“ Such appears to have been, in the experience of the different evidences cited, the forlorn and wretched situation of the slaves. They often complain, says Dr. Jackson, that they are an oppressed people; that they suffer in this world, but expect happiness in the next; whilst they denounce the vengeance of God on the white men their oppressors: if you speak to them of future punishments they say, "Why should a poor negro be punished; he does no wrong; fiery cauldrons, and such things, are reserved for white people, as punishments for the oppression of slaves." ”

“ Having now cited both the ordinary and extraordinary punishments inflicted upon the slaves, it may be presumed that some one will ask here, whether, under these various acts of cruelty, they are wholly without redress? To this the following answer may be given—That, with respect to the ordinary punishments, by the whip and cowskin (where they do not terminate in death) the power of the master or overseer is under little or no controul. ”

“ The natives of Africa, when bought by the European Colonists, are generally esteemed, says Dr. Jackson, a species of inferiour beings, whom the right of purchase gives the owner a power of using, at his will. Consistently with this definition we find the evidence asserting with one voice, that they " have no legal protection against their masters," and of course that "their treatment varies according to the disposition of their Masters." If their masters be good men, says the Dean of Middleham, they are well off, but, if not, they suffer. ”

“ M. Terry ever knew a field slave to possess was two pigs, and a little poultry. A field slave has not the means of getting much property.
Mr. J. Terry has known the field slaves so poor as not to be able to have poultry. They were not allowed to keep sheep on any estate he knew. On some they might keep two or three goats, but very few allowed it. Some keep pigs and poultry, if able to buy any. ”

“ Capital Offences and Punishments. On the subject of capital offences and punishments, a man and a woman slave are mentioned to have been hanged, the man for [12] running away, and the woman for having secreted him. The Dean of Middleham saw two instances of slaves being gibbetted alive in chains, but he does not say for what, only that this is the punishment for enormous crimes: and Mr. Jefferys, the only other person who speaks on this subject, says, that he was in one of the islands, when some of the slaves murdered a white man, and destroyed some property on the estate. ”

“ Some, however, complain of their being much pinched for food, [6] and the women often so as to be driven to prostitution, but the general account is that they are better fed than the field slaves, Their life, however, is described to be often wretched by being continually under the eye of their masters and mistresses, and therefore continually subject to be teized and mortified at their caprice, so that Forster, (as will be explained hereafter) thinks their situation even harder in this respect than that of the field slaves, and Coor has known many of them wish to be sent into the field. ”

“ First, Because, as we have already seen, they can order or inflict punishment for any, even imaginary, offences.
Secondly, Because the law of thirty-nine lashes (the greatest number allowed to be given to a slave, at any one time) is a mere farce, and never attended to by masters or owners, if they should think it proper to inflict more; for, Woolrich says, that the chief whipper lays on their back forty, fifty, sixty, or more lashes, at the pleasure of the owner or overseer. Captain Ross has known negroes receive two hundred lashes, where the law would give only thirty- nine. ”

“ Labour of the field slaves out of Crop. The field slaves, whose case is the first to be considered, are called out by day-light to their work. For this purpose the shell blows, and they hurry into the field. If they are not there in time they are flogged. When put to their work, they perform it in rows, and without exception under the whip of drivers, a certain number of whom are allotted to each gang. By these means the weak are made to keep up with the strong. ”

“ The Dean of Middleham observes, that the quantity of ground allowed to field slaves for raising provisions does not admit of their frequently possessing any considerable property. It is not likely they can spare much of their produce for sale. ”

“ On the subject of women becoming the executioners of their own fury, Doctor Jackson observes, that the first thing that shocked him in Jamaica was a creole lady, of some consequence, superintending the punishment of her slaves, male and female, ordering the number of lashes, and, with her own hands, flogging the negro driver, if he did not punish properly. ”

“ Lieutenant Davison, Captain Smith, and Dr. Jackson, all agree, that it was common for ladies of respectability and rank to superintend the punishments of their slaves. Conformably with this, we find Dr. Harrison stating to the Committee, that a negro, in Jamaica, was flogged to death by her mistress's order, who stood by to see the punishment. Lieutenant Davison also states, that in the same island, he has seen several negro girls at work with the needle, in the presence of their mistresses, with a thumb-screw on their left thumbs, and he has seen the blood gush out from the ends of them. ”

“ Captain Giles, Doctor Jackson, Mr. Fitzmaurice, and Mr. M. Terry, have seen negroes whose legs had been cut off, by their master's orders, for running away, and Mr. Dalrymple gives the following account: A French planter, says he, in the English island of Grenada, sent for a surgeon to cut off the leg of a negro who had run away. On the surgeon's refusing to do it, the planter took an iron bar, and broke the leg in pieces, and then the surgeon cut it off. This planter did many such acts of cruelty, and all with impunity. ”

“ On others they are allowed provisions, but no land: and on others again they are allowed land and provisions jointly. Without enumerating the different ratios mentioned to be allowed them by the different evidences, it may be sufficient to take the highest. The best allowance is evidently at Barbadoes, and the following is the account of it. The slaves in general, says General Tottenham, appeared to be ill fed: each slave had a pint of grain for twenty-four hours, and sometimes half a rotten herring when to be had. ”

“ He asked another pregnant woman, if she was forced to work like the rest, and she said, Yes. Sir G. Young adds, that women were considered to miscarry in general from their hard field labour; and Captain Hall says, that, where they had children, they were sent again after the month to labour with the children upon their backs, and so little time afforded them to attend their wants, that he has seen a woman seated to give suck to her child, roused from that situation by a severe blow from the cart whip. [2]
Their labour in the crop season. ”

“ It is clear, from the different evidences, that the custom of grass-picking varies, as to the time in which it is to be done, on different estates, for on some it is to be done within the intervals of rest said to be allowed at noon, and on others after the labour of the day. It is complained of, however, in either case, as a great grievance, inasmuch as it lengthens the time of work; as also because, particularly in droughts, it is very difficult to find grass at all, and because if they do not bring it in sufficient quantities, they are punished. ”

“ Smith, is one of the most frequent causes of punishment. He has seen some flogged for not getting so great a quantity of it as others, and that at a time, when he has thought it impossible they could have gotten half the quantity, having been upon the spot.
Hard case of the Women slaves. It is impossible to pass over in silence the almost total want of indulgence which the women slaves frequently experience during the operations in the field. It is asserted by Dalrymple, that the drivers in using their whip never distinguish sex. ”

“ Cook as having her domestics flogged every Monday morning. Capt. Cooke represents a woman of respectable condition as sending her servant to be flogged for a mistake only. Lieutenant Davison has often known the mistress send her domestics to be punished, and without telling them for what. He has seen a slave also, both whose nostrils had been slit by her mistress's order, who was of some consequence, being the wife of the Chief Engineer of the island, and he also remembers a new negro girl, flogged by the order of her mistress, who died in two days afterwards of her wounds. ”

“ J. Terry has known them punished by their master for so doing, and sent back to the plantation, though their complaints were just. Mr. Cook also has known slaves punished for complaining to the master, and, in his absence, to the attorney against the overseer, for ill usage. If again, says Coor, the slaves complain to the attorney, and the attorney listens, the overseer says he will leave the estate. He has also seen the attorney wink at the oppression of the slaves, because he has a per centage on the crop, and the more the overseer pushes them, the more the attorney gains. ”

“ J. Terry, the overseer punished, but his punishment consisted only of replacing the slave and leaving his owner's service. In that of killing the slave by lighting a fire round him and putting a hot soldering iron into his mouth, the overseer's conduct, says Mr. Giles, was not even condemned by his master, nor in any of the rest were any means whatsoever used to punish the offenders. In the three mentioned by Mr. Woolrich he particularly says, all the white people in the island were acquainted with these facts. ”

“ Handsome women are expected to bring home more money than the ordinary. They are punished if they return without the full wages of their prostitution.
Ordinary Punishments of the Slaves by the Whip & Cowskin. Having now described the labour, food, clothing, houses, property, and different kinds of employment of the planation, as well as the situation of the In-and-out-door slaves, as far as the evidence will warrant, it may be proper to advert to their punishments; and, first, to those that are inflicted by the cowskin or the whip. ”

“ The slaves appear to have been punished, as far as can be ascertained from the evidence under the head of ordinary punishments, for not coming into the field in time, not picking a sufficient quantity of grass, not appearing willing to work, when in fact sick and not able, for staying too long on an errand, for not coming immediately when called, for not bringing home (the women) the full weekly sum enjoined by their owners, for running away, and for theft, to which they were often driven by hunger. ”

“ In the towns many people have their slaves flogged upon their own premisses, in which case it is performed by a man, who is paid for it, and who goes round the town in quest of delinquents. But those, says Mr. H. Ross, who do not chuse to disturb their neighbours with the slaves cries, send them to the wharfs or gaol, where they are corrected also by persons paid. ”

“ Where, on the other hand, they have land and no provisions, all the evidences agree that it is quite ample to their support, but that they have not sufficient time to cultivate it. Their lands too are often at the distance of three miles from their houses, and Mr. Giles thinks the slaves were often so fatigued by the labour of the week as scarcely to be capable of working in them on Sunday for their own use. ”

“ The boilers and others about the works, relieved at twelve at noon, cut canes from shell-blow, (half past one) till dark, when they carry cane-tops or grass to the cattle penns, and then they may rest till twelve at night, when they relieve the spell in the boiling-house, by which they themselves had been relieved at twelve in the day. On all estates the boiling goes on night and day without intermission: but well handed estates have three spells, and intermissions accordingly. ”

“ With respect to the Out-door slaves, several persons, who have a few slaves, and little work, allow them to work out, and oblige them to bring home three or four bits a day. The situation of these is considered to be very hard, for they are often unable to find work, and to earn the stated sum. and yet, if they fail, they are severely punished. Mr. Clappeson has known them steal grass, and fell it, to make up the sum required. ”

“ He was of a very bad character and had been obliged to leave Barbadoes upon that account. At Grenada he had been a Bailiff's follower, and, from his rigour in executing his office and bad character, he was particularly obnoxious to the inhabitants of the town of St. George. ”

“ It depends on the disposition and circumstances of their masters. The largest allowance in the evidence is that which is mentioned by Dr. Harrison. The men, he says, at Christmas, are allowed two frocks, and two pair of Ofnaburgh trowsers, and the women two coats and two shifts apiece. Some also have two handkerchiefs for the head. They have no other clothes than these, except they get them by their own extra labour. Woolrich and Coor agree, that as far as their experience went, the masters did not expend for the clothing of their slaves more than half a crown or three shillings a year ”

“ Sometimes they possess a pig, and two or three fowls, and if they have also a few plantain trees, these may be the means of supplying them with knives, iron pots, and such other conveniences as their masters do not allow them. ”

“ When past labour, the owner did not feed them, says Giles; and Cook states that, within his experience, they had no food but what they could get from such relations as they might have had. This is the account given by the different witnesses; and accordingly we find some of the superannuated slaves on the different estates, who wanted every thing (Harrison) ; others begging (Rees) ; others digging in the dunghill for food, (Dalrymple) ; and others lying, miserable objects, about the wharfs and beaches, and in the roads and streets (Jeffreys, J. Woodward and Cook) . ”