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42 t w o Slave Resistance in Cuba to 1825 Everything will be taken from us by the negro devil that perhaps one day will rule over the Antilles. —field marshall josé moscoso, 1822 T his chapter opens with a brief account of the manifestations of slave resistance in Cuba during the first centuries of Spanish colonial rule. Understanding these early instances of resistance will allow us to appreciate a number of events that occurred in the Atlantic world during the Age of Revolution and the impact they would have upon slavery in Cuba. Before the changes associated with this new world order reached Cuba in the late eighteenth century, slave rebellion on the island had been confined to sporadic incidents that were generally quickly dealt with by the authorities. This overview of the acts of resistance that preceded the Age of Revolution will expand our understanding of the changes that took place within the institution of slavery in Cuba and will provide us with valuable insight into how these changes affected slave rebellion on the island from about 1820 on. early modern cuba, 1522–1790 Almost from the moment early Spanish adventurers settled in the New World, they faced dissent, first from the indigenous peoples and later from the newly imported African slaves. Although during the first decades of Spanish conquest and colonization of the Americas only a few minor urban settlements existed, the need for cheap labor to work in the mines and fields led the Spanish almost immediately to enslave men and women on a regular basis. As is well known, the indigenous population was soon decimated in the Caribbean islands by harsh living conditions and new diseases. Replacing them with Africans , who were considered to be stronger, was the logical next step. Slave Resistance in Cuba to 1825 · 43 In the first half of the sixteenth century some of these urban settlements began to grow and to acquire a certain importance. Cartagena de Indias, Panama , Nombre de Dios, Veracruz, Santo Domingo, and Havana became some of the most important administrative and political centers of the emerging Spanish Empire. Predictably, their socio-demographic paths differed, yet all experienced wide-ranging forms of resistance by the indigenous inhabitants of the colonized lands and then by the imported Africans. As early as 1522, Governor Diego Colón was forced to crush a rebellion that started on his own plantation , near Santo Domingo on the island of La Española.1 In each of these centers , whether Spanish authorities recorded instances of slave resistance was dependent on their level of distress or fear. Violent cases such as revolts and marronage were typically recorded, while other, disguised actions were more often than not ignored. As the sixteenth century progressed and more African slaves were taken to the New World, increasing numbers of references to the forms of resistance practiced by these African men and women and their descendants appeared in the historical record. In 1523, just a few months after the uprising in La Española, a group of African slaves rebelled in Mexico, and there were reports of disturbances in Santa Marta in 1529 and Panama in 1531.2 Cuba was no means an exception. As early as 1534, near the town of Bayamo , four blacks destined to work in the mines rose and pillaged the region. They were soon defeated, and their heads cut off and shown to the inhabitants of the town as a warning to other Africans.3 Runaway slaves were rapidly becoming another serious problem for the authorities and the residents. Reports from 1538 and 1543 indicate that Indians and African slaves ran away.4 The following years saw the island’s economy languish and its population steadily decrease until Havana became the last port of departure for the Spanish treasure fleets in the late 1550s. Very few cases of violent slave resistance were recorded in that period. There were references to runaway slaves in 1558 and 1569, but it was only in the mid-1570s that there was a concerted effort to tackle this problem with the Ordenanzas de Cáceres.5 The Ordenanzas of 1574, as they were also known, included some measures to deal with runaway slaves. Nevertheless , as the Cuban historian Alejandro de la Fuente has rightly pointed out, the limited attention to the problem within the Ordenanzas highlights the fact that runaway slaves were not a very serious threat to the colony at the time, something that would drastically change in...

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