A Short History of (Crucian) Emancipation

"Queens of Fireburn"

Emancipation (1848)

The fabric of history and culture in the Caribbean is woven with the threads of colonization, slavery, and emancipation. Today the Feather Leaf Inn sits on the land that was formerly the Butler Bay/Prospect Hill Plantations. These plantations were established when the island of St. Croix was part of the former Danish West Indies, a Danish colony making up the present day US Virgin Islands. St Croix was colonized primarily to grow and harvest sugar cane, an extremely valuable crop used to make sugar, molasses, and rum, which was then exported for Danish profit. Millions of people were stolen from Africa and enslaved all across the Caribbean; in the span of 200 years during the transatlantic slave trade, more than 50,000 people were forced into slavery on St. Croix. Colonial sugar cultivation and rum production came at the cost of human lives and environmental destruction as forests were transformed into cash crops.

In the late 1700s and early 1800s, about 88% of the population of St. Croix were people who were enslaved. The conditions of slavery were brutal and life expectancy was around 35 years at best. Any act of rebellion could be punishable by death and organizing a freedom revolt was difficult because most people were confined to their plantation.

The rebellion that led to emancipation in 1848 was not an impulsive act; many enslaved people, such as Moses Roberts from the Butler Bay Plantation, carefully planned and held secret meetings in preparation. Moses Roberts held a key role in gathering support and spreading the word to other plantations because he drove horse-drawn carriages, giving him a unique opportunity to visit other plantations and communicate with other enslaved people around the island. He was able to organize and build a strong network of people to resist Danish colonial rule. 

The rebellion itself was carried out at Fort Frederik in Frederiksted. On July 2, 1848, hundreds of enslaved people gathered and declared that they would no longer work. The next day, people began showing up in the thousands, leaving the plantations and demanding their freedom. Within a day, a crowd of a few hundred people swelled into a crowd of 8,000. At that time, 8,000 people was one third of the people that lived on the entire island. 

Not long after, the Governor, Peter von Scholten, declared that all unfree people in the Danish West Indies were now free. There are a lot of different stories about why the Governor granted the abolition of slavery. Some accounts say that he did so because he was in love with an enslaved woman, some say that he was just overwhelmed by the rebellion, but he was also completely outnumbered and isolated from outside help. Unlike the American South, plantation owners could not just call the next county over to help them when there was a slave revolt; they were on an island and forced to defend themselves on their own. It’s important to understand that freedom was not just freely given, it was the result of an organized rebellion that spoke out against a system of oppression.

Each year on July 3rd, Emancipation Day is celebrated in St. Croix to commemorate the rebellion against slavery that took place on July 2nd and 3rd in 1848. General Buddhoe, also known as John Gottliff or Moses Gottlieb, is remembered for leading the revolt. His statue sits at Buddhoe Park adjacent to Fort Frederik. One article from the Virgin Islands Daily News says,

"“Buddhoe” was a general term used during slavery in the Caribbean to describe someone with great leadership skills. Just like Mary Thomas was known as “Queen Mary,” other Caribbean islands had individuals to whom they referred to as “queen” or “Buddhoe” and also spelled as “Buddho”, “Buddoe”, “Buddo” and “Burdeaux,” who ascended in leadership to liberate their people.”

The events of the revolt in 1848 were the catalyst to change, but freedom was far from won. Read more about the history of St Croix and the Queens of the Fireburn rebellion of 1878.

Fireburn (1878) 

Just like in the South in the United States, abolition of slavery first came in name only. In St. Croix, after emancipation was declared in 1848 by the Danish governor, newly freed people were still being treated as slaves, many of them still working on the same plantations as before. The same power dynamics existed between plantation owners and workers. Although they were not legally slaves, people were still bound to the plantations. Individuals were required to sign year-long contracts to work at estates, and were only allowed to change employers on one day every year, Contract Day, on October 1st. This was essentially still slavery, just by a different name. 

Former slaves were now given some money and a place to live, however, it was almost nothing. Plantation owners were also no longer ordered to provide any healthcare or food. Before emancipation in 1848, slave owners were required to provide “for the old and disabled,” usually by having a hospital on site at the plantation. Slave owners also had the responsibility to pay for doctor visits pre-emancipation, but as workers, the burden was on the worker to pay for themselves. With the little wages they were earning, getting care for themselves or their families was not possible.

On October 1, 1878, what started as a celebratory gathering of people quickly turned into riots after police violently injured and hospitalized a farmer, who was rumored to have been killed by police. 

Fueled by the cruelty and violence of the unchanged colonial plantation system, four fearless women organized riots that led to the burning of around 50 plantations and the destruction of Frederiksted in protest to the inhumane colonial system. The women are referred to as the Three Queens: Queen Mary, Queen Agnes, and Queen Mathilda. People lit signal fires and blew conch shells to alert others of the riots. People brought their lanterns, torches, and machetes and burned down 900 acres of cane fields and plantations.

After the riots all three women were sent to prison in Denmark. In recent years, historians have discovered a fourth woman who was imprisoned following the fireburn, Susanna Abrahamson, who has been named the fourth queen. Today, there is a statue of Queen Mary in Copenhagen, made by the Crucian artist La Vaughn Belle and Danish artist Jeannette Ehlers, depicted sitting with a machete and a torch. The statue is displayed in front of the Danish West Indian Warehouse and is the first public monument to a Black woman in Denmark. 

Many others involved in the riots were arrested and some were immediately executed. In the end, full abolition of slavery was finally realized in 1878. St. Croix is the only other place in the Caribbean aside from Haiti where emancipation was achieved as a direct result of a rebellion led by enslaved people.

Around 40 years later, in 1917, the United States purchased the islands from Denmark and renamed them the US Virgin Islands. However, they were more concerned with the military and political potential that came along with the islands, rather than the people and agriculture.