Apprenticeship (1834-1838)

Mark Morris
Contributor
ON THE 29th day of August, 1833,668,000 slaves were made partially free as a result of the
Emancipation Act. The law took effect on August 1, 1834 by way of Order-in-Council sent to the Crown
Colony islands (Trinidad, Br. Guiana &St. Lucia). Copies of the Emancipation Act was sent to the other
islands with representative government for them to follow suit with the promise of compensation.
The Emancipation Act made:
1. All Children under 6 years from
August 1, 1834, however, if the mothers
were destitute, the child would be indentured
from age 12 years to 21 years.
2. II. Older children above 6 years
would serve a period of apprenticeship
based on the area of industry they had
worked 1 year before emancipation. As
such Praedial/Field slaves would serve an
apprenticeship of 6 years (1840) while
Non-Praedial Domestic Slaves, 4 years
(1838).
3. III. The apprentices would work 3/4
of the working week (40 1/2 hours) for
old masters without wages and 1/4(13
1/2 hrs) for wages (could be used to purchase
freedom)
4. IV) The British Govt. sent Special
Magistrates (Stipendiary Magistrates) to
adjudicate minor disputes between exslaves
and masters.
5. V). The British Govt. allocated
$20M to planters in compensation for the
loss of property on conditions that local
legislature passed laws to bring emancipation,
$ 16.5m was shared among B.W.I.
according to the number of slaves that
planters owned. In BG planters received
52 pound per slave, Trinidad 50 pound,
Jamaica 20 pound, Barbados 21 pound, St
Kitts 17 pounds. Antigua 15 pound and
Bermuda 12 pound.
6. VI. The apprentices retain the rights
of their houses and provision grounds and
were free to hire themselves out during
their spare time or work on provision
grounds:
7. VII. Special magistrates were to

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work along side local magistrates on party

Valuation Tribunals to work out the purchasing
of freedom if so desired by the
apprentices.
8. On the 31 July 18th, the last day of
slavery the slaves spent the time singing
and praying, getting drunk, dressing up,
going to church. Most could not understand
the system of being half free, half
slave. There were minor riots in a few
islands (Bahamas, Bermuda, Jamaica,
Trinidad, Dominica, and British Guiana),
however, the transition was peaceful.
9. Antigua and Bermuda decided not to
adopt the apprenticeship plan as a result
of the good relations they had with their
N E W SPAPEfcfl fi C H i V E _,,,.
slaves, small size of the island and the
economic cost of maintaining such a
system.
AIMS/ADVANTAGES
Aims
Soften the blow of emancipation by
providing a few more years of free labour
Provide easy and peaceful transition
Guarantee adequate labour supply
1. Train apprentices with the responsibilities
of freedom: sedentary lifestyles,
working regularly for wages, socially
acceptable trains such as marriage,
church, habits of industry and thrift.
Advantages
According to W. Green
Apprenticeship was to provide:
1. Additional time to mold the thinking
of the apprentices: To encourage habits of
industry:
Build churches; establishes stable social
patterns; induce the freedmen to remain in
settled estate villages when the system
ended.
Time for orderly preparation of a legal
system to supersede slave codes.
Time to establish banking institutions
to meet the needs of a free plantation
economy; providing colonists enough
coinage to pay wages, opportunity for

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local treasury to resolve monitory problems.

Time to introduce new equipment;
experiment with new technique and revise
methods of labour management.
Disadvantages/Problems
In practice few of the advantages were
realised.
1. A spirit of reconcilement and compromise
which was necessary for success
was never developed.
2. The labour relationship remained the
same; planters, attorneys and managers
were unable to over come their habitual
reliance on force and intimidation that
they had developed during slavery.
Neither party wanted the system, slaves
wanted freedom and the planters were
upset over the lost of arbitrary power and
social status;
3. The majority of the planters took an
exacting rather than conciliatory approach
which defied the spirit of the
Emancipation on Act; some planters withheld
customary privileges for example,
rations (saltfish, flour and commeal),
women with six children and elderly persons
previously exempted from work
were brought back into production.
On the issue of classification in some
islands planters classified their slaves as
praedials with the hope of getting two
additional years of service. In 1837, the
Lt. Governor of Grenada stated that all
the slaves in that island ha"d been classified
as praedials.
6. Exorbitant appraisement: the process
of valuation penalised industrious apprentices
as value was based on age, skills,
strength and general worth. Few apprentices
purchased their freedom in Barbados
only 467 in 1837, Trinidad, 90, the majority
were non-praedials.
The number of days to be spent working
on the estates. The planters wanted
them to work eight hours for five days,
while the ex-slaves wanted to work nine
hours for four days and half day on
Fridays, this was an area of contention. In
some islands there were problems relating
to work stoppages relating to rain, as well

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as the time it took the ex-slaves to get to

work.
8. Punishment continued however, in
the form of judicial punishment where exslaves
were now being punished by the
special and local magistrates.
9. Protection the'special magistrate
were the soul adjudicators in minor disputes
between employers and apprentices.
They were to ensure that allowances were
issued, discipline maintained, work hours
met, they were to inspect plantations hospital,
lock-ups, public prisons, they were
to sit on appraisement committee. The
system depended on the unbras and efficient
performance of these men. The
problem however, was that only 100 was
appointed and only half arrived on August
1, 1834, for example, in Nevis,
Montserrat and Tobago none had arrived
in St. Kitts and Grenada, only one and
Trinidad two. In total 150 served in the
Caribbean, 60 in Jamaica, the majority of
whom were retired army officers and a
number of local resident. THe majority
who came from England immediately fell
ill, some died as a result of diseases,
fatigue and excessive rum drinking. The
salaries of these men was small (300
pound p.a increased to 450 pound in
1835) this made the job very difficult,
apart from that this fact the men were
lonely, they were abused and sued by
both the planter class and the'abolitionists,
they struggled to win the confidence
of both planters and ex-slaves as a result
the majority were the 'servile defenders
and purchased instruments of the planters'
(Burns).
FAILURE OF APPRENTICESHIP
One reason is the role of the anti-slavery
party in England who monitored the .
workings of the apprenticeship system,
especially the excessive use of corporal
punishment by SM and the introduction
of the Treadmill in West Indian work
houses.
The most notable work was done by
Joseph Sturge and Thomas Harvey who
came to Jamaica and the Leeward Island

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in 1837. They wrote a book called 'The

West Indies in 1837' which was a best
seller in England and described in exaggerated
form the workings of the apprenticeship
system. They concluded that the
system was not working and was destructive.
Another set of abolitionists, Lloyd
and Scoble visited British Guiana, Bds,
Grenada, Jamaica and St. Lucia and produced
stable of punishment which
showed that over 350,000 lashes had been
administered after only 22 months of the
system. The work of these men influence
the British people to petition the
Government to appoint a Royal
Commission to investigate the operation
of apprenticeship. They concluded that
the scheme was not providing the apprentices
with the kind of training necessary
for freedom. There was a general fear of
violence across the islands that when the
domestic apprentices were freed in 1838
the praedials would rebel.
The questions of the artisan apprentice
was also a decisive factor as they wanted
to be counted as non-praedial and would
so be freed in 1838. The planters felt that
these workers were very important to the
production process and if they went in
1838, then the system could also go.
Some planters saw advantages from
. getting rid of the system. One important
gain would be that they would no longer
be required to provide apprentices with
food, clothing, medical care and housing.
The smaller islands of the Leewards
had ended the system in 1838 and the
larger territories like Jamaica, and BG
had to follow suit.
The planters were unwilling to have
their names and institution dragged
through the British Press as it had been in
1834.
The system ended prematurely in 1838
with no legal monetary or change in spirit
and practice of labour relation. Its success
can be seen that no major revolt took
place within the West Indies within this
period and sugar production was maintained.
The system could have worked if
more forethought, knowledge and decision

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had gone into its framing especially

with regards to the special magistrates.
According to Burns Britain simply left
both the negroes and planters to themselves.
They also left too much in the
hands of the Local Legislatures. They
expected goodwill among the partners
which was not to be expected. The system
was based on a fear of the withdrawal of
labour which was never realised.

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