the dismantlement of slavery, quite interesting. got a 100% on this presentation, worked hard on it.

1. *

2. *
*Anti-slavery sentiment in Britain had been growing for
approximately two centuries before finally becoming
popular in the early 1800’s with the passing of a ban on
the importation of slaves as well as declaring slaves
illegal. Enlightment figures, such as French philosophers
Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Montesquieu, both expressed
their disapproval of the Atlantic Slave System.
Emancipation in the Dutch-colonised islands were
triggered in 1848 by the rebellious actions of the enslaved
themselves. The Spanish crept out of the slave system
with legislation, in much the same way that they eased
into it.

3. *

4. *
*The Caribbean saw a series of slave revolts and uprisings
during the eighteenth century. Frankly speaking, the
enslaved people in the British colonies were discontent with
their current living and working conditions, as well as the
treatment which they received from their white rulers.
Hence, they took matters into their own hands.
*Additionally, revolts were methods that the enslaved
employed in their attempts to emancipate themselves.
Revolts such as the Berbice Rebellion (1763), the Haitian
Revolution (1791-1804), the Barbados Rebellion (1816), the
Demerara Revolt (1823) and lastly, the Christmas Rebellion
(1831) are all historical examples of how the enslaved
fought for the dismantlement of slavery and more
specifically their freedom.

5. *Narratives from literate slaves such as Olaudah Equiano and
Mary Prince gave first-hand knowledge of the lives of the
enslaved, the hardships which they faced and the horrors
which they had to endure.
*Equiano emerged in his forties as an ex-slave who was an
important spokesman for the early abolitionist movement.
He described some of his experiences in his enormously
successful Interesting Narrative (1789), which remains
probably the most complete account of the enslaved
experience in the eighteenth century.
*Mary Prince was the first black British woman to escape from
slavery and publish a record of her experiences. In this
unique document, Mary Prince vividly recalls her life as a
slave in Bermuda, working in the salt ponds on Turks Island,
and Anitgua – where she was a wash maid, nurse and
chamber maid. She also mentions her rebellion against
physical and psychological degradation and her eventual
escape to London in 1828.

6. *

7. *
*There was always an international dimension to the early
abolitionist movement. Indeed, foreign support and
intervention were deemed vital to the success of the
emancipation process in the Caribbean. In pursuit of these
aims, a group of abolitionists including humanitarians, members
of a religious sect called the Quakers and some industrialists
took charge of the disintegration of the system of enslavement.
*These abolitionists include men like Granville Sharpe, Thomas
Clarkson, William Wilberforce and Thomas Buxton. In 1787, an
anti-slavery society, “ The Society for Effecting the Abolition of
the Slave Trade”, was formed. The Society was determined to
have a law passed in Parliament to abolish the trade, following
which it felt that slavery would be forced to collapse, once the
supply of slaves had dried up.

8. *British women also played an important role in this process.
“ The Female Society for Birmingham, West Bromwich,
Wednesbury, Walsall, and their Respective Neighbourhoods,
for the Relief of British Negro Slaves” was officially founded
in 1825 by Sue Townsend and Lucy Thompson.
*Like the men, they were indebted to Non-Conformist
religious views such as Quakerism. Unlike the men however,
their official position was to raise charity funds to relieve
suffering, rather than to exist as a ‘political’ organization.
Undermining this distinction, some of the women’s views on
slavery were often highly radical, as can be seen by
Elizabeth Heyricks a noted member of this organization-
called for immediate abolition expressed as early as 1834.
*Similarly, the French also had their own abolition
movement. The “Societe pour L’abolition de L’esclavage”
was founded in Paris in 1834.

9. *The leading economist Hyppolite Passy, was the vice president
and prominent intellectuals like Alexside Tocqueville were
members. This society had similar aims and objectives to that
of the British abolition society, however the French movement
tended to move at a slower pace than the British.
*Unlike the British and the French, the process of
dismantlement of slavery was not gradual, tedious or slow,
instead emancipation did come ultimately from the
Metropolitan government. In the book History for the
Caribbean in the Atlantic World, the author states, “ From the
1830’s the intellectual community in Spain called for the
abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Trade in capturing Africans and a
gradual end to slavery… in 1865 Cubans formed an Anti-Slavery
Trade Association and focused on gradual control of
emancipation.”
*Beckles and Shepherd in their book Liberties Lost stated that,

10. *“ The anti-slavery leaders of the new Spanish republican
government joined together against the enslavers in Cuba and
Puerto Rico. The ‘Grito de Yara’ group in Cuba and the ‘Grito de
Lares’ group in Puerto Rico were fighting a war of emancipation
and had placed anti-slavery ideas at the centre of their
policies.”