Q: What was the absolute most violent grassroots (organized from scratch) rebellion of enslaved Blacks in South America?
– Black History Questions and Answers Admin Team
A: The Berbice Uprising of 1763 was the most violent rebellion of enslaved African people in South America.
Almost three decades before the revolution in Haiti, a contingency of crusaders in the Dutch colony of Berbice (near Suriname in modern-day Guyana) had already done the unthinkable.
In her book Blood on the River: A Chronicle of Mutiny and Freedom on the Wild Coast (2020), University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) professor Marjoleine Kars details how this rebellion brought freedom to all of the colony’s 5,000 to 6,000 enslaved Africans, who toppled the Dutch regime and lived under a government of their own making for almost a year.
While there were also 300 Native Americans enslaved under similar conditions in Berbice, and some were known participants in the rebellion, trial records and other documents from that time indicate that this was largely a Black rebellion. It is this fact which haunted the colonists most.
The air was thick with fright from the aftermath of a violent month-long mutiny of 26 Africans in 1762.
But, evidently, this test did absolutely nothing to prepare the White populace for what was coming next.
Just a few months later, upon receiving news of another uprising from his plantation abode, the colonial councilman and militia captain Laurens Kunckler spared no time at all. In haste, he buried his prized possessions and summoned the local Natives to safeguard his furniture.
He flung a prayer to the heavens.
Then, he bolted out the door, pausing briefly to warn his neighbor:
My dear neighbour, it is over for us and the Colony!
Burgher-Captain Kunckler, as quoted in The Berbice Uprising 1763 (2013) by A. J. McR. Cameron (a.k.a. Anna Benjamin)
In just over a month, 1,200 rebels had united under the leadership of three men with roots in West Africa: Coffy (or Coffij), Atta, and Accabiré.
Soon, they had a rudimentary government, which mirrored that of the Dutch colonial system, complete with a governor, a council, a treasurer, and even a minister of justice (literally a hangman). They divided their army and distinguished officers among them, borrowing again from the Dutch military’s chain of command.
By the time the land was back under Dutch control, nearly 50 White settlers were dead.
Kars argues that the decision to launch and to sustain the rebellion was not a unanimous one among the slaves. Rather, a small minority of the enslaved Black population led the way, using a number of tactics to coerce and compel others to join them. The sudden disappearance of murderous slave drivers and insatiable sugar barons had been a cause for much celebration. After plundering plantation properties, many were content only to bask in the glory of their conquest. They raided the wardrobes, storehouses, and kitchens of their former masters for anything of value. Berbice became the canvas of Europe’s worst nightmare: as far as the eye could see were mountains of ashes on which Black men were comfortably seated, luxuriously clothed, and indulging themselves in fine brandy. It mattered not to the rebels and their allies what the world thought of them. This moment of freedom was well deserved.
To their relief, several months passed on without so much as a single puff of smoke on the horizon. But this peace was not to last. Petty fights broke out between the leaders of the rebellion. Over time, excitement turned to despair. Storms were buffeting the land, food supplies were dwindling and, as they anticipated the arrival of reinforcements from the Dutch homeland, the leaders began to realize the weight of their predicament. Meanwhile, the people on a whole had yet to grasp the value of self-determination. The masses of former slaves were receptive to the cause of their leaders. But some were not so deeply resolved. The Creoles, in particular, (Blacks who were born in the colony) were mostly preoccupied with maintaining the lands of their masters in the event of their return. Others found it difficult to entrust their survival to the rebels or the Creoles. As they later recounted to the authorities, they ‘did not want to be anyone’s slave.’ They decided instead to wait out the conflict in hiding until they could execute some plan of escape.
One of the methods that the new leaders employed in order to address this situation was to re-enslave Blacks who either resisted their rules or refused to contribute to the construction of the new nation.
In her 1979 thesis on the rebellion, Dutch historian Ineke Velzing identifies that the leaders feared those who had not been loyal to the cause would switch sides, making matters worse for their fledgling flock.
In the interest of unity, strict discipline was the primary requirement. For that reason those people who had either kept aloof or had assisted the Whites in making good their escape had to continue to work as slaves on the plantations.
Ineke Velzing, as quoted in an excerpt from her master’s thesis for the University of Amsterdam, published by Stabroek News
Slavery under the rebel regime was all about survival.
While it served to legitimize and to enforce the authority of the leaders, it also served a more fundamental purpose for the people: fuel for their movement.
In a review of Kars’ book, British author A. J. McR. Cameron conjectured:
In order to feed people, kitchen gardens had to be cultivated; in order to prevent the Dutch from retaking the colony, they had to train and supply an army; in order to feed the army they needed cash; in order to get cash they needed to have workers to grow cash crops.
A. J. McR. Cameron (a.k.a. Anna Benjamin), in her Guyanese paper, the Sunday Stabroek
The earliest published account of the rebellion is Beschryving van Guiana, of de Wilde Kust in Zuid-America (Description of Guiana, or the Wild Coast in South America) (1770) by Jan Jacob Hartsinck (1716-1779). Hartsnick served as a director of the West India Company, a major supplier of African slaves to Dutch plantations. In his book, he describes the brutal punishments of the rebels.
900 persons were interrogated. In order to discourage any further disturbances in the colony, the colonial government meted out the harshest of punishments to those they deemed guilty.
124 rebels (120 men and 4 women) were executed.
In one group, 53 were killed (22 hanged, 16 broken on the wheel, and 15 burned).
The final group consisted of 32 persons, who were identified as the main leaders of the rebellion; 18 were hanged, 8 were broken on the wheel, and 6 were burned to death.
Atta received the worst punishment of all. He was chained to a pole in such a way that he could walk in a complete circle around it. A pile of wood was laid out in a circle around the pole under his feet. Large chunks of flesh were torn from his body in four places. Then this was done every 10 minutes for 3 hours. The wood was then ignited from the outside and closed in towards the center for 2 and a half hours until he was burnt to a crisp.
The Berbice Uprising cost the colony almost half of their enslaved workforce – roughly 2,000 adults.
A greater proportion of European colonists had either perished in the chaos or abandoned all hope of a full recovery (many fled to other colonies and some managed to drag their slaves with them).
Most mainstream scholars, like Kars, consider the rebellion a disaster, doomed from the start. But the Berbice Rebellion was significant in many ways.
The first thing that stands out is the boldness of the participants.
In a letter formally addressed as a “Warning to His Excellency the Governor,” the leaders “Koffie” and “Accara” wrote the following:
…Be warned that his Excellency should go with the ships to Holland as soon as possible, if not immediately, and should the Governor not do this then your Excellency must fire three shots and then the Captain will come with a large number of people to fight.
The reason for this war is that there have been many gentlemen who have not given the slaves their due…
Not only did they identify their struggle as a legitimate war, positioning themselves as equals with the Dutch authorities, but in another letter, they attempted to negotiate the return of the island in exchange for the freedom of all inhabitants. They further threatened that if their demands were not taken seriously, then ‘things will go badly.’
In writing of the rebellion, the celebrated historian of the African Diaspora John Henrik Clarke (1915-1998) quotes Guyanese political activist Eusi Kwayana, who referred to it as ‘an episode, in the 18th century of world-wide significance.’
This is true, said Kwayana, for a number of reasons.
First of all, it came before the American Revolution, which is widely regarded as the original colonial revolution (actually I believe that title belongs to the Corsicans, who declared their independence from Genoa in 1755). Therefore, Kwayana also saw the Berbice Uprising as a ‘foreshadowing’ of other historic revolutions, including those in France, Russia, and Cuba.
A more compelling, yet equally valid observation on the subject is the line he draws, connecting the Berbice Uprising to other Black uprisings in that region.
In Kwayana’s view, the uprisings of Maroons in Jamaica and Suriname kicked off the uprising in Berbice, which in turn, set the stage for the revolution in Haiti.
The revolt of the Maroons, both in Jamaica and in Surinam, helped to create the condition and attitude that made the Berbice revolt in Guyana possible. These revolts collectively helped to create the condition and attitude that went into the making of the most successful slave revolt in history – better known as the Haitian Revolution.
Eusi Kwayana (formerly Sidney King), as quoted by John Henrik Clarke in the journal Présence Africaine (African Presence)
Kars herself follows this line of thinking with a strong statement on its implications for the study of Black history today.
Governor Coffij might have pre-empted Haiti’s leader Toussaint Louverture as the first Black liberator to defeat colonial powers.
Marjoleine Kars in her book Blood on the Water (2020), as quoted in the Sunday Stabroek
The Berbice Uprising on the Dutch coast of South America was, essentially, a bridge between the Black liberation struggles against the British and the French in the Caribbean. Thus, this uprising, more than any other, signaled the fall of the slave system and ushered in a new era of freedom from Eastern colonialism in the Western hemisphere.
What else can be said about the Berbice Uprising?
That Black people were capable of fully liberating and governing themselves in not one, but two former colonies during the height of their oppression settles, once and for all, any questions of our potential.
– Omri Coke, Black Researchers United Admin Team
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