An examination of the social aspects of Bahamian society between the early-19th and mid-20th centuries, locating the Bahamas within the regional and historical context of the West Indies. It shows that the Bahamas' social development bears great similarities to other countries of the Caribbean.

"Saunders resoundingly affirms the relevance of island history. Scholars will appreciate the detail and insights."--Choice "Deftly unravels the complex historical interrelationships of race, color, class, economics, and environment in the Colonial Bahamas. An invaluable study for scholars who conduct comparative research on the British Caribbean."--Rosalyn Howard, author of Black Seminoles in the Bahamas "Saunders is to be commended for a scholarly study that prominently features the non-white majority in the Bahamas--a group which usually has been overlooked."--Whittington B. Johnson, author of Post-Emancipation Race Relations in The Bahamas In this one-of-a-kind study of race and class in the Bahamas, Gail Saunders shows how racial tensions were not necessarily parallel to those across other British West Indian colonies but instead mirrored the inflexible color line of the United States. Proximity to the U.S. and geographic isolation from other British colonies created a uniquely Bahamian interaction among racial groups. Focusing on the post-emancipation period from the 1880s to the 1960s, Saunders considers the entrenched, though extra-legal, segregation prevalent in most spheres of life that lasted well into the 1950s. Saunders traces early black nationalist and pan-Africanism movements, as well as the influence of Garveyism and Prohibition during World War I. She examines the economic depression of the 1930s and the subsequent boom in the tourism industry, which boosted the economy but worsened racial tensions: proponents of integration predicted disaster if white tourists ceased traveling to the islands. Despite some upward mobility of mixed-race and black Bahamians, the economy continued to be dominated by the white elite, and trade unions and labor-based parties came late to the Bahamas. Secondary education, although limited to those who could afford it, was the route to a better life for nonwhite Bahamians and led to mixed-race and black persons studying in professional fields, which ultimately brought about a rising political consciousness. Training her lens on the nature of relationships among the various racial and social groups in the Bahamas, Saunders tells the story of how discrimination persisted until at last squarely challenged by the majority of Bahamians.

Johnson examines the formative years of post-slavery Bahamas, when the islands' nonwhite majority began to adjust to their new status as subjects of the British Crown. This is the first book to contrast Bahamians' newfound freedom with that of emancipated slaves in the American South. The author argues that because the Bahamian abolition movement sought only to free the slaves--not to promote social equality and democracy--freed Bahamians were able to move beyond the slave experience to life in a free but still white-dominated and prejudicial society. Moreover, they suffered none of the violence, segregation, and discriminatory laws that African Americans encountered. The most striking feature about the Bahamas' post-emancipation years was how quickly society forgot that a majority of its people had been slaves, as if Bahamians suffered from a collective case of selective amnesia after Emancipation Day, August 1, 1834. No longer identified as black or people of color, freed nonwhites embraced their new identity without forsaking their African heritage. Yet in the United States, almost 140 years after the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, many African Americans continue to be acutely aware and resentful of their slave roots. In studying the islands' politics, economy, social organizations, education, religion, and criminal justice system, the author explores whether nonwhites used their majority in the electorate to gain control of the British colony after it became a free society, whether whites sought to use force to maintain control of the islands, and whether whites tried to emigrate from the Bahamas. He also analyzes the role that the islands' racial classification system--which stresses ethnicity over skin color--played in post-slavery society.

The present work concludes the important and monumental undertaking of Islanders in the Stream: A History of the Bahamian People, creating the most thorough and comprehensive history yet written of a Caribbean country and its people. In the first volume Michael Craton and Gail Saunders traced the developments of a unique archipelagic nation from aboriginal times to the period just before emancipation. This long-awaited second volume offers a description and interpretation of the social developments of the Bahamas in the years from 1830 to the present. Volume Two divides this period into three chronological sections, dealing first with adjustments to emancipation by former masters and former slaves between 1834 and 1900, followed by a study of the slow process of modernization between 1900 and 1973 that combines a systematic study of the stimulus of social change, a candid examination of current problems, and a penetrating but sympathetic analysis of what makes the Bahamas and Bahamians distinctive in the world. This work is an eminent product of the New Social History, intended for Bahamians, others interested in the Bahamas, and scholars alike. It skillfully interweaves generalizations and regional comparisons with particular examples, drawn from travelers' accounts, autobiographies, private letters, and the imaginative reconstruction of official dispatches and newspaper reports. Lavishly illustrated with contemporary photographs and original maps, it stands as a model for forthcoming histories of similar small ex-colonial nations in the region.

From two leading historians of Bahamian history comes this groundbreaking work on a unique archipelagic nation. Islanders in the Stream is not only the first comprehensive chronicle of the Bahamian people, it is also the first work of its kind and scale for any Caribbean nation. This comprehensive volume details the full, extraordinary history of all the people who have ever inhabited the islands and explains the evolution of a Bahamian national identity within the framework of neighboring territories in similar circumstances. Divided into three sections, this volume covers the period from aboriginal times to the end of formal slavery in 1838. The first part includes authoritative accounts of Columbus’s first landfall in the New World on San Salvador island, his voyage through the Bahamas, and the ensuing disastrous collision of European and native Arawak cultures. Covering the islands’ initial settlement, the second section ranges from the initial European incursions and the first English settlements through the lawless era of pirate misrule to Britain’s official takeover and development of the colony in the eighteenth century. The third, and largest, section offers a full analysis of Bahamian slave society through the great influx of Empire Loyalists and their slaves at the end of the American Revolution to the purported achievement of full freedom for the slaves in 1838. This work is both a pioneering social history and a richly illustrated narrative modifying previous Eurocentric interpretations of the islands’ early history. Written to appeal to Bahamians as well as all those interested in Caribbean history, Islanders in the Stream looks at the islands and their people in their fullest contexts, constituting not just the most thorough view of Bahamian history to date but a major contribution to Caribbean historiography.

This deeply researched, clearly written book is a history of black society and its relations with whites in the Bahamas from the close of the American Revolution to emancipation. Whittington B. Johnson examines the communities developed by free, bonded, and mixed-race blacks on the islands as British colonists and American loyalists unsuccessfully tried to establish a plantation economy. The author explores how relations between the races developed civilly in this region, contrasting it with the harsher and more violent experiences of other Caribbean islands and the American South. Interpreting church documents and Colonial Office papers in a new light, Johnson presents a more favorable conclusion than previously advanced about the conditions endured by victims of the African Diaspora and by Creoles in the Bahama Islands. He makes use of an impressive and important body of archival and secondary research. Race Relations in the Bahamas will be a book of great interest to southern historians, historians of slave societies and black communities, scholars of race relations, and general readers.

From two leading historians of Bahamian history comes this groundbreaking work on a unique archipelagic nation. Islanders in the Stream is not only the first comprehensive chronicle of the Bahamian people, it is also the first work of its kind and scale for any Caribbean nation. This comprehensive volume details the full, extraordinary history of all the people who have ever inhabited the islands and explains the evolution of a Bahamian national identity within the framework of neighboring territories in similar circumstances. Divided into three sections, this volume covers the period from aboriginal times to the end of formal slavery in 1838. The first part includes authoritative accounts of Columbus’s first landfall in the New World on San Salvador island, his voyage through the Bahamas, and the ensuing disastrous collision of European and native Arawak cultures. Covering the islands’ initial settlement, the second section ranges from the initial European incursions and the first English settlements through the lawless era of pirate misrule to Britain’s official takeover and development of the colony in the eighteenth century. The third, and largest, section offers a full analysis of Bahamian slave society through the great influx of Empire Loyalists and their slaves at the end of the American Revolution to the purported achievement of full freedom for the slaves in 1838. This work is both a pioneering social history and a richly illustrated narrative modifying previous Eurocentric interpretations of the islands’ early history. Written to appeal to Bahamians as well as all those interested in Caribbean history, Islanders in the Stream looks at the islands and their people in their fullest contexts, constituting not just the most thorough view of Bahamian history to date but a major contribution to Caribbean historiography.

The process of terminating the European Transatlantic Trade in Africans (TTA) was long and drawn-out. Although Africans, including the enslaved had long resisted its operation, abolition has traditionally been presented as a benevolent act by the British state acting under pressure from the intellectual classes and humanitarian activists. But the campaign to end the TTA cannot be separated from the resistance struggle of the Africans themselves.In Saving Souls: The Struggle to end the Transatlantic Trade in Africans, the companion volume to Trading Souls, noted Caribbean historians Hilary Beckles and Verene Shepherd trace the African experience from capture, the horrors of the Middle Passage to liberation. Their story emphasises the contributions of the victims of the enslaved even while acknowledging the critical role of the British abolitionists. Readers will learn about: The structure and conduct of the trade in African peopleDetails of the resistance of Africans to capture, sale and transportationThe abolition movement - involving black and white, enslaved and free, male and female, Christian and non-Christian activistsLegacies of the 1807 ActThe final Abolition Acts, namely the 1805-1806 Order-in-Council and the 1807 Act are included as appendices for easy reference.

"This book was originally published to coincide with the bicentennial of the arrival of the American Loyalists in The Bahamas. It describes the Loyalist influx in the 1780s, their settlement and the social, political and economic influence they exerted on their adopted home. The author gives a brief description of their original settlements pointing out the differences between the Loyalists who settled in the northern Bahamas and those who settled in the south. She examines the slaves of the Loyalists and concludes that their descendants significantly influenced Bahamian history. The economic impact of the Loyalists and their slaves is considered in depth together with their influence in religion, and social and cultural life. Finally, she mentions the rift which developed in politics between newcomers and the old inhabitants."--Page 4 of cover.