42 CONSPIRACY TO EXTORT EMANCIPATION, PLANNED BY SHARPE. childhood, had been long crushed under the iron heel of oppression, now rising in the might of the savage ferocity, so repeatedly but so falsely attributed to them. Even at this hour, incited by revenge and by unchecked success, they displayed no bloodthirstiness that would bear comparison with the spirit displayed, by the conquering soldiers of any European power, in civilized warfare. Many disgusting atrocities were, it is true, attributed to them by the late Peter Borthwick, and other hired advocates of the West India interest, but these, almost without exception, were proved to be unfounded: it would be well if the conduct of the white militia could bear the same investigation. To return to the narrative. The terrified inhabitants of Montego Bay crowded their wives and children on board the few ships, then in the harbour. The militia of the various parishes, who were "keeping guard" as usual during the Christmas holidays, now augmented with the addition of all capable of bearing arms, were assembled in the towns, or distributed on the estates skirting the shore, with the exception of the Western Interior regiment (under the command of Colonel Grignon, the planting attorney† already referred to), which occupied a central position at Belvidere estate, and the barracks of Shettlewood, near the borders of the three parishes, St. James, Hanover, and Westmoreland. On December 28th, Colonel Grignon, with about 150 men, thought proper to quit these stations, and take up a position at Old Montpelier, the property of Lord Seaford, where he was strengthened in the evening by the arrival of the 7th company of the St. James' regiment from Montego Bay. The insurgents, en months in gradually imbuing the minds of his fellow-slaves with the idea that their "free papers had already been sent out and were withheld by their masters; that their friends in England who had done so much for them, now expected them to do something for themselves; that the soldiers had received secret orders not to make war upon them; and, in short, that emancipation would be theirs if they would only be true to the cause, and with one consent stop work after Christmas, and refuse to recommence except for wages. In support of his assertions, he read to them passages from the local papers, and bade them listen to the language uttered by their masters in their own hearing. Being gifted with much natural eloquence, and an excellent memory stored with Scripture, Sharpe roused the enthusiastic minds of his countrymen to a state of extreme excitement, and persuaded them to take on the Bible an oath of secrecy and fidelity. His scheme hinged on the power of passive resistance: doubtless, he said, many would be cruelly tortured, and even killed, but everybody must die some day, and at the worst, the planters could not destroy them all; besides which, the king of England would not suffer it. The opportunities offered by the Baptist prayer-meetings were used by Sharpe for the purpose of spreading his doctrines, and thus it happened that so many members of this denomination were concerned in the outbreak. Had his plan been strictly followed—no | property destroyed, no life assailed, and readiness to work for reasonable wages been very generally manifested, the result might have been different, but the appeal of the missionaries had induced many even of his immediate followers to resolve to stand by their masters; and the Wesleyans, without ex-couraged by Colonel Grignon's retreat, burnt the ception, remained in the ranks of order and submission. Notwithstanding his intimate acquaintance with Holy Writ, and his evidently careful study of life and character, the conspirator had forgotten the emphatic warning, that the beginning of strife was like the letting out of water, and that negroes in the first moments of freedom, snatched by force, would be far beyond human control. And so it proved. On the evening of the 27th December, a few ungovernable spirits, excited, in the first instance, by th- curtailment of their holidays, and infuriated with liquor, set fire to an estate named Kensington, belonging to a Mr. Morris; the example once given was speedily and extensively followed, and incendiary fires burst forth on property after property, until one of the fairest portions of the island became the scene of wide-spread desolation. It is impossible to describe the consternation that prevailed when the fires commenced; the horizon for miles shone with the red glare of the burning estates. None could tell the extent of the danger; and the strongest hearts turned sick at the thought of the horrors enacted so lately in San Domingo. The feelings of many an overseer at that awful hour must have been maddening, as pictures rose before him of bleeding figures, covered with deep welts and gashes; of beings in whom the dignity of manhood, the tenderness of womanhood, and the endearing weakness of *For instance, such quotations as the following: "It must be alarming when whispered that our brethren the BRITISH SOLDIERS, who have been ostensibly stationed for our protection, who are liberally paid by us, the expense of whom forms the chief drain upon our exchequer, have received secret orders to remain neuter, or to act against us, in the event of disturbance !”—(Umbratus' letter, Courant, August 16th, 1831.) deserted barracks, and proceeded to attack Mont- who, by power of attorney, represented the proprietor. DISGRACEFUL CONDUCT OF THE WHITE MILITIA-JAMAICA, 1832. 43 had the 200 or 300 insurgents, for there were no more then in the field, been pursued at once, thousands of well-disposed slaves would have flocked round his standard, and the whole affair would probably have been speedily ended. Two of the ringleaders, who afterwards acquired considerable notoriety under the names of Colonel Gardiner and Captain Dove, declared that they had determined to abandon the enterprise after the repulse at Montpelier, but were inspired with fresh hope on finding the “buckras" (white men) had run away. The negroes soon learned the desertion of Montpelier; they immediately proceeded thither, burnt the buildings, took the corpse of the white man out | of the coffin that had been made for it, threw it into the flames, and substituted that of their own comrade Johnson, whom they buried with the usual ceremonies. Many, who returned to the estates to which they respectively belonged, in reliance upon the promise held out to them, were put to death nevertheless, and thus the proclamation came to be regarded simply as a snare, and numbers held out who would otherwise have gladly surrendered. In one instance, a subaltern officer of militia actually went on an estate about an hour after the general had left it, and without any pretence of trial, shot dead a man whom sir Willoughby had himself expressly pardoned.* Cases such as these induced the negroes to continue the struggle, but it was a hopeless one, for by the able plans of their commander, both the regular troops and militia were effectively employed, and soon reduced to subjection the undisciplined, and, for the most part, unarmed mob. The attack on Montpelier was the only approach to a battle that occurred during the whole insurrection, which sir Willoughby By the desertion of Colonel Grignon's body, nearly completely crushed in a few days; but several subthe whole county of Cornwall, with the exception of sequent weeks were spent by the militia in hunting a few isolated spots round the sea-coast, was left in and taking vengeance upon the wretched fugitives. the hands of the blacks, the militia being generally They marched from estate to estate, shooting every all stationed in, or round about the principal towns negro who attempted to escape; and such was the of the parishes to which they belonged, so that for terror excited by their approach, that the very sight about eight days, the roads were in the possession of of one of them would be the signal for a general the rebels, and hardly a white face was to be seen from flight, while the Maroons were employed in their old Montego Bay to Savanna la Mar, and from Black service of murder and mutilation, the usual premium River to Lucea. Thus the insurgents met with no being offered for every pair of human ears, however obstacle, but went about from place to place destroy-acquired, without any proof being required of the ing everything in the shape of a building, sparing only their own huts, and all places of worship, overpowering the well-disposed slaves, who in many cases attempted to prevent the destruction of their masters' properties, and compelling them, under pain of death, to join their ranks. guilt of their victims. Some few of the militia officers conducted themselves with creditable humanity, but by so doing became extremely unpopular with their fellows. One of them (Mr. Beaumont) in replying from his place in the Assembly, to a taunt respecting the non-efficiency of the corps which he had commanded, declared that by its exertions 1,500 deluded slaves had been brought in, without one life being sacrificed; and held up in strong contrast to the deeds of other bodies, that his soldiers had "killed no old men, no old women, and no children.” soon As soon as tidings of the insurrection arrived at the seat of government (Spanish Town), martial law was proclaimed throughout the island. General Sir Willoughby Cotton, the commander-in-chief, arrived at Montego Bay, January 1st, 1832, with a detachment of the 84th regiment, and on the following day the Blanche frigate arrived from the south side of At a very early period, many persons, suspected of the island, having on board 200 men of the 77th, being concerned in the disturbances, were appreand two companies of the 84th regiments. Sir Wil-hended, tried by court-martial, and executed imloughby spent several days in making himself acquainted with the actual state of the case, and then rightly judging that kindness and leniency, would be more effectual in reclaiming the insurgents and inducing them to return to the estates, than the adoption of violence and excessive severity, he offered, in the king's name, a free pardon to all, who within a limited period, would return to their masters, except the principal leaders and incendiaries. This proclamation had the effect of undeceiving many of the negroes, who had been previously fully persuaded that H.M. troops had come down expressly to take part with them; and it would have been almost alone sufficient to quell the disturbance, but for the bad faith of the majority of the militia officers, whose ungovernable passions had been roused to fury by the destruction committed by the insurgents, and were probably additionally exasperated by the panic to which they had blindly yielded. *By an order of Sir Willoughby Cotton, this person was afterwards tried by court-martial. He did not attempt to deny the act of which he was accused, but in defence, declared that he had acted for the best, and could not tell why, among several similar acts of his, this one should have been brought forward. His planter-judges, in the teeth of the clearest evidence, and even of his own admission, declared the charge not proved. † Parl. Papers (Commons), August, 1832; p. 260. mediately. The mode of destruction was changed from shooting to hanging. At Montego Bay, and the other principal towns, the amount of life thus sacrificed must have been terrific; nor must it be forgotten, that for each slave put to death the master was liberally remunerated by the parish; but for this arrangement the planters might not have been disposed to witness, without remonstrance, the waste of so much property. At Montego Bay alone, above a hundred executions took place; a court-martial sat there daily for some considerable time, and it often happened that men were tried, sentenced, and hanged, all in one hour and a-half.† No return was ever made of the number thus destroyed; the Assembly absolutely refused to answer the questions put to it on this subject by H. M. ministers:‡ but some idea of the extent may be formed by the fact, that one of the local papers gravely announced, after six weeks incessant slaughter, that "the exe The late Sir Fowell Buxton moved in the House of Commons for a return of the number of lives lost on either side, the sentences passed by the respective courts, and the punishments actually inflicted, with various other information which it was highly desirable to obtain. Returns to this effect were demanded through the governor, Lord Mulgrave, but obstinately resisted by the planters, who might well shrink from offering an exposition of their sanguinary excesses. 44 WANTON DESTRUCTION OF HUMAN LIFE-JAMAICA, 1832. cutions during the week have been considerably diminished, being in number only fourteen," and this related exclusively to the town of Montego Bay. The effect of such continuous carnage on the public mind, was to render it utterly callous to the very sights which were intended, it is to be hoped, to "three men led out, tied up to the gallows, and serve as a warning. "I have seen," says Mr. Bleby, launched into eternity, in the public market-place; and the people around buying and selling, and scarcely turning round their heads to look at the awful scene that was passing in their presence, so entirely had they become familiarized with the slaughter of their fellow-men. The gallows erected in the public square, in the centre of the town, was rarely without occupants. Generally four, seldom less than three, were hung at once." The bodies remained stiffening in the breeze, till the courtmartial sent other victims to the hands of the executioner, a savage brutal fellow, who would then ascend the ladder which rested against the fatal beam, and with his knife cut the ropes, and let the corpses fall heavily to the ground. The poor creatures, newly arrived, were then suspended in the vacant places, and in turn, removed to make room for others; the accumulating heap remaining at the gallows-foot, until the workhouse negroes came in the evening, carted it away as if it had been so much dung, and flung it into a pit dug for the purpose, a little way out of the town. In receiving any sepulture at all, these unfortunates were, however, better treated than their comrades who had fallen in the open field, for they were left to rot where they fell; and years afterwards, the bones of scores of human beings, whose flesh had been devoured by carrion, remained to taint the heated air, and bear loathsome testimony to the barbarities of war.-(Parl. Papers, August, 1832; p. 261.) 4 and stepping aside, gave the fatal order, Make ready— The above is a specimen of a formal trial; but many were put to death by the decree of what was called a drum-head court-martial, and some without any pretence of official investigation whatever. In allow men, many of whom had been recently reall cases it was the veriest mockery of justice, to duced to the verge of ruin, to sit in judgment upon those, by whom they had been thus injured; under such circumstances, it was not to be supposed that they would be capable of impartially weighing the merits of the cases brought before them. A planter would come from his estate, driven thence by the insurgents, gnashing his teeth, and literally foaming with rage against the negroes; and a few hours after, that same person might be by whom he had been, or by whom he believed himseen presiding at a court-martial, and sending those self to have been aggrieved, to die by the bullet or the halter. Where life was spared, other severe punishments instances to 500 lashes, and occasionally terminated were inflicted. The floggings extended in some fatally, which is not to be wondered at, since the cat having nine thongs, the number of lashes amounted in effect to 4,500. From twenty to thirty persons would be successively tied up to the gallows-foot, and after receiving a certain number of lashes, were cast until they were sufficiently recovered to crawl to a aside to lie bleeding and fainting about the streets, place of shelter. (Parl. Papers, Aug., 1832; p. 259.) It need hardly be stated, that no very conclusive evidence was required to secure the conviction of the accused. Mr. Bleby gives the following account all the negroes who still held out, having neither On the 8th of February, the governor, Lord Belof one of the many trials at which he was present :— more, repealed martial-law, and offered pardon to “A man named George Spence was charged with re- giving themselves up within 10 days, with the surrendered nor been captured, on condition of their bellion and rebellious conspiracy. All that was proved exception only of the principal ringleaders. Great against him was, that he was present in a crowd of persons popular outcry was raised at these measures; and when the buildings of an estate were burning. Much of in fact, though intended to stop the slaughter the evidence was elicited from himself, in answer to in- which had been so long suffered to continue, they quiries put by the president of the court; but nothing only partially checked it. Courts-martial were supercame out to show that he had borne arms or taken any seded by slave-courts; and although these included part with the insurgents. Leading questions were pro- trial by jury, yet the alleged criminals were little posed, the design of which was to criminate Mr. Burchell, benefited by the change, since both judges and the Baptist missionary, then on his land. way from EngBurchell told you you were to be free at Christ-jurors were generally planters. The prisons were still mas, didn't he?' Didn't Burchell say that you must crowded with captives charged with having taken fight for freedom?' In answer to these and similar ques- part in the insurrection, and as if enough blood had tions, the poor man said he didn't know Mr. Burchell; he not been shed already, a general gaol delivery was not a Baptist, but belonged to Mr. Watson's church. took place, after the most approved Jamaica fashion, The manifest impropriety of such proceedings induced an officer present, though not a member of the court, to in- estates to which they belonged, to be executed there, and nearly the whole were sent to the different terfere and protest against them. silenced, the court cleared, and the prisoner led out to be comrades. However, he was as a means of striking terror into the breasts of their shot. That the formality of passing sentence had been teen negroes led out at once to be hanged; these were omitted, I am not prepared to say, but I heard the man followed by fourteen the day after, and the day after "One day," says Mr. Bleby, "I saw nineinquire as he came out, What are you going to do with that by twenty-two;" and this system was being carme?' The marshal replied, with a bitter sneer, never mind; you will see presently what will be done with attention of the governor being at length called to O you ried out in more than one parish at a time. The you.' He was marched direct to the market-place, and tied between the posts of the gallows. Observing the these proceedings, he directed that no more execusoldiers load their muskets, he seemed to apprehend the tions should take place without his sanction; but truth, and in great alarm repeated his former inquiry. Gardiner, or Colonel Gardiner, as he was termed, a No reply was made, but the officer, commanding the de- noted leader of the insurgents, was hanged upon the tachment, took the jacket the man had worn, and threw it estate to which he belonged, in defiance of this over his head, tying the sleeves loosely round the neck, prohibition. PROPERTY AND LIFE LOST DURING THE INSURRECTION. 45 gressed the laws of his country, vindicated the missionaries from any share whatever in the insurrection, and exhorted all his hearers to practise the christian duties enjoined by their ministers. He declared emphatically, "I depend for salvation upon the Redeemer who shed his blood upon Calvary for sinners." In a few moments the executioner had done his work, and a man, endowed with capacities far above mediocrity, and whose ardent thirst for liberty for himself and his fellows, had alone led him into the grievous but too common error of seeking right ends by wrong means, had been cut off from the earth, as if too vile to live. The number of lives lost during the insurrection cannot now be exactly ascertained, the Assembly having, as before stated, refused to make any return on the subject. Of the white population probably not twelve persons perished; of the negroes there is reason to believe at least 1,500 must have been sacrificed. The destruction of property was unquestionably very large, although the committee of the House of Assembly much exaggerated the facts, in stating it at £1,111,628 88. 9d. currency, equal to £666,977 18. 3d. sterling. This included the loss occasioned by the destruction of buildings, grass, and cane-fields, robbery and plunder of every description, damage done to the existing and succeeding crops, loss of the labour of slaves, and the marketable value of the vast amount of life wantonly destroyed during and after the disturbances. To this was to be added the sum of £165,000, being the military expense incurred during the period of martial law, and another sum, not specified, incurred afterwards for the pay and rations of a portion of the Maroons, as well as detachments of militia employed in hunt-instance of violence was committed by them until ing fugitive slaves. Upwards of 160 properties, of various kinds, were desolated by the hands of the incendiaries, leaving thousands of people homeless; and the militia following the example of the negroes, without any politic reason to plead in excuse, utterly destroyed the huts upon many properties, under the pretence of retaliation; but the loss ultimately fell upon the proprietors, at whose expense they were necessarily rebuilt, before the disaffected could be brought to their usual employments. The mischief done in this respect would have been much greater, but for the interposition of Sir W. Cotton, who was much blamed for this, as for other judicious measures. | Of the other conspirators, none equalled him in ability; but their behaviour, and, indeed, the whole conduct of the insurgents, from first to last, proved beyond dispute that their object in the struggle was not blood, plunder, or revenge in any shape, but solely freedom, and this they firmly believed to have been conceded by the Imperial Parliament, and wrongfully withheld by the colonists. No single after the executions by martial law had commenced. Then they perpetrated the literally few barbarities of which they were really guilty. On the 5th of April, 1832, Mr. Jones, a member of the "Rebellion Committee," stated in the House of Assembly, that "Mrs. Holmes and Mrs. Pearce were the only persons whose husbands were murdered during the rebellion." Mr. Pearce, who belonged to the Hanover regiment of militia, having imprudently ventured into the interior alone, and in his military dress, fell into the hands of a small party of negroes, who slew him with their cutlasses, and left his mangled body lying in the road, where it was soon afterwards found by a body of militia. The principals in The leaders of the insurrection were all captured this horrid transaction were afterwards captured and at an early period. Sharpe, as before stated, ac- executed at Montego Bay, with the bloody clothes of knowledged himself to have been the originator of their victims tied about their necks, and the head of the conspiracy. He admitted that as an individual their leader was cut off and carried to Welcome he had had no cause to complain of the treatment he Estate, to which he had belonged, to be set on a had received. His master, Samuel Sharpe, Esq., pole as an object of terror to others. The most and the family, had always been very kind to him; cruel act perpetrated by the insurgents was the but he thought white people had no more right to murder of Mr. Holmes, in the presence of his wife. keep black people in slavery, than black people Two other white men were reported to have been could have to make white people slaves; and, for his killed by small bodies of negroes, into whose hands part, he would rather die than live in slavery. He they feil. In reference to violence offered to females, expressed sorrow that he should have been the cause concerning which so many vague charges were made, of so great destruction of life and property, but de-only one solitary case was ever authenticated. clared that it had formed no part of his plan of passive resistance. Mr. Bleby (who, with two other ministers, was requested to procure from him evidence respecting the origin of the rebellion) endeavoured to convince him that he had sinned in violently asserting his claim to freedom, and at length drew from him the admission, "I have done wrong in that, but I cast myself upon the atonement." After this, the missionaries were prohibited by the magistrates from visiting the prisoners. Some weeks elapsed before Sharpe's execution, on the 23rd of May, 1832. Long confinement in a close and noisome dungeon had not impaired his courage; he walked to the scaffold with a calm, firm bearing, and, unappalled by the near approach of an ignominious death, or by the number of spectators, who, in consequence of the notoriety he had acquired, had assembled to witness it; he addressed them with a clear, unfaltering voice, acknowledged that he had violently trans-prevent inquiry into the doings of a period in which sooner than remain in slavery.-(Parl. Papers, Commons, 1832.) *The negroes who were executed, almost without exception, manifested remarkable firmness; many declared that if they had twenty lives they would sacrifice them all, | Fifty thousand negroes were probably more or less concerned in the insurrection, and out of these perhaps twenty were accessory to acts of personal violence. When it is considered how many defenceless familiest of men, women, and children, were completely in their power, and that it is the very nature of war to give a free rein to every evil passion, that moreover a large part of these negroes were totally devoid of any religious instruction, that they had groaned and writhed under the lash, and been for years subjected to the most degrading and grinding oppression,-the wonder is, and ever must be, not the excesses of the few, but the moderation of the many. The cold-blooded murders committed by the militia were known to be numerous, and the assembly when called together at the close of the "Reign of Terror," hastened to pass a bill of indemnity, to The planters and overseers were scarcely in any in 46 CRUELTIES INFLICTED ON THE SLAVES IN JAMAICA, 1832. all law, and even Christianity itself, was considered to be abrogated. The opportunity afforded by the insurrection was availed of for the persecution of many slaves, whose religious character and habits had rendered them objects of ill will. One of them, Henry Williams, whose name had previously been brought before the notice of the British public in connexion with the unjust treatment he had received at the instigation of the Rev. Mr. Bridges, the rector of St. Ann's, had long been a marked man with the anti-sectarian, or rather anti-religion party. Although there had been no disturbance, and no evidence of insubordination in the parish of St. Ann's, Henry Williams was taken from the estate which he was superintending during the absence of the white people on militia duty, and questioned concerning what the missionaries had preached about, &c. His answers were deemed unsatisfactory and impertinent, and he was sentenced to receive some hundred lashes. Part of the punishment only was inflicted, because a medical man declared that if it were continued, he would die under it. Another case was that of a negro at Falmouth, named Lamont, who was also flogged, not for any share, real or alleged, in the insurrection, but simply for being a Methodist. Three hundred strokes, i.e. 2,700 lashes, were inflicted upon him, and he was sent to the workhouse for life; where, separated from his wife and children, degraded and oppressed, he soon sunk under the effects of the torture of body and mind to which he had been so causelessly subjected. broken down his frame, as it had done many an one before, and did many an one after; so that he lingered only a few months, spent in communion with the church of which he had been a consistent member, and then his spirit passed away, rejoicing in the dawn of the freedom which his children and his countrymen were soon to inherit. As an instance of the minor oppressions daily committed by overseers in compliance with the dictates of that fiendish spirit of tyrannous cruelty which, in all ages, and among all races, is found, like every other fearful propensity, to grow the faster the more it is indulged, I cite the following passage, from the Journal of the Rev. Mr. Bleby, not as by any means exhibiting an extraordinarily heinous case, but simply as an illustration of the every-day workings of the slave system, in its ameliorated form, as it prevailed in the West Indies in the year 1832, at a period when the planters impudently asserted, that if compelled to change their state with that of a slave or a free British labourer, they would choose the lot of the former : "One day soon after the rebellion, while I was residing at Montego Bay, a gang of negroes were repairing the road opposite the house in which I lived. I observed a decent. looking man, with an iron collar fastened about his neck, fainting by the road-side, apparently from exhaustion and loss of blood, with which his shirt and pantaloons were saturated. I called the driver, and requested that he would allow the sufferer to come over to my house, and take something to revive him, as he appeared so much exfind that he was one of our own members, who had distinhausted. When he was brought over, was surprised to and courage James Malcolm, a class-leader among the Method-guished himself in the late disturbances by his faithfulness in defence of his master's property. On inists, had rendered himself extremely obnoxious to the quiring what had brought him into his present circumoverseer of the property to which he belonged, by stances, he stated, that on account of the cruelties of the having more than once stood in the way of his guilty overseer, a number of the negroes on the estate had fled pleasures, by persuading female slaves to marry and into the woods. To revenge this, the overseer had taken live consistently with their Christian profession, for away or spoiled everything he could find belonging to the whom the overseer had other and very different views. fugitives, and, without any provocation, had entered his Such offences were too great to be forgiven, and house, and destroyed the little property he possessed, although the unfortunate slave was actually employed whilst he was at work as usual. On learning this, he during the rebellion, as a pioneer to the militia, and went to inquire why he had been so dealt with; but the on the restoration of tranquillity sent back to his overseer answered him only by calling him a rebel and a master's estate, yet through the malice of the oversectarian ; and then beat him severely about the face with seer he was forwarded to take his trial as a rebel, swollen features bore ample testimony. Not satisfied with his fists, to which statement the poor man's bruised and and would have been hung but for the strenuous this, the overseer sent him to the cage' [prison], and exertions of the missionaries, Messrs. Murray and lodged a complaint against him before a magistrate, by Bleby, who, by causing the intended victim to be whom he was dispatched to the workhouse, and sentenced subpoenaed on an approaching trial, procured his to receive three hundred lashes. When the punishment removal by writ of habeas corpus to Montego Bay, had been inflicted, a collar and chain were fastened round trusting that during the delay thus occasioned some- the sufferer's neck, and he was turned out, all mangled thing might transpire to save his life. The gov- and faint, with his clothes soaked in blood, to labour in ernor's prohibition of further executions, without his the streets." own warrant, had the desired effect. The man was removed to his own parish, tried by a slave-court, committee (whose proceedings have been already reImmediately after the abolition of martial law, a and condemned to death; but the sentence, notwith-ferred to) was appointed by the House of Assembly standing the opposition of the overseer, was com- to examine into the origin and consequences of the muted to imprisonment and hard labour for life. insurrection. Under the weak government of the The prisoner's gentle and inoffensive conduct during Earl of Belmore, the popular faction carried matters his confinement, pleaded for him: he obtained a with a high hand; and the sole design of this movepardon from the benevolent Earl of Mulgrave, and ment was to obtain aid from Great Britain, and shelter was restored to his wife and family. But the irons themselves from deserved censure by casting it abunwith which he had been loaded, lamed him for life, dantly where it was least merited. The men chosen and the horrible ordeal of a Jamaica workhouse had for the investigation† were, with only two excep stance, however tyrannical their previous conduct, subjected to personal violence, or even insult. *The attorney-general gave it as his opinion that "martial law abrogated all law," and a colonel of militia gravely asserted, that "martial law abrogated Christianity." A singular fatality attended the thirteen men who formed that committee, for, although mostly in the prime of manhood, before as many years had elapsed, they had all, except one, passed from the earth. The chairman (L. Lynch) secretly left the island a few months after, a defaulter to a large amount, with regard to property en |