1814 Thomson Map of Barbados and St. Vincent, West Indies

This is John Thomson's 1814 map of Barbados and St. Vincent, both part of the Lesser Antilles volcanic arc, West Indies. It illustrates the final days of slavery on both islands, and coincides with a period marked by internal strife, social upheaval, economic decline, and rebellion.

Barbados

From the 17th century, Barbados was one of the most prosperous British West Indian colonies with a large slave-driven sugar-growing economy. As evident on this map, there are hundreds of plantations and sugar mills - represented tiny windmills - scattered throughout, with landowners named. Nonetheless, when this map was issued, slavery was in decline in British colonies and with it, the plantation economy. In 1816, when this map was being printed, Barbados' enslaved rose up in the first of three rebellions in the British West Indies, and the largest slave uprising in the island's history. The rebellion largely surprised planters, who felt their slaves were content because they were allowed weekly dances, participated in social and economic activity, and were generally fed and looked after - notwithstanding the Barbados Slave Code, which denied slaves human rights and prescribed inhumane torture, mutilation, or death as a means of control. Unlike, neighboring St. Vincent, which is mountainous and densely jungled, Barbados offered wide flat terrain, which strongly favored British rather than guerilla tactics. The rebellion failed militarily, and most combatants were deported. It did, however, set the stage for progressive legislative reform culminating in the abolition of slavery on Barbados by 1834.

St. Vincent

The map reveals St. Vincent during a period of economic decline. St. Vincent was first occupied by the French but was ceded to England after the Seven Years' War (1756 - 1763). Like the French before them, the British maintained only a tenuous control over the island, with powerful Carib tribes dominating the mountainous north and western slopes - as shown here. The First Carib War (1769 - 1773) ended in a stalemate. The Second Carib War began in 1795. With the support of French Revolutionary advisors and troops from Martinique, the Caribs pushed towards the British stronghold of Kingstown. They were ultimately repulsed when British reinforcements, led by General Ralph Abercromby, led a major expedition into Carib-held territory. More than 5,000 black Caribs were deported from Saint Vincent first to the island of Baliceaux, off Bequia, where half of them died in concentration camps, and then to the island of Roatán off the coast of present-day Honduras, where they later became known as the Garifuna people. In the following decades, the British attempted to establish a plantation economy, but the abolition of slavery in 1838 left most plantations abandoned and the economy in a long decline.

Publication History and Census

This map was prepared and engraved in 1814 in Edinburgh by Kirkwood and Sons for inclusion in the 1817 first edition of John Thomson's New General Atlas.