We have earlier examined how the authorities and planters in the West Indies shifted their attention towards India for the recruitment of labour, and the manner in which metropolitan political, and Indian governmental forces aligned themselves against this trade. Secondly, we have seen how as a response to immigration, and to wider political pressure, the colony set up a bureaucratic initiative, namely an ‘Agent for Emigrants’, and introduced legal changes with regard to plantation hospitals in the form of the 1847 Hospital Ordinance. Additionally, we have looked at how the resources of
155. Ibid. 156. Ibid.
157. Bertram Wyatt-Brown, ‘The Mask of Obedience Male slave psychology in the Old South’, in J. Williams Harris (ed.). Society and Culture in the Slave South (Routledge 1992), pp. 128-161.
158. Gautam Bhadra, ‘The Mentality of Subaltemity. Kantanama or Rajdharma’, in Ranajit Guha (ed ). Subaltern Studies VI (Oxford University Press 1989), p. 54.
Corridors of power: labour, migration, and health provision in British Guiana 1838-1847
the colonial hospital were shifted towards the treatment of immigrants. All of these reforms may be seen as part of a broader regulatory structure which was gradually set up in different parts of the empire to organise and oversee the flow of immigrant labour. It is to this that we now turn. The discussion begins with India before moving to Guiana.
In India, after the suspension of emigration to Mauritius and the West Indies, a six person Commission o f Enquiry was established (1 August 1838) to consider the whole question of indentured labour.^^° This investigation was matched by a similar one in Mauritius, and, as we have already discussed, by Governor Light’s enquiry in Guiana. Commissions in British political life were relatively new bodies, designed to take evidence from all classes and thereby facilitate rational decision making. Yet, as we shall see with the Indian Commission, they made recommendations, not policy.
Powerful and influential knots of commercial interest and political ideology were bound up in the immigrant trade. It was not just the commercial pull of the West Indies which drew labour from India. In the ports of Calcutta and Madras, an extensive network of agents, ‘crimps’, ‘duffadars’ and shippers accumulated high revenues from their ability to procure and deliver labour to Mauritius planters. The organisation of this trade, the contracting of shipping, the hiring of labour, and supply of provisions and financial credit, further extended the numbers o f individuals who benefited from this trade. It was this whole system of activity and profit that the Commission potentially threatened.
One simple but compelling reason for continuing with this trade lay in the pervasive ideology of ‘free trade’ and ‘free labour’. It is worth briefly discussing what this meant in terms of the empire, since its influence amongst politicians was wide. For many members of the British and Indian governments, free trade was, as Lord Palmerston later argued, ‘one of the great standing laws of nature.’'®' As Brian Harrison has shown, many Victorians believed that commerce would ‘banish superstition, ignorance, war and brutality’.'®^ In fact, the abolitionist movement itself was deeply
159. Smith. Enclosure no. 2 in Light to Russell, 29 December 1839. P.P. 1840. Vol. XXXIV.
160. ‘Committee appointed to enquire respecting the exportation of Hill Coolies’, 1 August 1838. P.P. 1841. Vol. XVI. p. 9.
161. P. J. Marshall, ‘An Expanding Trade’, in P. J. Marshall (ed.), Cambridge Illustrated History of the British Empire (Cambridge University Press 1996), p. 32
162. Brian Harrison, ‘Philantluopy and the Victorians’, in Brian Harrison Peaceable Kingdom: Stability and Change in Modem Britain (Oxford 1982), p. 230.
imbued with these views, and frequently drew attention to the superiority of ‘free labour’ over slavery.
In India however, the ideas of free trade seemed to have less resonance. There, the circumstances of rule encouraged a strong strand of utilitarian thinking. This found expression in a concern for establishing the proper institutional frameworks, e.g. codes of law and taxation, deemed necessary for economic expansion and commerce. Utilitarianism appears to have been particularly suited to the commercial opportunities and political circumstances of early nineteenth century India. In the progressive and reforming language of utility, it was possible to adorn Company Rule in the ideological garb of a civilising force, while reaping the commercial benefits which accrued through having a commanding political influence. One element of this discourse expressed itself by a European desire to foster the 'natural' industriousness of Indians. The most far sighted policy for India, in the opinion of the East India Company official James Mill, was to:
...teach people to look for their elevation to their own resources, their industiy and economy. Let the means of accumulation be afforded to our Indian subjects; let them grow rich as cultivators, merchants, manufacturers...'^^
Opinions such as this were easily adaptable to the commercial interests of certain Calcutta traders. One such person was W. Dawson, a merchant who was directly involved in the ‘coolie’ trade, and also a member of the afore mentioned Commission of E n q u i r y . M i l l had suggested that free individuals, voluntarily acting in their own interests, were at the centre of British political philosophy in India. Dawson developed the practical implications of this view by arguing that any opposition to emigration was an attack on individual liberty. Moreover, he elaborated, in the circumstances of India, restricting emigration simply condemned individuals to starvation and disease. Dawson linked prosperity and the development of colonies with the free movement of labour, and by implication, the economic destruction of colonies should the labour supply cease. This formulation effectively harmonised humanitarian anti-slavery ideology with pro emigration free labour liberalism. Dawson went on to observe, 'the system is capable of
163. For example, see the Barbados Liberal ‘Free Labour verses Slave Labour! ’ British Emancipator June 1839. G. R. Searl, Morality and the Market in Victorian Britain (Clarendon Press 1998), p 60.
164. Stokes, English Utilitarians pp. 87-93, 219.
165. James Mill, ‘History of British India’, in William J. Barber, British Economic Thought and India 1600- 1858 (Clarendon Press 1975), p. 165.
Corridors of power: labour, migration, and health provision in British Guiana 1838-1847
being regulated in its detail, so as to ensure to the labourers the fullest justice, security, and comfort.”^’
It is important to note that although Dawson’s views have been given prominence above, they did not sway other members of the Commission. Amongst the massive amount of accumulated evidence on emigration practices there were too many incidences o f coercion, brutality and abuse to ignore.'^* Two further difficulties stood out. Firstly, a practical problem, that of managing health on a lengthy sea voyage. The long sea route to the West Indies, the unavoidable journey around the Cape, and the inevitable hardships on board ship suggested a high mortality rate. This difficulty alone appeared to preclude any regular system of emigration. Secondly, there were important political dimensions. Quarrels with foreign governments who still traded slaves remained likely, and thus, any renewal of the trade in Indian labour threatened to:
weaken the moral influence of the British Government throughout the world, and deaden or utterly destroy the effect of all future remonstrances and negotiations respecting the slave trade.’
Hence, the problem of labour emigration was capable o f being approached from distinctly different political perspectives. Representations to the Commission by Calcutta merchants stressed the plausibility of a highly regulated system of emigration involving voluntary contracts, minimum standards of food, return passages, and 'kind personal treatment'. According to this view, an emigration system shorn of abuse would be 'not only defensible but worthy of commendation.'’’’
These tensions proved unbridgeable. When, in October of 1840, the Commission’s Report came out, it contained strong criticism of indentureship. However, only three of the Commission’s members signed the report and two others (one of whom was Dawson) submitted lengthy alternative views. Finally, therefore, when the report came up for consideration in London, it did not represent a unanimous condemnation of indentureship. Consequently, parliamentary opinion, in accordance with free trade thinking, and itself under pressure from West Indian commercial interests, gradually moved in favour of regulating the trade in Indian labour rather than total prohibition. The first step was to legislate for the island of Mauritius, and on the 15 January 1842, an Order of Council repealed the ban on emigration there. Subsequently,
167. Minute of Mr. Dawson. P.P 1841. Vol. XVI. p.l6. 168. Tinker, A New Svstem of Slavery pp. 66-67.
169. Committee on ‘Hill Coolies’, P.P. 1841. Vol. XVI. pp. 4-9. 170. Ibid. p. 9.
in parliamentary debates on this matter in March and July of that year, the abolitionist position, that of retaining a ban on emigration, was lost.’’^
Accompanying the Order of Council was a schedule of regulations. This is significant, because it was through the elaboration, development and reworkings of regulatory controls that emigration from India to the West Indies once again became possible. The sociologist Weber, has pointed to three principal characteristics of a bureaucracy; rules to delineate powers, hierarchies of subordination, and docum entation.A s we will see, in the structures designed to oversee Indian emigration these criteria were wholly fulfilled.
The undoubted appeal of bureaucratic systems lay in their supposed rationality, the way they encouraged accountability and ordered relationships through the use of state officials, and by applying legal authority, precedent and routine. The language of emigration regulatory control, which was developed in India, very much stressed the numerous safeguards against abuse. The systems of certification posed a series of bureaucratic filters which were 'materially restrictive' to the unhindered flow of emigrant l a b o u r . I t is not in the remit of this thesis to discuss whether the regulations actually ‘worked’ to prevent abuse, what is clear is that they ‘worked’ in a political sense, in that they re-opened the emigration trade. Probably, it would be a mistake to take the rhetoric of control wholly at face value, especially since emigration, and the importance of its legislative regulation, was bound up in the polemic of parliamentary disputes over this issue. Furthermore, it should be remembered, these controls were not designed to prevent migration, but to facilitate migration, a task they successfully assisted in until the abolition of indentureship in 1917.
At the heart of the new regulatory scheme was a new post, the Protector of Indian Emigrants (fashioned after the Protector of Slaves) and the establishment of bureaucratic procedures to ensure the proper treatment of emigrants. Routines to assemble, isolate, observe, and assess the labourer structured the operation. From Calcutta to Mauritius, where a reciprocal set of regulations were arranged by the
171. Representations from the Merchants of Calcutta. Ibid. pp. 147-8. 172. Tinker, A New Svstem of Slavery p. 74.
173. Max Weber, Economy and Society in Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich (eds.), (Uniyersity of California Press 1978), pp. 956-958. See also Ken Morrison, Marx. Durkheim, Weber. Formations of Modem Social Thought (Sage 1995), pp. 293-304
Corridors of power: labour, migration, and health provision in British Guiana 1838-1847
colonial authorities, the process was marked at each juncture by a complex system of certificates and registration monitored by salaried state officials and ships’ surgeons.
In fact, this style of supervision had already been deployed on convict ships, and from 1831 onwards, on government assisted emigrant ships bound for Australia. In both of these cases mortality rates had begun to decline. Robin Haines and Ralph Shlomowitz have demonstrated how colonial immigration officials and ships’ surgeons developed a system of pre-departure medical examinations for British emigrants. In addition, ships’ surgeons reduced on-board crowding, and improved shipboard sanitation. Cleaner water, better ventilation and a superior diet complemented these reforms.'’^ In a modified form, these technologies of health, supervision, space and diet, were also applied to the ports of Calcutta and Madras for the departing indentured labourers. As a result of these official interventions into the running of emigrant ships, the onboard mortality levels for Indian immigrants to the West Indies did gradually decline, although the figures were uneven from year to year. A severe outbreak of disease on one ship could skew the figures for a whole year. Still, by the 1870s shipboard mortality had fallen by more than half, to 7.1 per 1000, although it was still greater than that of European emigrants to Australia during the same period.
The laws permitting Indian emigration to Mauritius did not yet extend to the West Indies. Amongst most parliamentarians confidence in the West Indian planter remained low. Yet activity on this issue in Guiana, despite the prohibition of labour from India, had not subsided over the previous years. In fact, with the collapse of the Gladstone scheme, planters had redoubled their efforts to establish emigration schemes to bring labour into the colony. None of these private initiatives found favour with the colony’s Governor who enlisted the support of the Colonial Office in order to press for the establishment of better regulatory structures within the colony. Light wrote to the Colonial Office in October 1839 pointing out the decisive role of the home government’s attitude to events in Guiana:
The anxiety to meet the views of Her Majesty's Government, expressed by the community at large on the subject of immigration, will enable your Lordship to assume any position in protection of immigrants you may think necessary.
Light was particularly sceptical that 'individual enterprise', or 'private speculators', could safely transport immigrants into the c o l o n y . I t was far more
175. Haines and Shlomowitz, ‘Explaining’ p. 16. 176. Ibid. p. 23.
preferable, in Light's view, to bring about a whole-scale government scheme, whereby bounties were paid out of public revenue and the control and supervision of emigrants rested in proper government appointed agents.
Planters were also keen to open up the route to Africa. To this, the home government remained 'decidedly hostile’. Moving labour from Africa to the West Indies remained far too politically sensitive to receive sanction, threatening, as the Marquis of Normanby for the Colonial Office put it, to bring ‘discredit on the sincerity of efforts made by this nation for the suppression of that system of guilt and misery.” *® Nevertheless, over the course of the next year, petitions from planters and memorials from Liverpool-based West Indian merchants were steadily conveyed to the Colonial Office. Each one was an appeal on behalf of the ‘hard pressed’ West Indian planter for permission to import labour.’*' The West Indian Committee hinted at the racial benefits of using labour from warm climates, and drew attention to the rationale of seeking labour from those colonial possessions where labour was ‘surplus’. In its opinion, the very survival of Guiana depended upon labour arriving from 'densely populated countries whose inhabitants, from climate and other circumstances, are best adapted for tropical labour."*^
These views were complemented by positive assessments of labouring conditions in Guiana, which were also made known to the Colonial Office. From the early 1840s, Magistrates increasingly adopted an optimistic and favourable stance towards plantations. On the formerly notorious Belle-Vue estate, the sheriff o f Berbice wrote about the workers 'nothing could be more favourable than the condition in which I found them."*^ A complimentary assessment of Guiana, by the delegates of the Free Coloured People of Baltimore, added to the view that conditions for labour in Guiana had undergone a transformation.'*“ In some magistrates’ remarks about the physical and ‘moral’ improvement of immigrants, we can see how far the cause of emigration was embedded within European culture. The magistrate C. H. Strutt, clearly had the broader visions of empire in mind, as well as the concerns of the colony, when he argued;
178. Light to Russell, 4 June 1840. P.P. 1841. Vol. XVI.
179. Normanby to Light, 15 August 1839. P.P. 1840. Vol. XXXIV. 180. Ibid.
181. Letters signed by representatives of Liverpool West India Association and another from the directors of the Colonial Bank, various merchants and the M. P. James Blair. Enclosures no. 1 and no. 2 in Russell to Light
15 Februaiy 1840. P. P. 1840. Vol. XXXIV. 182. Encl. No. 1. Ibid.
Corridors of power: labour, migration, and health provision in British Guiana 1838-1847
The Coolie in India is badly paid, badly fed, and wholly uninstructed in the principles of Christianity. The African in Africa leads the life of the savage, and preys, or is preyed upon, by his neighbour, murder and bloodshed being as familiar to his eyes as the trees of the forest in which he dwells. In this country, on the contrary, the labourer is protected by humane and wholesome laws, liberally paid for the work he performs, comfortably housed and carefully attended in sickness, whilst his opportunities of acquiring religious and moral instruction are rarely equalled.
Governor Light also stressed to the Colonial Office the benefits of the colony’s moral framework (church, chapel, school) for immigrants.’®^ These were views highly congenial to London, and the committed colonialist. Lord John Russell, when head of the Colonial Office, was prompted to write to Light in full agreement with these civilising notions.’®’ At the same time, the legacy of the earlier emigration from India, which had drawn the opprobrium o f the Anti-Slavery Society, weighed heavily against planting interests in Guiana. While the Government of India continued with its Commission of Enquiry, Russell, like his predecessor Normanby, refused to sanction further emigration to the West Indies. The free trader Russell extolled the virtues of ‘Freedom of Labour’, but only under suitable political conditions.
In the mean time, under the auspices of the colony’s Emigration Society, the ship
Venezuela, landed a small number of emigrants from Barbados and America. Russell
surveyed this scheme and encouragingly declared the endeavour not 'unobjectionable in its e lf ’®® However, for the scale o f immigration required, substantial amounts of finance were needed, namely loans raised in London, to be paid for out of the colony’s future
revenue. The scale of these financial arrangements made the backing of the home government essential, but this support was not forthcoming. These circumstances produced bursts of acrimonious and bitter conflict within the ruling circles of the colony, most especially between the Governor and planter representatives on the Court of Policy.’®^ Planter frustrations were channelled into hindering the business of government, and it was not until February 1841, after the home government had finally relented, and assented to Guiana passing an Immigration Ordinance and thus allowing