BAPTISMAL RECORDS IN THE STUDY OF THE ILLEGAL HAVANA SLAVE TRADE, 1821-1843 By Andrew George Barsom A THESIS Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of History—Master of Arts 2017 ABSTRACT BAPTISMAL RECORDS IN THE STUDY OF THE ILLEGAL HAVANA SLAVE TRADE, 1821-1843 By Andrew George Barsom This thesis describes a dataset drawn from the baptismal registers of four Havana-area churches. Baptism entries date from between 1821 and 1843 and include the baptisms of 7,181 Africans. The goal of creating this thesis is to understand more precisely the demographics of the illegal slave trade, which carried hundreds of thousands of Africans to Cuba over the course of the nineteenth century. It includes data on the age, sex, ethnicity, origin, and legal status of these Africans. Results are then compared to other sources of data on Africans trafficked to Havana during this period and the implications are discussed. TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................................iv LIST OF FIGURES ...............................................................................................................v Introduction and Background ................................................................................................1 Methods..................................................................................................................................7 Results ....................................................................................................................................10 Comparisons and Analysis.....................................................................................................19 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................28 APPENDIX ............................................................................................................................30 ENDNOTES ..........................................................................................................................51 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................57 iii LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Africans Baptized at Havana Churches, 1821-1843 ...............................................11 Table 2. African Ethnic Denominations (Nations) ...............................................................13 Table 3. Region of Origin for Baptized Africans, 1821-1843 ..............................................17 Table 4. Average Age by African Region of Origin, 1821-1843 .........................................17 Table 5. Region of Origin for Disembarked Africans, 1821-1843 .......................................21 Table 6. Sex Ratio by Nation: Mixed Commission vs. Baptismal Registers .......................25 Table 7. Average Age by Sex: Mixed Commission and Baptized Africans ........................25 Table A.1. Jesus, María y José, 1821-1843 ..........................................................................31 Table A.2. Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, 1821-1843 ........................................................35 Table A.3. Nuestra Señora de Regla, 1821-1843..................................................................39 Table A.4. Santo Angel de Custodio, 1821-1843 .................................................................43 Table A.5. Emancipados .......................................................................................................47 iv LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Legal Status at Time of Baptism, 1821-1843 ........................................................11 Figure 2. Age of Baptized Africans, 1821-1843 ...................................................................13 Figure 3. Sex Ratio by Nationality, 1821-1843 ....................................................................18 Figure 4. Africans in Havana, 1821-1843 .............................................................................20 Figure 5. Origin of Disembarked Africans, 1821-1843 ........................................................23 Figure 6. Origin of Baptized Africans, 1821-1843 ...............................................................23 v Introduction and Background In the historical study of the Atlantic slave trade, the Cuban branch during the 1820s and 1830s is intriguing for several reasons. The first is that it was illegal. While Cuba and Brazil were by far the largest importers of enslaved Africans during the nineteenth century, only in Cuba was the slave trade entirely prohibited beginning in 1820; the Brazilian slave trade remained legal south of the equator for years. Unlike other contraband trades, which were illegal owing to their failure to comply with taxes and regulations, the Atlantic slave trade was prohibited as a matter of humanitarian principle. The inherent immorality ascribed to the slave trade itself made slave trafficking a “qualitatively different” sort of criminal enterprise than other kinds of smuggling.1 It is somewhat murky the degree to which the growing international consensus against the slave trade on moral grounds affected its manner of conduct—aside from its decline in volume—over the course of the nineteenth century, and while this question is beyond the scope of the present thesis, it remains ripe for future inquiry. From a methodological perspective, studying contraband trade networks necessarily creates challenges for historians. For scholars of the slave trade in the pre-abolition era, there are a wide range of extant sources in the archive upon which to draw. These include company ledgers, port entry/exit records, shipping manifests, and the figures kept by a variety of government institutions involved in the regulation and taxation of slave traders.2 Between 1789, when the Bourbon reforms opened Cuba to the Atlantic slave trade, and 1820, when the slave trade was legally prohibited in Spanish possessions, Havana port officials regularly noted the arrival of slave ships inbound from the African coast.3 After 1820, slavers employed tactics like false itineraries and the clandestine landing of slaves in order to avoid detection. As a result, many of the official sources historians typically rely on for measuring slave traffic were not 1 produced in settings where the slave trade was outlawed. Study of the illegal Cuban slave trade therefore requires different investigatory methods. Perhaps the most widely used source of information about the illegal Cuban slave trade are the records of British officials in Havana. Beginning in the 1820s, Britain established an extensive network of anti-slave trade officials and operatives in Havana with the aim of ensuring Spanish and Cuban adherence to the 1817 treaty abolishing the Atlantic slave trade. While some slave ships were apprehended by the British navy as they entered the Caribbean upon return from the African coast, many more escaped capture and successfully ended their voyages in Cuban ports. Their activity was frequently reported to British officials in Havana by a purportedly large network of informants.4 Unfortunately, few specifics are known about many of these slaving voyages. While a British diplomat in Havana might receive reports of a slave ship disgorging a certain number of African slaves along the coast east of Havana, its point of origin on the African coast and details about its captive cargo could remain obscure. Acting on this information, British officials could request an inquiry on the part of the Spanish colonial authorities, but the resulting reports can be either described generously as half-hearted, or, more accurately, as sandbagging on behalf of slave-trading interests.5 The best-documented illegal slaving expeditions were those that ended in capture by ships of the British navy and condemned before Mixed Commission courts established to prosecute slave traffickers in Sierra Leone, Havana, and additional locations in the South Atlantic. In addition to reliable information about a slave vessel’s itinerary, Mixed Commission registers note the name, age, height, and sex of every surviving African captive. Over the last decade, historians—most notably David Eltis—have begun to publish large-scale data drawn from Mixed Commission records. Indeed, one of the most exciting developments to come out of 2 the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (TSTD) project, hosted for the last decade by Emory University at www.slavevoyages.org, is the African Names Database, accessible at the primary TSTD website and, with the addition of multimedia content, at its own domain as the African Origins project (www.african-origins.com).6 Currently, African Origins contains information on more than 90,000 Africans, including educated guesses as to the ethnic provenance of individuals based on their recorded names. Henry Lovejoy, a member of the African Origins team, has compiled and analyzed those records produced in Havana and produced a dataset of more than 10,000 liberated Africans, referred to as emancipados.7 In addition to names, physical characteristics, sex, and age estimates, Mixed Commission registers in Havana also noted the supposed African nación, or “nation” of emancipados.8 As with the African Origins dataset, this information is available online through the Liberated Africans Project (www.liberatedafricans.org). While the Mixed Commission data is detailed and extensive, it represents only a relatively small portion of the African population trafficked to Cuba during the era of the illegal slave trade. Furthermore, it is worth considering the extent to which this portion—comprising those aboard slave ships interdicted by the British navy—is representative of slave trafficking patterns in their entirety. Aside from the above-mentioned methodological considerations that make the illegal slave trade between Africa and Cuba interesting to historians, the time in question—1821 to 1843—witnessed a number of significant developments in Cuban slave society that would weigh heavily on the remainder of the nineteenth century. Assisted by the application of industrial machinery, sugar production expanded dramatically across the island, prompting a dramatic increase in illegal slave imports peaking only in the late 1830s.9 Alongside (and in part the inevitable demographic result of) this surge in enslaved Africans arriving in Cuba, a growing 3 population of free Africans and African-descended people lived and worked in its urban centers. By 1841, white Cubans comprised less than 42% of the island’s population, with slaves and free people of African descent forming a substantial majority.10 These shifts culminated in the slave insurrections of 1843 and the draconian response that followed in 1844—called the “year of the lash” for the widespread violence the colonial state employed in its crackdown on Afro-Cuban communities.11 Along with the imposition of harsh new restrictions on the activities of free blacks and pardos, slave imports were finally curtailed, albeit temporarily and for reasons having nothing to do with anti-slavery. Given the above-mentioned limitations on the types of source materials available for the study of illegal slave trafficking, it is necessary to reconstruct slave trading patterns from a variety of perspectives. British consular records contain the most comprehensive account of contraband slaving voyages, but they are often limited to only the most general information and rarely mention anything in detail about the African captives themselves, who are of particular interest to historians of pre-colonial Africa and the African Diaspora. Mixed Commission registries, on the other hand, contain significantly richer information about the enslaved Africans who were the victims of the illegal slave trade. As a result, we currently know more about some illegal-era slaving voyages and the composition of their human cargos than we do about otherwise well-documented slaving expeditions during the legal era. However, this information is limited to a relatively small percentage of slave trafficking voyages during the nineteenth century. One way to get around this obstacle is to employ source materials that may not be directly related to the Atlantic slave trade itself, but can produce data that speaks to its results. When slaves were bought and sold within the island of Cuba, notaries made records of these 4 transactions, including information about the slave him/herself. Laird Bergad, Fe Iglesias García, and María del Carmen Barcia compiled data from more than 23,000 slave sales that took place between 1790 and 1880 in Havana, Santiago, and Cienfuegos.12 This data set describes slaves’ gender, age, nation, occupational skills, and their price. Because African-born slaves were described as belonging to a certain nation, it is easy to identify those individuals who were trafficked to Cuba, although it is not usually possible to connect any one person to the slave ship in which they crossed the Atlantic. On the other hand, unlike the Mixed Commission registers, slave transactions documented in notarial protocol records were not limited to slaves who happened to be aboard one of the several dozen vessels captured by British warships and impounded in Havana. In theory, they amount to a sample taken from the entire African slave population of nineteenth-century Cuba. This study focuses on a different genre of documents that, like slave sale records, provide a window into the demographics of African slaves within Cuba. These are the baptismal records of the Catholic Church. In Catholic slave societies, like nineteenth-century Cuba, African slaves were frequently baptized and christened in accordance with Church doctrine. As a result, church archives dating from the period (and other periods as well, up to the present day) contain large volumes of baptismal registers, in which priests made note of each baptism their performed. Many historians have already employed these sources to develop demographic datasets with which to study the social history of Catholic slave societies.13 As Mariza de Carvalho Soares observes, “in the absence of any secular civil registers, the baptism document often provided the only official written information attesting to a person’s identity.”14 One of the advantages baptismal records have over slave sales as a means by which to measure a population is that the same individual, by rule, could not have been baptized twice. 5 Thus, each baptismal entry in a church register refers to the baptism ceremony of a unique individual. Another strength of baptismal records is their uniformity. While certain priests included details that others neglected, there is a baseline standard of information present in every baptismal entry regardless of circumstances. The purpose of this study is to explore the utility of baptismal records as a source of demographic information about the Atlantic slave trade. While baptismal documents, just like slave sales, do not directly inform us about the process of slave trafficking itself, the very presence of the people whose baptism ceremonies they record can fill in some of the blind spots created in the archive by the illegality of the slave trade after 1820. In addition, these records can tell us something about the lives of African slaves after they left the slave ship. The data collected from Havana baptismal records and described in this study compels two main conclusions about the Havana slave trade in the decades following the legal abolition of the transatlantic slave trade. First, slave smugglers brought captives to Cuba from across the African continent, with no single provenance predominating.15 This sets Cuba apart from other major American slave societies, where the slave trade was often dominated by traffic from a few African ports and, consequently, the African-born population was more homogeneous.16 The sheer diversity of the African population of nineteenth-century Havana was without precedent. Second, the demographics of the illegal Cuban slave trade varied depending on the region of the African coast. While the age of African captives was consistent across the continent, some regions produced far more male slaves for export, while others produced a more even balance of males and females. 6 Methods First, I must acknowledge that the present study owes its existence to the work conducted by Jane Landers’ Ecclesiastical and Secular Sources for Slave Societies (ESSSS) project at Vanderbilt University (hosted online at http://www.vanderbilt.edu/esss/). ESSSS is an online collection of hundreds of thousands of digitized documents from archives in Cuba, Brazil, and Colombia, including many thousands of pages of baptismal registers from Cuban churches dating from between 1821 and 1843. Without the arduous work of ESSSS team members who created and assembled this collection of images, the dataset described in this thesis would not have been possible. ESSSS has published images of baptismal registers from seven different Havana-area churches. Of these, only four have published baptism entries dating from 1821 to 1843. They are the church of Santo Angel de Custodio, located in the north end of the old, walled city, Jesús, María, y José, situated in Havana outside the city walls, Nuestra Señora de Regla, across the harbor from Havana itself, and Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, in the town of Guanabacoa approximately two kilometers east of Regla. Fortunately, these records are complete for the entire 23-year period of interest.17 Each baptismal entry contains the following information, without exception: First, the priest recorded the date of the ceremony, followed by his own name and title and the name of the church where the baptism was performed. The gender of the individual baptized, their Christian name, and at least one godparent serving as a witness. In the case of Africans baptized in colonial Cuba, the priest almost always made note of an individual’s nationality and age grade (almost all were listed as adults). If the African being baptized was a slave, and most were, the name of the slave owner was included as well. Africans who were emancipados, or those individuals aboard slave ships condemned by the court of the Mixed Commission in Havana, often were identified along with their official number as a registered emancipado, the name of 7 their appointed supervisor under whom they worked as indentured laborers until they were granted full freedom, as well as the name of the slaving vessel to which their cases pertained. However, for emancipados this information was included with much less reliability than nationality and age grade. Before 1840, priests occasionally estimated the age (in years) of the baptized African, but this was exceptional and applied most frequently to emancipados. Over the last three years of the sample, priests recorded age estimates for most African slaves and emancipados. I encountered several persistent problems while transcribing baptismal entries into spreadsheet format. Some of these had to do with difficulty deciphering certain priests’ handwriting. For this researcher, clarity of writing was most often problematic when attempting to transcribe an unusual African ethnic denomination. If, after consulting Jesús Guanche’s Africanía y Etnicidad en Cuba, I could not identify the nationality in question, a note was made and the attribute consigned to the category “Other/Unknown.”18 In other cases, the confounding nationality was adjoined to a common meta-denomination, such as gangá, or lucumí. In these instances, a note was made and the individual was identified simply by the meta-denomination. Individuals’ names were often frequently an area of struggle, especially the surnames of slave owners; I made a best attempt at transcription and noted the probable error. The most frequently encountered problems, however, owed to shortcomings in the digitization process. Many ESSSS images are, unfortunately, out of focus (sometimes dramatically so). At times, a reading can still be made of their contents, but some simply require eventual replacement. In other situations where digital imaging was carried out effectively, the binding-style of the church volumes obscures large segments of text when viewed from directly above. In and out of the archive, an 8 oblique perspective would be required to make a full reading of these entries. When certain categories of information were inaccessible due to these circumstances, they were left blank. 9 Results In total, these four churches contain the baptisms of at least 7,181 Africans from January 1, 1821 to December 31, 1843.19 3,246 of these baptisms were performed at the church of Santo Angel de Custodio in Havana, 1,661 at Jesús, María y José, 1,312 in Guanabacoa, and 962 in Regla (see Table 1). This distribution is unsurprising given the relative population density of the four parishes. Out of these 7,181 Africans, 6,548 were enslaved at the time of their baptism (See Figure 1). 585 were emancipados, and only 23 were free at the time they were baptized. Of those 23 free Africans, several were former emancipados who had become fully free residents of Havana. Some of the remainder were granted freedom by their owners at the time of their baptism ceremony, while others’ path to freedom remains a mystery. The legal status of the remaining 25 individuals could not be determined. 2,956 baptisms were of females, comprising 41.3% of the population. Over the same period of time, 4,203 males were baptized as well, a 58.7% majority. The preponderance of male slaves can be expected, given that slave traders usually carried majority-male cargos. More surprising, at least on its face, are the 6,895 slaves listed as “adults” compared to a mere 20 children and infants (the remaining total were not clearly identified as belonging to either age cohort). As it turns out based on age estimates sometimes included by priests in baptismal entries, many so-called adults were in fact children as young as seven. Henry Lovejoy suggests that the distinction between adults and children in the context of the slave trade was often made by height rather than age or maturity.20 In this case, it appears that priests used the term “adult” to designate most anyone receiving the sacraments who was too old to be considered an infant or very young child. In the context of Havana baptismal records, therefore, “adult” should simply be interpreted to mean “not an infant.” 10 Table 1. Africans Baptized at Havana Churches, 1821-1843 Church Number of Baptisms Performed Jesús, María, y José 1,661 Nuestra Señora de Regla 962 Nuestra Señora de la Asunción de Guanabacoa 1,312 Santo Angel de Custodio 3,246 All Churches 7,181 Figure 1. Fortunately, age estimates are available for 807 individuals, concentrated heavily in the last three to four years of the sample. While these ages are almost uniformly guesses made by the priest performing the baptism, they still offer a general picture of the age distribution of African slaves in Havana. For reasons having to do with human physical development and 11 maturation, Havana priests’ estimates of age were almost certainly more accurate for children and young teenagers than for adults. In fact, as the estimated age of baptized Africans reached into the twenties and thirties, priests gravitated toward “round” figures such as 25, 30, and 35, making age data valuable only in assigning individuals to age cohorts. Nevertheless, the data is sufficient to paint a clear picture of how old baptized Africans in Havana were. Estimated ages range from a youthful two years of age on one end to 55 on the other. Overall, the mean age estimate was 19.29 years old, with a standard deviation of 6.7 years. The result is a strikingly normal distribution (see Figure 2), with the uneven slope on the higher end of the chart the result of unsure priests assigning many apparent twenty-somethings the approximate age of “25.” Women and girls averaged just under 17.7 years of age, while males were somewhat older at 20.03 years. Out of the 7,181 Africans baptized, 6,962 were identified with an African nation that could be determined. Most of the remainder were also recorded as belonging to a nation, but the precise nationality could not be determined due to document condition and photographic error. Only a small number of baptismal entries neglected to mention the nation of the baptized individual. In these cases, the African was either described simply as an African, or his/her nationality and provenance were omitted entirely. While I identified 72 different nations among this group, nearly 94 percent were referred to only by one of 8 main meta-denominations: Arará, Carabalí, Congo, Gangá, Lucumí, Macua, Mandinga, and Mina. A large majority of the remaining nations fell within the umbrella of one of these eight denominations. For a detailed accounting of this breakdowns, see Table 2. The significance of these national denominations has been the subject of considerable debate. It certainly reasonable to conclude, as Africanists have, that there is a danger in equating the nationalities attributed to African slaves in Cuba with 12 Figure 2. Table 2. African Ethnic Denominations (Nations) Arará Arará Arará Magi Arará Quatro Ojos Lucumí Arará Arará Total 282 3 1 4 290 Carabalí Carabalí Carabalí Bambare Carabalí Briani Carabalí Bricamo Carabalí Brican Carabalí Camarón Carabalí Sicuato Carabalí Elugo Carabalí Isa Carabalí Mogo Carabalí Oluso Carabalí Oru 1,203 1 1 20 5 2 7 15 1 1 2 5 13 Table 2. (cont’d) Carabalí Ososo Carabalí Osusun Carabalí Papa Carabalí Suama Carabalí Uque Carabalí Viví Carabalí Total 2 1 12 26 1 23 1,330 Congo Congo Congo Luango Congo Mani Congo Mondongo Congo Mozambique Congo Murenque Congo Musconde Congo Musundi Congo Solongo Congo Total 1,345 59 1 30 1 1 1 19 1 1,469 Gangá Gangá Gangá Beri Gangá Briche Gangá Fai Ganga Longoba Ganga Mani Ganga Nongoa Gangá Total 1,336 1 3 2 32 3 1 1,379 Lucumí Cacanda Lucumí Lucumí Chambá Lucumí Ello Lucumí Llebu Lucumí Nago Lucumí Total 1 1,707 3 42 2 1 1,756 Macua Macua Mozambique 242 10 14 Table 2. (cont’d) Macua Total 252 Mandinga Baluandro Cacheu Mandinga Mandinga de Cabo Verde Mandinga Soso Mandinga Total 1 1 188 1 1 192 Mina Mina Mina Ata Mina Fanti Mina Popo Mina Total 230 1 7 55 294 Other/Unknown Baza Combe Crinia Guinda Lula Mambaza Unknown Seusiva Tacome Wi Yanvaire Yeru Zambani Other/Unknown Total 1 1 1 1 1 1 208 1 1 1 1 1 219 Grand Total 7,181 cultural or political identities that would have been meaningful in the African homeland.21 Nevertheless, the historical literature makes it clear that national denominations played a significant role in organizing colonial Afro-Cuban society.22 Furthermore, while the significance of shared Ganga or Congo identity in the African setting is dubious, these nationalities serve as 15 very reliable indicators of geographical provenance.23 For example, Africans belonging to the Mandinga nation were brought to Cuba by slave ships visiting ports along the coast of presentday Guinea-Conakry and Guinea-Bissau. For Gangás, the middle passage began in what is now Sierra Leone and Liberia. Minas, Ararás, and Lucumís would nearly all have been sold to Cubabound slavers along the Bight of Benin littoral, while Calabarí Africans came from the Bight of Biafra. The denomination Congo corresponds to Bantu-speaking Africans embarked somewhere along the Central African coast between present-day Gabon and Angola, while Macuas came from the Indian Ocean coastline of present-day Mozambique. I have thus collapsed the eight main national denominations into a set of five geographical regions (see Table 3). “Upper Guinea” includes those Africans belonging to the Mandinga and Gangá nations. Evidence from the baptismal entries of emancipados indicates that Lucumí, Arará, and Mina Africans could often be shipmates on slaving vessels loaded at locations along the Bight of Benin, such as Ouidah or Little Popo. Given the term Mina’s etymological association with the Gold Coast, I have reluctantly included the Gold Coast as an extension of the Bight of Benin region to avoid misidentifying the provenance of any Mina Africans baptized in Havana. Average ages for Africans from each region were remarkably consistent, with no region exceeding 2 years older or younger than the continent-wide average. Males were older among each geographic cohort, except for Southeast Africans (Macuas and Mozambiques); priests estimated that females were, on average, slightly more than one year older than their male counterparts. The age gap between the sexes can likely be attributed to the Cuban agricultural sector’s demand for adult males to perform physical labor—especially for cane cutters on Cuba’s sugar ingenios.24 For specific figures on average age of baptized Africans broken down by sex and region of origin, see Table 4. 16 Sex ratios, on the other hand, differed substantially from one nation to the next (see Figure 3). Although the overall sample was nearly 59 percent male, among Lucumí Africans this rose to more than 68 percent. At the other extreme, male Carabalís comprised less than 48% of that nation’s number. Mandingas were split almost evenly between males and females, while male Gangás and Ararás comprised a slight majority of their respective nations. Congos, Minas, and Macuas, on the other hand, were predominately male. Here I will avoid speculation about the reasons for this variance in sex-ratios, except to argue that they must certainly have their root in African economic, political, and cultural circumstances.25 Table 3. Region of Origin for Baptized Africans, 1821-1843 Region Bight of Benin & Gold Coast Bight of Biafra Central Africa Southeast Africa Upper Guinea Unknown All Africa Number of Baptisms 2,340 1,330 1,469 252 1,571 219 7,181 Table 4. Average Age by African Region of Origin, 1821-1843 Region Bight of Benin & Gold Coast Bight of Biafra Central Africa Southeast Africa Upper Guinea Unknown Male 21.2 22.2 18.9 20.9 18.4 19.9 Female 17.5 18.7 16.6 22.1 18.0 16.5 Total 20.1 20.7 18.3 21.2 18.2 18.7 All Africa 20.0 17.7 19.3 17 Percent Female 18 Percent Male 67.5% 68.4% 32.5% 31.6% 58.7% 63.6% 36.4% 41.3% 62.6% 52.9% 47.1% 37.4% 52.0% 48.0% 62.2% 50.5% 49.5% 37.8% 47.7% 52.3% Figure 3. Sex Ratio by Nationality, 1821-1843 Comparisons and Analysis To better understand the significance of this dataset and test the relative representativeness of samples derived from baptismal registers, it is necessary to compare the results to data drawn from different genres of source material. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (TSTD) is qualitatively different from the baptismal register dataset assembled here in several respects. First, TSTD is organized around slaving voyages as the central unit of analysis, while baptismal entries correspond to an individual African. However, for most TSTD slaving voyages, figures indicate the total number of African slaves embarked and disembarked by the vessel. This allows one to calculate the overall size of the African population trafficked to Cuba and, more specifically, Havana. According to TSTD, nearly 92,000 Africans arrived in Havana by means of the illegal slave trade between 1821 and 1843. This means that just under eight percent of African arrivals to Havana were baptized in one of the four churches featured in this study. The baptismal registers of these four churches cannot, therefore, be considered a comprehensive account of the Havana slave trade. However, in several respects they amount to a highly representative sample. Of these, 8,826 arrived aboard ships interdicted by the British navy and would have been baptized as emancipados, rather than as slaves. Emancipados thus comprised 9.59 percent of Africans disembarked in Havana, according to TSTD, while they comprised 8.15 percent of the baptisms performed on Africans over the same period. Between 1821 and 1843, an annual average of 3,999 Africans disembarked slave ships in Havana. However, the volume of the slave trade varied dramatically from year to year, ranging from a low of zero in 1842 to a high of more than 12,000 in 1835. As a result, the average annual figure of 3,999 over the entire period has a standard deviation of 2,878—more than 72% 19 of the mean. Africans baptized annually in the four focus churches were an order of magnitude fewer at 312. Unlike the wild ebbs and flows of the slave trade, the number of Africans being baptized was far more regular, with a standard deviation of 93. This relative consistency can be seen clearly in Figure 4, which compares the year-to-year total of Africans disembarked in Havana to the number baptized. This chart also indicates that, while the number of baptisms in each year did not fluctuate in exact accordance with the relative increase or decrease in disembarkations, a broad correlation is discernable with volume peaking in the early-to-mid 1830s before declining steadily at the beginning of the following decade. It is also possible to observe the appearance of a slight lag on the part of baptism numbers, which indicates that Africans arriving in Havana were not necessarily baptized immediately. Instead, some African slaves and emancipados lived and worked in Havana for years before their baptism ceremonies were performed. Figure 4. Outside Source: Eltis, et al, Slave Voyages 20 Table 5. Region of Origin for Disembarked Africans, 1821-1843 Region Bight of Benin & Gold Coast Bight of Biafra Central Africa Southeast Africa Upper Guinea Unknown Number of Disembarkations 6,217 24,121 6,689 4,143 7,333 43,468 All Africa 91,971 Source: Eltis, et al, Slave Voyages In comparing the geographical origin of Africans in the Havana slave trade, it is first necessary to standardize geographical regions. For organizational purposes, TSTD sorts slave trade ports along the African coast into eight major regions: Southeast Africa and Indian Ocean Islands, West-Central Africa and Saint Helena, Bight of Biafra and Gulf of Guinea Islands, Bight of Benin, Gold Coast, Windward Coast, Sierra Leone, and Senegambia and Offshore Atlantic. Fortunately, this breakdown is quite like the one I have used to impute geographical provenance of baptized Africans. Because this imputation is based on ethnic denomination, rather than on actual geographical information which can be compared directly to TSTD data, five different TSTD regions have been consolidated into two larger regions which fully encompass the possible origin of the Africans to whose nation they correspond. “Senegambia,” which in TSTD includes the coast of Guinea-Bissau, “Sierra Leone,” which includes Guinea-Conakry, and “Windward Coast” (Liberia) have been combined into a single region: “Upper Guinea.” As mentioned above, due to the potential presence of Mina Africans in ships loading slaves in both regions, “Bight of Benin” and “Gold Coast” have been combined into a single region as well. Table 5 contains these results. 21 There are two notable differences between the two datasets. The first is that the TSTD data show a much higher proportion of Africans without a known region of origin—47.3 percent of the population, as opposed to only three percent in the baptism registers. This suggests that baptismal records can provide information which could be used to estimate the origins of this unknown 47 percent. The second is the higher proportion of Africans from the Bight of Biafra region present in the TSTD dataset: Approximately one half of Africans with a known region of origin arrived in Havana by way of the Bight of Biafra. This contrasts to about 18 percent of baptized Africans. However, the substantial number of Africans from the Bight of Biafra region in TSTD is exaggerated dramatically by the inclusion of voyages to the Gulf of Guinea islands of Sao Tome and Principe. There are several good reasons to believe very few if any of these slaving expeditions ever embarked a single African slave at either Sao Tome or Principe. Many of the vessels accused by British officials in Havana of engaging in the slave trade listed one or both destinations in their voyage itineraries, which were in turn used as evidence by Spanish colonial officials to deflect accusations of slave trafficking on the African coast. Because the islands were not far from many of the major slaving ports of West Africa, Africa-bound slave traffickers could use them as plausible destinations for legitimate commercial activity, providing cover for their actual, illegal objectives. This is evidenced by the frequent discovery of licenses to conduct trade at Sao Tome or Principe aboard Spanish slavers captured elsewhere by the British navy. For example, the Spanish schooner Maria, captured in 1830 off the coast of Sierra Leone with 505 slaves on board, carried documents notarized in Havana authorizing “a lawful commercial voyage” to Sao Tome and Principe.26 The same year, the brigantine Dos Amigos was taken in the Cameroons 22 Figure 5. Origin of Disembarked Africans, 1821-1843 14000 Disembarkations 12000 10000 8000 6000 4000 2000 0 1821 1826 1831 Bight of Benin & Gold Coast Central Africa Upper Guinea 1836 1841 Bight of Biafra Southeast Africa Unknown Source: Eltis, et al, Slave Voyages Figure 6. Origin of Baptized Africans, 1821-1843 500 450 400 Baptisms 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 1821 1826 1831 1836 Bight of Benin & Gold Coast Bight of Biafra Central Africa Southeast Africa Upper Guinea Unknown 23 1841 while loading slaves. This vessel too possessed an embarkation license from Havana indicating a “voyage of lawful commerce” to the Gulf of Guinea islands.27 Despite being authorized to conduct legal commerce in Sao Tome and Principe, the Spanish Brig Marinerito apparently sailed directly from Havana to Calabar, where it was captured in April 1831 along with 475 slaves.13 Therefore, to obtain a more accurate picture of what TSTD data really tell us about the geography of the illegal slave trade, voyages listed as taking on slaves at Sao Tome and Principe should be considered to have unknown ports of embarkation. This means subtracting 18,878 disembarkations from the 24,121 originating in the Bight of Biafra region and adding them to the ranks of the unknown, leaving 5,243 Africans who were transported to Havana between 1821 and 1843. This brings the proportion of Africans originating in the Bight of Biafra littoral in line with what baptismal records indicate. The overall TSTD figures for region of origin year-to-year (after shifting Sao Tome and Principe from the “Bight of Biafra” region to “Unknown”) can be compared to the equivalent data from Havana baptism registers in Figure 5 and Figure 6, respectively. Unfortunately, TSTD is rather limited in its ability to convey information about these trafficked populations beyond their total numbers. The sex ratio of African arrivals to Havana is available for eight voyages between 1821 and 1843. Overall, 72.5 percent of individuals aboard these eight ships were males, with only 27.5 percent females. This is a substantially higher proportion of men and boys than the 58.7 percent seen in baptismal registers. The Liberated Africans Project website is a much stronger source of data on the sex ratio of Africans trafficked to Havana during this period, compiling data on the occupants of 44 slave ships captured by the British navy between 1824 and 1847. Out of 10,391 individuals, 7,509 were male and 2,882 24 were female. This works out to a 72.3 percent male population—strikingly close to the TSTD figure. We are further able to compare the sex ratios within each national cohort in the Liberated Africans dataset and my data drawn from baptismal registers (See Table 6). None of the vessels tried before the mixed commission between 1824 and 1841 loaded slaves in the Indian Ocean, so I have omitted the baptisms of Macua slaves and emancipados from this comparison. Across the board, a higher proportion of females of all nations were baptized than were aboard slave ships Table 6. Sex Ratio by Nation: Mixed Commission vs. Baptismal Registers Nation Arará Carabalí Congo Gangá Lucumí Mandinga Mina Total Mixed Commission Male (%) Female (%) 55.9 44.1 68.9 31.1 80.0 20.0 62.2 37.8 73.0 27.0 72.8 27.2 74.2 25.8 Baptisms Male (%) Female (%) 52.9 47.1 47.7 52.3 62.2 37.8 52.0 48.0 68.4 31.6 50.5 49.5 63.6 36.4 72.3 27.7 58.4 41.6 Change (MC% → B%) +3.0 (Female) +21.2 (Female) +17.8 (Female) +10.2 (Female) +4.6 (Female) +22.3 (Female) +10.6 (Female) +13.9 (Female) Outside Source: Liberated Africans Project (www.liberatedafricans.org) Table 7. Average Age by Sex: Mixed Commission and Baptized Africans Sex Female Male Total Mixed Commission 16.1 20.5 Baptismal Registers 17.7 20.0 Change (MC → B) +1.4 -0.5 19.3 19.3 0.0 Outside Source: Liberated Africans Project (www.liberatedafricans.org) 25 tried by the court of the Mixed Commission in Havana. In the Mixed Commission registers, Arará, Carabalí, and Gangá remain nations with a higher than average percentage of females, while Congo, Lucumí, and Mina are still more male than the mean. It is clear, therefore, that Africans baptized in Havana churches were significantly more likely to be female than the entire African population trafficked to Havana. To determine the reason for this difference in sex ratio between Africans disembarking in Havana and those baptized in its churches, it is necessary to turn to a second sample of the African population of Havana. Bergad, Iglesias, and Barcia dataset drawn from Havana slave sale records contains entries for 1,594 Africans between the years of 1821 and 1843.28 Of these, 903 (56.7 percent) were males and 691 (43.3 percent) were females. This figure is much closer to the 58.7 percent of Africans baptized in Havana who were male than it is to the 72.3 percent of liberated African slaves aboard ships tried by the Mixed Commission. The fact that both samples of Havana Africans yield greater proportions of females suggests a geographic split between rural African populations, who largely worked in agriculture on Cuba’s coffee and sugar plantations, and Africans in Havana, who worked more frequently as domestic servants and skilled craftsmen.29 Many male Africans disembarked in Havana, including emancipados, may have gone on to work in the nearby countryside and their baptisms (if they took place) would have been recorded in churches located there. The estimated age of baptized Africans correlates closely to the estimated age of African slaves emancipated by the Mixed Commission court in Havana. In fact, the average age estimate of individuals in both samples is identical. However, females baptized in Havana were approximately 17 months older than females whose ages were recorded by Mixed Commission officials. To the extent that this age gap is statistically significant, which is far from a sure bet 26 given the unreliability of the age estimates upon which the figures draw, it is probable that it reflects time passed between an individual’s arrival in Havana and the date of her baptism. However, male slaves baptized in Havana churches were six months younger on average than the average age of liberated Africans. Assuming this small age gap indeed reflects a different population average and not simple variance in sample, it could be due to rural demand for adult male labor resulting in a younger male African population in Havana. 27 Conclusions It is clear from the numbers that baptismal records are a viable source of data on African populations in nineteenth century Cuba. While the four churches surveyed here baptized only a fraction of the total number of Africans disembarked by slave traffickers and British naval patrols in Havana between 1821 and 1843, this fraction appears to be reasonably representative of larger patterns in the overall slave trade. Baptisms did not track slave trade patterns exactly, but there are enough similarities to argue that they were correlated to the ebbs and flows of the overall traffic. As the volume of the Havana slave trade decreased following its abolition in 1820, so did the number of Africans baptized in Havana churches. Then, as slave traffickers expanded their operations in the late 1820s and 1830s, baptism numbers rose as well. Using the national denominations assigned to Africans in Cuba to impute their regional origins on the African continent, it is possible to estimate the overall regional distribution of the illegal Havana slave trade. During the 1820s, no single African region stood out as a dominant source of slaves for Havana traffickers, with significant minorities of Africans hailing from the Bight of Biafra, Central Africa, Upper Guinea, and the Bight of Benin. In the 1830s, it appears that the Bight of Benin became the most significant region of African slave imports to Havana. The bulk of these slaves (and emancipados) were Yoruba-speaking men, perhaps caught up in the violent conflict that took place following the collapse of Oyo.30 As time passed, Central Africans also comprised a growing portion of the slave trade, based on their increased prominence in Havana baptismal registers. Conversely, Carabalís from the Bight of Biafra region were baptized in fewer and fewer numbers, indicating a shift in the slave trade away from what is now southeastern Nigeria and Cameroon. 28 Based on Havana baptism records, it is possible to say that the middle passage aboard a contraband slaver was a trauma suffered largely by teenagers. Relatively few young children and adults older than their mid-twenties appear to have been trafficked to Havana between 1821 and 1843. Upon arrival in the city and its immediate environs, many of the men and older boys would have been sold to the owners of ingenios and cafetals and sent off into the countryside, while the remainder worked in their owners’ homes and shops in Havana. This second group still comprised more men and boys than women and girls, but the ratio was far more even than in rural areas. One of the weaknesses of this study is its focus on four Havana-area churches. Baptismal registers from urban churches do not record the baptisms of most African slaves who lived in rural settings and worked in the agricultural sector. Given the significant role of agriculture— sugar in particular—in creating a market for illegally-trafficked African slaves, it is important that historians working with baptismal record datasets to study slave societies attempt to locate and transcribe registers from rural locations, including those located on private estates. 29 APPENDIX 30 Table A.1 Jesus, María y José, 1821-1843 1821 Baptisms 1822 125 Baptisms Sex Female Male 1823 120 Baptisms 67 Baptisms Female Male 30 37 Female Male Sex 62 54 Female Male 1824 Sex 57 62 Legal Status Slave 118 Free 1 Legal Status Slave Free 66 1 Nationality Carabalí 39 Elugo 1 Vivi 1 Carabalí 41 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 3 Congo Mondongo Congo 38 1 39 Gangá 14 Lucumí 17 Macua Mandinga 8 2 Carabalí Elugo Suama Vivi Carabalí Congo Luango Real Congo Gangá Lucumí 38 1 2 1 42 27 1 1 29 5 56 Baptisms 25 31 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 113 5 1825 Carabalí Bricamo Elugo Osunsun Papa Suama Vivi Carabalí 17 1 1 1 1 2 1 24 Congo Luango Mondongo Congo 10 1 1 12 1826 25 Baptisms 11 14 Female Male Sex Sex 3 Macua 10 Unknown Other 1 1 Mandinga Cabo Verde Mandinga 9 1 10 Popo 1 Mina 1 Legal Status Slave 25 Legal Status Slave 27 Emancipado 9 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 3 Nationality Carabalí 11 Carabalí Papa Carabalí 4 1 5 Congo Mondongo Congo 2 1 3 Congo 4 Gangá 6 Gangá Beri Longoba Gangá 4 1 1 6 Lucumí 1 Lucumí 13 1 Carabalí Elugo Suama Carabalí 17 1 1 19 Congo Luango Musundi Congo 17 1 1 19 Gangá 6 Macua 2 Lucumí 3 Mandinga 3 Popo Mina 1 1 Gangá 8 Macua 4 Lucumí 7 Mandinga 2 Macua 5 Mina 2 Mandinga 7 Mina 1 31 18 18 Legal Status Slave 56 18 Mina 36 Mandinga 2 Mina 1 Table A.1 (cont’d) 1827 Baptisms 1828 37 Baptisms 13 24 Female Male Sex Female Male 1829 29 Baptisms 12 17 1830 Baptisms Female Male 15 14 Female Male Legal Status Slave 43 Emancipado 10 Legal Status Slave 34 Emancipado 10 Legal Status Slave 64 Emancipado 10 Free 4 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Sex Legal Status Slave 20 Emancipado 9 Legal Status Slave Emancipado 25 4 Nationality Arará Quatro Ojos Arará 1 1 2 Nationality Carabalí Bricamo Papa Carabalí 5 1 1 7 Nationality Carabalí 12 Carabalí 9 Congo Bombala Congo 2 1 3 Gangá 7 Lucumí Ello Lucumí Macua 6 2 8 Gangá Longoba Gangá 7 3 10 Lucumí 8 33 20 Female Male Congo 2 Gangá 8 Lucumí 2 Congo Mina Popo Mina 2 2 4 Gangá Longoba Gangá Unknown Other 1 1 Baptisms 25 19 Female Male Carabalí Oru Uque Carabalí 18 2 20 Lucumí 2 Macua 1 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 2 Mina 2 Mina Fanti Popo Mina 2 1 5 8 Unknown Other 2 2 78 Sex 1 19 1 1 21 5 1 32 44 Sex Nationality Carabalí 8 Bricamo 1 Elugo 2 Suama 2 Carabalí 13 2 Mina Baptisms Sex Legal Status Slave 30 Emancipado 7 5 53 1832 29 Sex Congo 1831 Congo 3 Gangá 12 Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mina Popo Mina 3 2 5 Carabalí Bricamo Elugo Papa Carabalí Congo 52 26 6 12 3 1 1 17 6 Gangá Longoba Gangá 17 4 21 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 19 1 20 Mandinga 1 Mina Fanti Popo Mina 3 1 2 6 Unknown Other 1 1 Table A.1 (cont’d) 1833 Baptisms 1834 78 Baptisms 41 43 Female Male Sex Female Male 1835 108 1836 Baptisms Sex 162 Baptisms Sex 33 75 1837 80 Baptisms 28 52 Female Male Sex Female Male 69 92 Female Male 1838 96 Baptisms 35 61 Female Male Sex 101 Sex 36 65 Legal Status Slave 77 Emancipado 6 Free 1 Legal Status Slave 104 Emancipado 4 Legal Status Slave 151 Emancipado 11 Legal Status Slave 88 Emancipado 8 Legal Status Slave 88 Emancipado 8 Legal Status Slave 97 Emancipado 4 Nationality Arará Magi Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Magi Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Carabalí Papa Carabalí Congo Mani Mondongo Real Congo Gangá Lucumí Mandinga 3 1 4 19 1 20 5 1 1 1 8 8 Carabalí 13 Congo Murenque Congo 13 1 14 Gangá 15 Lucumí Ello Llebu Lucumí 48 1 1 50 19 Mandinga 1 Mina Popo Mina 6 1 7 27 2 5 Carabalí Bricamo Vivi Carabalí 31 2 2 35 Congo Luango Real Congo Gangá 4 1 5 Carabalí 20 23 1 1 25 Congo Luango Mondongo Real Congo 11 1 1 1 14 31 Gangá 12 Lucumí Ello Nago Lucumí 57 1 1 59 Macua 1 Lucumí 27 Macua 1 Mina Fanti Mina 1 1 Mandinga 3 Unknown Other 3 3 Unknown Other 3 3 33 1 6 Carabalí Camarón Papa Suama Carabalí 19 2 1 1 23 Congo Mondongo Real Congo 12 1 2 15 Gangá Longoba Gangá 11 2 13 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 29 1 30 Macua Mozambique Macua 4 1 5 Baluandro Cacheu Mandinga 1 1 2 Mina 2 2 Carabalí Bambare Bricamo Carabalí 15 1 1 17 Congo Luango Mondongo Congo 30 2 1 33 Gangá 17 Lucumí 20 Macua 5 Mina Fanti Mina 5 1 6 Unknown Other 1 1 Table A.1 (cont’d) 1839 Baptisms 1840 80 Baptisms 25 55 Female Male Sex Female Male 1841 69 Baptisms 27 42 Female Male Sex 1842 57 Baptisms 17 40 Female Male Sex 1843 67 Baptisms 23 44 Female Male Sex 58 Sex 17 41 Legal Status Slave 78 Free 2 Legal Status Slave 67 Emancipado 2 Legal Status Slave 53 Emancipado 4 Legal Status Slave 67 Legal Status Slave 51 Emancipado 4 Free 3 Nationality Arará 9 Nationality Arará 1 Nationality Arará 2 Nationality Arará 1 Nationality Carabalí Carabalí 4 5 2 7 Carabalí 3 Carabalí 7 Congo 18 18 1 2 21 Gangá 8 Lucumí 16 Macua 10 Congo 24 Carabalí Bricamo Carabalí Gangá Nongoa Gangá 19 1 20 Congo Luango Congo Lucumí Macua Mozambique Macua 12 6 1 7 Gangá Lucumí Macua 20 1 21 7 16 Congo 24 Gangá 9 Lucumí 11 Macua Popo Mina Congo Mondongo Real Congo Gangá 4 Lucumí 17 Macua 4 Mandinga 8 Mina 5 7 1 1 13 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 1 Mina 2 Mina Fanti Popo Mina 1 1 1 3 34 1 Mandinga 2 Mina 2 Unknown Other 1 1 Table A.2 Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, 1821-1843 1821 Baptisms 1822 88 Baptisms 42 46 Female Male Sex Female Male 1823 85 Baptisms 38 47 1824 71 Baptisms Female Male 25 46 Female Male Legal Status Slave 36 Sex Sex Legal Status Slave 85 Legal Status Slave 71 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 1 2 37 Baptisms 14 23 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 88 2 1825 Nationality Arará 16 Carabalí 14 Carabalí 10 Congo Luango Real Congo 35 1 1 37 Congo Mondongo Congo 32 1 33 Congo 18 Congo 11 Gangá 16 Gangá 2 Gangá 10 Lucumí 8 Lucumí 4 Lucumí 6 Macua 6 Macua 7 Macua 5 Mandinga 5 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 7 Mina 2 Mina 6 Seusiva Other 1 1 Mandinga Mina 9 9 1 7 3 35 16 32 Female Male 48 Sex Legal Status Slave 48 Nationality Carabalí Macua Baptisms 28 20 Legal Status Slave 42 Emancipado 6 Nationality Arará 1 20 Lucumí 48 Sex Carabalí Gangá 1826 2 Carabalí Briani Oluso Vivi Carabalí 10 1 2 1 14 Carabalí Suama Vivi Carabalí Congo 13 Congo 2 Gangá 6 Lucumí 10 Gangá Fai Gangá 9 1 10 Macua 2 Lucumí 12 Mandinga 1 Macua 1 Mina 2 Mina 1 17 1 2 20 Table A.2 (cont’d) 1827 Baptisms 1828 53 Baptisms 20 33 Female Male Sex Female Male 1829 47 Baptisms 15 32 1830 Baptisms Female Male 24 24 Female Male Legal Status Slave 52 Emancipado 13 Legal Status Slave 55 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave 73 Emancipado 5 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Sex Legal Status Slave 47 Legal Status Slave Emancipado 39 9 Nationality Arará Nationality Carabalí 17 Bricamo 1 Carabalí 18 Nationality Arará 2 20 1 21 Congo 5 Carabalí Suama Carabalí 11 3 14 Congo 9 Gangá 13 Congo 1 Gangá Briche Gangá 9 1 10 Lucumí 6 Gangá 18 Macua 1 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 3 2 5 Mandinga 3 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 5 1 6 Mina 1 Macua 1 Macua 2 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 1 Mina 4 Mina Baptisms 20 45 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 48 Emancipado 5 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí 65 1832 48 Sex 2 1831 1 36 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí Congo 58 Baptisms 22 36 Female Male Sex 2 11 1 12 6 78 Sex 2 24 52 4 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí 15 1 16 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí 10 1 11 Congo Luango Congo 13 1 14 Congo Mondongo Congo 18 1 19 Gangá 16 Gangá Longoba Gangá 17 5 22 Lucumí Chambá Lucumí 16 1 17 Gangá Longoba Gangá 25 4 29 Chambá Lucumí 1 1 Lucumí Macua 5 2 Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mandinga 4 Mina 3 Mina Popo Mina 6 2 8 Tacome Wi Other 1 1 Mandinga 2 Mina 1 Table A.2 (cont’d) 1833 Baptisms 1834 119 Baptisms Sex Female Male 1835 79 Baptisms Female Male 27 51 Female Male 23 44 Female Male Legal Status Slave 56 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave 39 Emancipado 1 Legal Status Slave 46 Nationality Arará Nationality Carabalí Nationality Arará 2 Carabalí 1 Sex Legal Status Slave Emancipado 58 9 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 8 Nationality Arará 2 Carabalí 7 Carabalí 7 19 1 20 Congo Baptisms 28 31 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 76 Emancipado 3 Carabalí Bricamo Carabalí 59 1838 Baptisms Legal Status Slave 111 Emancipado 7 6 1837 67 Sex 29 90 1836 25 Congo Luango Congo 13 1 14 Congo Luango Congo 24 1 25 Gangá 27 Gangá 15 Lucumí 36 1 26 1 27 8 1 9 Macua Lucumí Ello Lucumí Gangá Longoba Gangá Lucumí 21 Mandinga 1 Macua 1 Mina 2 Mandinga 3 Combe Other 1 1 Mina Popo Mina 1 2 3 37 40 Baptisms 8 32 Female Male Sex 2 46 Sex 4 11 35 Carabalí Isa Carabalí 10 1 11 Congo 26 Gangá 2 Congo 16 Congo 27 Lucumí 4 Gangá 2 Gangá 9 Mandinga 2 Lucumí 19 Lucumí 9 Mina 1 Macua 2 Mandinga 1 Baza Other 1 1 Mandinga 1 Mina 1 Crinia Other 1 1 Table A.2 (cont’d) 1839 Baptisms 1840 74 Baptisms 22 52 Female Male Sex Female Male 1841 35 Baptisms 17 18 1842 26 Baptisms Female Male 13 13 Female Male Sex Sex Legal Status Slave 32 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave Emancipado 25 1 Nationality Arará 1 Nationality Arará 1 Nationality Carabalí 2 Carabalí 7 Congo Musconde Solongo Congo 28 1 1 30 Congo Luango Congo 5 2 7 Congo Mondongo Congo Gangá 6 Gangá Lucumí 18 Macua 2 Lucumí 19 Baptisms 6 13 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 72 Free 1 Gangá 1843 Sex Legal Status Slave 22 Nationality Carabalí 2 Nationality Carabalí 1 Congo Mondongo Congo 5 1 6 Congo Mondongo Real Congo 7 1 1 9 4 Gangá 4 Gangá 2 Lucumí 2 Lucumí 5 Lucumí 7 Mandinga 2 Macua 1 Macua 1 Mina 1 Mina 2 15 1 16 25 4 Mina 2 8 14 Legal Status Slave 19 5 Macua 22 38 Table A.3 Nuestra Señora de Regla, 1821-1843 1821 Baptisms 1822 54 Baptisms 17 37 Female Male Sex Female Male 1823 22 Baptisms 13 9 1824 Baptisms Female Male 21 20 Female Male Legal Status Slave 23 Legal Status Slave 32 Legal Status Slave 29 Emancipado 1 Nationality Arará Nationality Carabalí 10 Briani 1 Oluso 2 Vivi 1 Carabalí 14 Nationality Arará Sex Baptisms 8 15 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 53 Free 1 Legal Status Slave 22 Legal Status Slave 41 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 1 2 23 1826 41 Sex 2 1825 32 Baptisms 13 19 Female Male Sex 1 Sex Carabalí 20 Carabalí 16 Carabalí 14 Carabalí 10 Congo Luango Real Congo 35 1 1 37 Congo Mondongo Congo 32 1 33 Congo 18 Congo 11 Gangá 16 Gangá 2 Congo 13 Gangá 10 Lucumí 8 Lucumí 4 Gangá 6 Lucumí 6 Macua 6 Macua 7 Lucumí 10 Macua 5 Mandinga 5 Mandinga 2 Macua 2 Mandinga 7 Mina 2 Mandinga 1 Mina 6 Other 1 Mina 2 Gangá 9 Lucumí 9 Macua 1 Mandinga Mina 7 3 39 30 Carabalí Suama Vivi Carabalí 6 24 2 17 1 2 20 Congo 2 Gangá Fai Gangá 9 1 10 Lucumí 12 Macua 1 Mina 1 Table A.3 (cont’d) 1827 Baptisms 1828 47 Baptisms 18 29 Female Male Sex Female Male 1829 35 Baptisms 16 19 1830 Baptisms Female Male 11 19 Female Male Legal Status Slave 41 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave 44 Emancipado 4 Legal Status Slave 58 Emancipado 6 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Sex Legal Status Slave 31 Emancipado 4 Legal Status Slave Emancipado 25 5 Nationality Carabalí 19 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 1 Congo 5 Carabalí Gangá 4 Lucumí 12 Congo Luango Congo 1 2 3 Mandinga 1 Gangá Mina 1 Carabalí Suama Carabalí Baptisms 17 27 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 46 Emancipado 1 10 44 1832 30 Sex 1 1831 16 1 17 Carabalí Suama Carabalí Baptisms 21 27 Female Male Sex 2 10 1 11 Congo 2 Congo 7 Gangá 5 Lucumí 4 Macua 1 Gangá Longoba Gangá 22 1 23 Mandinga 1 Mandinga 3 Lucumí 2 Mina 2 Popo Mina 1 1 Mina 8 40 48 2 64 Sex 1 Carabalí 11 Gangá Longoba Gangá 17 2 19 Lucumí 10 Mandinga 2 Mina Popo Mina 3 1 4 Carabalí Cicuato Elugo Carabalí 30 34 2 14 1 1 16 Congo 2 Gangá 18 Lucumí 18 Mandinga Soso Mandinga 2 1 3 Mina Popo Mina 4 1 5 Table A.3 (cont’d) 1833 Baptisms 1834 64 Baptisms 23 41 Female Male Sex Female Male 1835 75 Baptisms 17 58 1836 Baptisms Female Male 15 14 Female Male Legal Status Slave 43 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave 52 Emancipado 3 Legal Status Slave 38 Nationality Carabalí Nationality Arará 2 Nationality Carabalí 8 1 9 Congo Luango Congo 14 1 15 23 Gangá 7 6 2 8 Lucumí 7 Mandinga 1 Sex Legal Status Slave 71 Emancipado 4 Legal Status Slave Emancipado 28 1 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Carabalí 5 Congo 3 Gangá 10 Lucumí 8 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí Congo 12 1 13 10 1 1 12 Congo Luango Mondongo Congo 8 1 1 10 Gangá 19 Lucumí 24 2 Gangá 17 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 23 1 24 Mina Carabalí Cicuato Suama Carabalí 5 Baptisms 21 25 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 61 Emancipado 3 3 46 1838 29 Sex 2 1837 55 Baptisms 20 35 Female Male Sex 6 Sex Congo Mondongo Congo 10 1 11 Carabalí Bricamo Carabalí Gangá 12 Congo Lucumí 7 Mandinga 2 Gangá Longoba Gangá Mina 2 Lucumí 6 Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mandinga 1 Mina 4 Mambaza Other 1 1 41 38 18 20 7 Table A.3 (cont’d) 1839 Baptisms 1840 34 Baptisms 13 21 Female Male Sex Female Male 1841 35 Baptisms 9 26 1842 37 Baptisms Female Male 9 28 Female Male Legal Status Slave 39 Legal Status Slave 39 Free 1 Nationality Carabalí Bricamo Carabalí Nationality Arará 2 Carabalí 3 Sex Sex Legal Status Slave 35 Legal Status Slave 37 Nationality Carabalí Nationality Carabalí Nationality Carabalí 2 Congo 9 Gangá 4 Lucumí Congo Luango Congo 12 2 14 Gangá 6 Lucumí Macua Popo Mina 1 Congo Cabinda Luango Congo 12 1 1 14 Gangá 7 Lucumí 4 Macua 4 Mandinga 1 Mina 3 4 2 2 2 39 Baptisms 6 33 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 34 5 1843 40 Sex 1 1 2 10 30 8 2 10 Congo 6 9 Congo Luango Congo Gangá 2 Mandinga 2 Gangá 17 Lucumí 24 Macua Mozambique Macua 3 3 6 Lucumí 5 Macua 3 Macua 3 Mina 2 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 1 Mina 2 Mina 1 Yanvaire Other 1 1 42 Table A.4 Santo Angel de Custodio, 1821-1843 1821 Baptisms 1822 131 Baptisms Sex Female Male 1823 96 Baptisms Female Male 52 44 1825 Baptisms Female Male 53 28 Female Male Legal Status Slave 52 Legal Status Slave 56 Emancipado 6 Legal Status Slave 68 Emancipado 13 Free 3 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Sex 52 Baptisms 32 20 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 96 Legal Status Slave 81 Nationality Arará 10 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 2 Carabalí 27 Carabalí 18 Carabalí 19 Carabalí Congo 38 Congo 28 Congo 24 Congo 9 Gangá 26 Gangá 11 Gangá 11 Gangá 15 Lucumí 7 Lucumí 5 Lucumí 11 Lucumí Macua 5 5 6 6 1 7 Macua Mandinga Macua Mozambique Macua Mandinga 5 Mina 7 Mandinga 5 Mina Yeru Other 1 1 Mina 3 Other 43 64 Baptisms 32 32 Female Male Sex Legal Status Slave 131 7 1826 81 Sex 73 58 1824 1 11 84 Sex 4 38 46 5 Carabalí 14 Carabalí 16 Congo 12 Congo 22 3 Gangá Longoba Gangá 14 1 15 Gangá Fai Longoba Gangá 14 1 1 16 Macua 5 Lucumí 8 Lucumí 19 Mandinga 2 Macua 2 Macua 1 1 Mandinga 5 Mandinga 1 1 Mina 2 Mina Popo Mina 2 1 3 Table A.4 (cont’d) 1827 Baptisms 1828 105 Baptisms Sex Female Male 1829 81 Baptisms 41 40 Female Male Sex 52 53 Female Male 1830 138 Baptisms Sex 1831 130 Baptisms Sex 73 65 Female Male 1832 175 Baptisms Sex 63 67 Female Male 193 Sex 99 76 Female Male 109 84 Legal Status Slave 83 Emancipado 22 Legal Status Slave 61 Emancipado 20 Legal Status Slave 109 Emancipado 29 Legal Status Slave 102 Emancipado 27 Free 1 Legal Status Slave 136 Emancipado 37 Free 1 Legal Status Slave 153 Emancipado 40 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 8 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 15 Nationality Arará Carabalí Brican Elugo Papa Carabalí 15 2 1 1 19 Carabalí Cicuato Elugo Suama Carabalí Gangá 31 3 2 3 39 5 Carabalí Ello Elugo Suama Vivi Carabalí Congo Luango Congo 12 1 13 Congo 8 Carabalí Cicuato Elugo Mogo Oru Suama Vivi Carabalí 36 1 1 1 2 2 2 44 Gangá 43 Congo 10 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 14 1 15 Gangá 65 Macua 3 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 22 1 23 Mandinga 2 Mandinga 6 9 Carabalí Elugo Carabalí 23 1 24 Congo 20 Gangá Briche Gangá 23 2 25 Congo 11 Gangá 13 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 17 10 27 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 14 9 23 Gangá 40 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 16 2 18 Macua 2 Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mandinga 2 Mina 3 Macua Mozambique Macua 2 1 3 Mandinga 3 Mina Popo Mina 10 1 11 44 Mina Popo Mina 9 31 1 1 3 2 36 12 2 14 Mina Popo Mina 8 Carabalí Bricamo Brican Cicuato Oru Ososo Papa Suama Carabalí 35 1 1 1 2 2 2 5 47 Congo 11 Gangá Longoba Gangá 61 1 62 1 Lucumí Chambá Lucumí 40 1 41 5 11 16 Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mina Fanti Popo Mina 11 1 10 22 Table A.4 (cont’d) 1833 Baptisms 1834 169 Baptisms Sex Female Male 1835 128 Baptisms Sex 86 81 Female Male 1836 178 Baptisms Sex 56 72 Female Male 1837 203 Baptisms 73 129 Female Male Sex 77 96 Female Male 1838 266 Baptisms 92 174 Female Male Sex 210 Sex 62 148 Legal Status Slave 150 Emancipado 14 Free 3 Legal Status Slave 115 Emancipado 12 Legal Status Slave 155 Emancipado 22 Legal Status Slave 181 Emancipado 21 Free 1 Legal Status Slave 238 Emancipado 27 Legal Status Slave 180 Emanc. 30 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 10 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 12 Nationality Arará 13 Nationality Arará 8 Carabalí Ososo Vivi Carabalí 15 1 1 17 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí Gangá 16 2 18 5 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí Gangá Longoba 20 1 21 22 1 Carabalí Oru Carabalí 23 1 24 Congo Luango Congo 12 1 13 Congo Luango Mondongo Congo 32 5 1 38 50 3 2 2 57 26 20 1 2 1 1 25 Congo Luango Mondongo Real Congo Gangá Congo Boma Luango Mondongo Real Congo Lucumí 45 Gangá 37 Gangá Longoba Gangá 21 1 22 Gangá Longoba Gangá 23 1 24 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 66 1 67 Lucumí 114 Macua 1 Mandinga 2 Mozambique Macua 1 1 Mina 1 Mandinga 1 Mina 3 4 Carabalí Elugo Carabalí 29 1 30 Congo Luango Mondongo Musundi Congo 7 4 6 1 18 Gangá Longoba Gangá 37 1 38 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 59 1 60 Mandinga Macua 1 Mandinga 1 Mina Fanti Popo Mina 7 1 3 11 7 1 Mina 3 Mina Popo 2 1 Mina 3 45 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 92 1 93 Macua 9 Mandinga 2 Mina 2 Carabalí Bricamo Brican Carabalí 17 1 1 19 Congo Luango Mondongo Real Congo 38 3 1 1 43 Gangá 18 Lucumí Cacanda Lucumí 101 1 102 Macua Mozambiq ue Macua 6 1 Mandinga 3 Mina 3 7 Table A.4 (cont’d) 1839 Baptisms 1840 204 Baptisms 71 133 Female Male Sex Female Male 1841 169 Baptisms 53 116 Female Male Sex 1842 159 Baptisms 51 108 Female Male Sex 1843 124 Baptisms Sex 106 Sex 42 82 Female Male 40 66 Legal Status Slave 194 Emancipado 9 Legal Status Slave 163 Emancipado 6 Legal Status Slave 146 Emancipado 13 Legal Status Slave 119 Emancipado 5 Legal Status Slave 87 Emancipado 19 Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará Nationality Arará 4 Carabalí Vivi Carabalí 22 1 23 Congo Luango Mondongo Mozambique Musundi Congo 42 5 1 1 1 50 Gangá 31 8 Carabalí 13 Congo Luango Musundi Congo 32 3 2 37 Gangá 30 Lucumí 57 Macua 8 Lucumí 68 Mina 3 Macua 13 Mandinga 3 Mandinga 4 Mina 5 Zambani Other 1 1 Mina Popo Mina 9 1 10 5 3 5 Carabalí Bricamo Papa Carabalí 9 1 2 12 Carabalí Ello Papa Carabalí 8 1 1 10 Carabalí Papa Vivi Carabalí 10 1 2 13 Congo Banba Luango Musundi Real Congo 29 1 1 1 2 34 Congo Luango Mondongo Real Congo 27 6 2 1 36 Congo Mondongo Musundi Real Congo 11 1 1 2 15 13 1 14 20 27 1 28 Gangá Longoba Gangá Gangá Gangá Mani Gangá Lucumí 52 Lucumí Ello Lucumí 31 1 32 Lucumí Ello Llebu Lucumí 27 2 1 30 Macua 9 Macua 6 Macua 12 Mandinga 5 Mina Popo Mina 5 1 6 Mandinga Mina Ata Mina 3 5 1 6 46 Mandinga 5 Mina 3 Table A.5 Emancipados Aguila Aurelia Feliz Baptisms 24 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 2 3 1 18 Sex Female Male 10 14 Metanation(s) Arará Congo 1 23 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1833 1843 1836.2 Baptisms 3 Church SAC 3 Sex Female Male Metanation(s) Mandinga Year(s) All Fingal Baptisms Carlota Baptisms 6 Church NSA NSR SAC 1 2 3 2 1 Sex Female Male 4 2 3 Metanation(s) Gangá 5 1843 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Firme Baptisms Church JMJ NSR SAC 1 1 3 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 14 14 4 39 Sex Female Male 3 2 Sex Female Male 26 45 Metanation(s) Gangá 4 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí Mina 3 7 56 1826 1828 1827.2 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1835 1837 1836.5 71 1829 1841 1831.6 Baptisms 1 Church NSA 1 Sex Female 1 Sex Female Male Metanation(s) Lucumí 1 Metanation(s) Carabalí Lucumí Year(s) All 2 2 Sex Female Male 1 1 Metanation(s) Mandinga 2 47 1840 Indagadora Church SAC Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Emilio Baptisms Gallito 5 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Chubasco 1832 1838 1835 Baptisms 3 1 1 5 Sex Male 10 Metanation(s) Lucumí Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 14 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 5 3 1 5 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 10 4 9 2 1830 1838 1833.5 Intrepido 10 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC Baptisms 9 1833 1843 1836.1 Baptisms 21 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 1 2 1 17 Sex Female Male 16 5 Metanation(s) Carabalí Gangá 20 1 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1829 1839 1831.5 Table A.5 (cont’d) Isabel Joaquina Josefa Baptisms 1 Baptisms 3 Church JMJ 1 Church SAC 3 Sex Male 1 Sex Female Male Metanation(s) Gangá 1 Metanation(s) Carabalí Year(s) All 1834 Magico Baptisms Baptisms 19 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 2 4 3 10 2 1 Sex Female Male 15 4 3 Metanation(s) Gangá 19 1836 1838 1836.7 Manuelita 17 Church SAC 17 Sex Female Male 4 13 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí Mina 2 13 2 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1826 1831 1827.8 Baptisms Joven Reina Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1830 1835 1832.1 Baptisms Church JMJ NSA SAC 3 3 44 Church JMJ NSR SAC 7 2 14 Sex Female Male 3 47 Sex Female Male 8 15 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí 1 43 Metanation(s) Arará Congo 1 20 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Baptisms 2 Church SAC 2 Sex Male 2 Metanation(s) Congo 2 Year(s) All Maria de la Gloria 50 1834 1841 1837.4 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 48 23 1825 1830 1827 Julita 1837 Baptisms 4 Church JMJ NSR SAC 1 2 1 Sex Male 4 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Maria Baptisms 1836 1837 1836.3 Midas 1 Church NSR 1 Sex Male 1 Metanation(s) Lucumí 1 Year(s) All 20 1 1843 Baptisms 24 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 8 2 6 8 Sex Female Male 14 10 Metanation(s) Carabalí 24 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1829 1837 1832.1 Table A.5 (cont’d) Negrita Negrito Baptisms 1 Church JMJ 1 Sex Female 1 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí Year(s) All 2 13 1835 Planeta Baptisms Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 3 3 1 7 Sex Female Male 6 8 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 11 1 1832 1839 1835.1 Nuevo Campeador 14 Baptisms Church JMJ NSR SAC 1 1 12 Church JMJ NSA SAC 2 1 7 Church JMJ NSR SAC 1 1 8 Sex Female Male 6 8 Sex Female Male 1 9 Sex Female Male 5 5 Metanation(s) Carabalí Congo 8 1 Metanation(s) Carabalí 9 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1 12 1833 1840 1835.9 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Baptisms 1837 1843 1841.2 Rosa 12 Baptisms Church JMJ SAC Sex Female Male Metanation(s) Gangá Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 10 Baptisms Orestes Baptisms Relampago 14 Metanation(s) Carabalí Lucumí Ninfa Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean Baptisms 5 7 Church NSA SAC 2 7 7 5 Sex Female Male Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí 1825 1831 1826.75 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 49 1827 1836 1829.5 Santiago 9 12 10 Baptisms 27 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 3 4 2 18 Sex Female Male 6 21 Metanation(s) Arará Lucumí 1 23 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1827 1829 1827.59 Voladora 4 Baptisms 34 Church JMJ NSR SAC 1 1 2 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 8 6 1 19 4 5 Sex Female Male 3 1 Sex Female Male 17 17 1 7 Metanation(s) Carabalí Lucumí 2 1 Metanation(s) Arará Carabalí Lucumí Mina 3 1 4 25 1834 1840 1835.9 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1831 1835 1832.3 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1829 1840 1831.8 Table A.5 (cont’d) Viage Xerxes Baptisms 1 Church NSA 1 Sex Female Metanation(s) Carabalí Year(s) All Baptisms 33 Church JMJ NSA NSR SAC 6 3 5 19 1 Sex Female Male 17 16 1 Metanation(s) Carabalí Lucumí 31 2 1832 50 Year(s) Earliest Latest Mean 1828 1838 1831.3 ENDNOTES 51 Benjamin N. Lawrance and Richard L. Roberts, Trafficking in Slavery’s Wake : Law and the Experience of Women and Children (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2012), 7. 1 2 For example, see Joseph E. Inikori’s examination of British Board of Trade records derived from eighteenth-century Cape Coast Castle: Inikori, “Measuring the Atlantic Slave Trade : An Assessment of Curtin and Anstey,” The Journal of African History The Journal of African History vol. 17, no. 2, 1976, pp. 197-223: Also using African port records is Joseph C. Miller's data series drawn from eighteenth-century Luanda port entry/exit listings: Miller, Way of Death : Merchant Capitalism and the Angolan Slave Trade, 1730-1830 (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988); Stephen D. Behrendt's comprehensively detailed summary of the last three decades of the British slave trade relies on documents from a range of British government archival sources, as well as private papers pertaining to the slaving business, and newspapers from around the British Atlantic world. Behrendt's work became a central pillar of the watershed Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database: Behrendt, “The Annual Volume and Regional Distribution of the British Slave Trade, 1780-1807.,” Journal of African History vol. 38 no. 2, 1997, pp. 187– 211; David Eltis and Martin Halbert, Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (Emory University, 2008). 3 Herbert S. Klein worked with this (incomplete) collection of documents and compiled its contents into a single dataset. Herbert S. Klein, “North American Competition and the Characteristics of the African Slave Trade to Cuba, 1790 to 1794,” The William and Mary Quarterly vol. 28, no. 1, 1971, pp. 86–102; Herbert S. Klein, “Slave trade to Havana, Cuba, 1790-1820,” (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Data and Program Library Service, 1974), /z-wcorg/. 4 The seminal work on British efforts in Cuba to effectively abolish the slave trade, including the activities of the Mixed Commission in Havana, is David R. Murray’s Odious Commerce: Britain, Spain and the Abolition of the Cuban Slave Trade (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980). 5 In a typical episode, the captain and owners of the Cuban brigantine Alcatraz were accused by British officials of slave trafficking upon the ship’s return to Havana in the autumn of 1835. According to a Spanish inquiry, the Alcatraz departed Havana in October 1834, sailing first to the Cape Verde Islands and then to Sao Tome, where the captain, Francsico Gallardo, apparently anchored over the summer of 1835. “Not finding a cargo,” Alcatraz subsequently returned to Havana arriving with an empty hold in November. The plausibility of such a 13-month exercise in commercial futility among the Portuguese islands of the offshore Atlantic is dubious: Miguel Tacón to Primero Secretario de Estado, Havana, 11 Nov 1835, Archivo Histórico Nacional, Estado, Legajo 8015, Expediente 27. 6 David Eltis, Martin Halbert, Philip Misevich, African Origins (Emory University, 2009). 7 Henry B. Lovejoy, “The Registers of Liberated Africans of the Havana Slave Trade Commission: Transcription Methodology and Statistical Analysis," African Economic History Vol. 38 (2010) pp. 107-135; “The Registers of Liberated Africans of the Havana Slave Trade 52 Commission: Implementation and Policy, 1824-1841,” Slavery & Abolition vol. 37, no. 1 (2016) pp. 23–44. 8 This study uses the term “nation” in place of the Spanish “nación” to refer to these designations out of a desire to avoid complication and convey the language of source materials. The word “nation” in this context should not be confused with its commonplace use in connection to the nation-state, nor does it reflect actual African ethno-polities as they existed in the early nineteenth century. According to Jesus Guanche, whose study of Afro-Cuban ethnicities serves as a reference for the present study, these nations appeared in three-major forms: First, as ethnonyms used to denote an individual’s belonging to a certain ethnic community; second, as ethnic denominations used to refer to all individuals belonging to a specific group or sharing a common provenance; third, as meta-ethnic denominations which grouped together Africans of various nations into larger national identities reflecting a region of provenance: Jesus Guanche, Africanía y Etnicidad en Cuba (La Habana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, 2009) 9 Perhaps chief among the technological developments shaping the landscape of the Cuban countryside was the steam train, which opened the whole island to the export market on a large scale. Manuel Moreno Fragináls writes that “the steam train, and not the steam-powered [sugar] press, is the first element of the industrial revolution to completely transform Cuban conditions of production” (my translation). Fragináls, El Ingenio: Complejo Económico Social Cubano del Azúcar, Vol I (La Habana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, 1978). 10 There are a variety of census figures and estimates historians have used to study the colonial Cuban population. Here I borrow 1841 census figures from Franklin Knight, Slave Society in Cuba during the Nineteenth Century (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1970). 11 See: Robert L. Paquette, Sugar Is Made with Blood: The Conspiracy of La Escalera and the Conflict between Empires over Slavery in Cuba (Middletown, CT.: Wesleyan University Press, 1988); Michele. Reid-Vazquez, The Year of the Lash: Free People of Color in Cuba and the Nineteenth-Century Atlantic World (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2011). 12 Laird W. Bergad, Fe Iglesias García, and María del Carmen Barcia, The Cuban Slave Market, 1790-1880 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995). 13 See, for example: Ildelfondo Gutierrez Azopardo, “Los Libros de Registros de Pardos y Morenos en los Archivos Parroquiales de Cartagena de Indias,” Revista Española de Antropología Americana, Vol. XIII, 1983, pp. 121-141; Jane Landers, Black Society in Spanish Florida (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1999); Aisnara Perera Díaz and María de los Ángeles Meriño Fuentes, Esclavitud, Familia y Parroquia en Cuba: Otra Mirada desde la Microhistoria, (Santiago de Cuba: Editorial Oriente, 2006); Matthew Restall, The Black Middle: Africans, Mayas, and Spaniards in Colonial Yucutan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009); Mariza de Carvalho Soares, People of Faith: Slavery and African Catholics in Eighteenth Century Rio de Janeiro, trans. Jerry Dennis Metz (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011); David Martin Stark, Slave Families and the Hato Economy in Puerto Rico (Gainesville, FL: 53 University of Florida Press, 2015). 14 Soares, People of Faith, p. 67. 15 This finding reinforces Oscar Grandio Moráguez’s argument that the Cuban slave trade was typified by geographical diversity on the African end: Grandio Moráguez, “The African Origins of Slaves Arriving in Cuba, 1789-1865” in Extending the Frontiers: Essays on the New Transatlantic Slave Trade Database, David Eltis and David Richardson, eds. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008) pp. 176-201. 16 For example, see João José Reis, Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The Muslim Uprising of 1835 in Bahia (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995); Douglas Chambers’ work on the Igbo presence in colonial Virginia: Chambers, Murder at Montpelier: Igbo Africans in Virginia (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 2005); Walter Hawthorne, From Africa to Brazil: Culture, Identity, and an Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-1830 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 17 While the original records are mostly intact, due to occasional photographical mishaps that apparently took place during the digitization process, some of the images hosted by ESSSS are unusable. More on this later. Records used in compiling this dataset are as follows: “Libros 5-9, Bautismos de Pardos y Morenos, 1821-1844,” Documents held at the Iglesia de Jesus, María, y José, Havana, Cuba; “Libros 12P-15P, Bautismos de Pardos y Morenos, 1820-1846,” Documents held at the Iglesia de Nuesta Señora de la Asunción de Guanabacoa, Havana, Cuba; “Libros 1-4, Bautismos de Pardos y Morenos, 1805-1848,” Documents held at the Iglesia de Nuestra Señora de Regla, Havana, Cuba; “Libros 18N-24N, Bautismos de Pardos y Morenos, 1819-1848,” Documents held at the Iglesia de Santo Angel Custodio, Havana, Cuba. All records are available online at Ecclesiastical and Secular Sources for Slave Societies (ESSSS). [http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/esss-cuba.pl] (accessed April 11, 2017). 18 Guanche, Africanía y Etnicidad. 19 It is probable that the number is marginally higher, due to poor condition of some documents and the illegibility of a small number of ESSSS reproductions. The contents of these pages were consequently excluded from this dataset. The church of Santo Angel de Custodio’s baptismal records for the period between September and December of 1822 is in particularly poor condition and is therefore underrepresented. 20 Lovejoy, “Registers of Liberated Africans," p. 117. 21 Historians of pre-colonial Africa have argued that these ethnic denominations are a product of the diaspora, rather than contemporary African political and ethnic arrangements. See: Robin Law, "Ethnicity and the Slave Trade: "Lucumi" and "Nago" as Ethnonyms in West Africa," History in Africa, vol. 24, 1997, pp. 205-19; Chima J. Korieh, “African Ethnicity as Mirage? Historicizing the Essence of the Igbo in Africa and the Atlantic Diaspora,” Dialectical Anthropology, vol. 30, no. 1-2, January, 2006, pp. 91-118; David Northrup, “Becoming African: 54 Identity Formation among Liberated Slaves in Nineteenth-Century Sierra Leone,” Slavery & Abolition, vol. 27, no. 1, 2006, pp. 1-21. 22 Philip A. Howard, Changing History: Afro-Cuban Cabildos and Societies of Color in the Nineteenth Century (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1998); Manuel Barcia Paz, Seeds of Insurrection: Domination and Slave Resistance on Western Cuban Plantations, 18081848 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2008); María del Carmen Barcia, Los Ilustres Apellidos: Negros en la Habana Colonial (La Habana: Ediciones Boloña, 2008). 23 John Thornton argues that African slaves boarding slaving vessels in an African port were likely from the same broad geographical region. Africans from the same regions would have had at least some cultural and linguistic commonalities that they did not share with Africans from more far-flung parts of the continent. These regional traits may have served as the basis for the formation of broader, regional identities in the diaspora: John Thornton, Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Henry Lovejoy’s Mixed Commission data reveals that African ethnic denominations were very closely correlated with the coastal region in which ships took on slaves: Lovejoy, “Registers of Liberated Africans." 24 Not all rural slave populations were heavily male. William Van Norman shows that Cuban cafetals, or coffee plantations, featured a relatively even sex ratio among the enslaved workforce. This contrasted sharply with the overwhelmingly male slave labor employed in sugar production: Van Norman, Shade Grown Slavery: The Lives of Slaves on Coffee Plantations in Cuba (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2013). 25 G. Ugo Nwokeji argues that a variety of cultural practices were responsible, in part, for the relatively high percentage of women exported to Atlantic slavers in southeastern Nigeria. See: Nwokeji, The Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra: an African Society in the Atlantic World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 26 Alex FIndlay & William Smith, "Report of the Case of the Spanish Schooner 'Maria,' Jozé Rodriguez, Master." Sierra Leone, 25 Jan 1831, in Irish University Press Series of British Parliamentary Papers / Sessions 1825-1839. Correspondence with British Comm. and with Foreign Powers ... (Class A and Class B). - 1968. 13 = 13 = (Shannon: Irish Univ. Press, 1968), 13-14. 27 Findlay & Smith, “Report of the Case of the Spanish Brigantine “Dos Amigos,” Juan Ramon de Muxica, Master,” Sierra Leone, 10 Mar 1831, in Ibid., 16-21. 28 Bergad, et al, The Cuban Slave Market, p. 177-180. 29 Between 1823 and 1844, an average of 81 percent of slaves living on Cuban ingenios were African born, of whom more than 70 percent were men. Fraginals, El Ingenio, Vol. 2, p. 86. 55 30 Manuel Barcia argues that Lucumí slaves in Cuba during this era included an unusually large number of men with military experience due to ongoing conflict in what is now western Nigeria: Barcia Paz, Seeds of Insurrection; For more on the significance of the collapse of Oyo in the history of the Atlantic slave trade, see: Kristin Mann, Slavery and the Birth of an African City: Lagos, 1760-1900 (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2010); Paul E. Lovejoy, Transformations in Slavery: a History of Slavery in Africa, 3rd Edition (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012); 56 BIBLIOGRAPHY 57 BIBLIOGRAPHY Archival Sources Archivo Histórico Nacional, Madrid Digital Primary Sources Ecclesiastical and Secular Sources for Slave Societies. Vanderbilt University http://www.vanderbilt.edu/esss/. Published Primary Sources Irish University Press Series of British Parliamentary Papers (Shannon: Irish University Press, 1968). Secondary Sources Azopardo, Ildelfondo Gutierrez. “Los Libros de Registros de Pardos y Morenos en los Archivos Parroquiales de Cartagena de Indias.” Revista Española de Antropología Americana. Vol. XIII. 1983. Pp. 121-141. Barcia, María del Carmen. Los Ilustres Apellidos: Negros en la Habana Colonial (La Habana: Ediciones Boloña, 2008). Barcia Paz, Manuel. Seeds of Insurrection: Domination and Slave Resistance on Western Cuban Plantations, 1808-1848 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2008). 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