if the 20 blls of flour your ordered arrive safe. You at Golden Grove and I at Holland felt little or nothing of the storm. […]
(Vanneck-Arc/3A/1781/4, Simon Taylor to Chaloner Arcedeckne, Kingston, 8 April 1781)