GLC@Lunch: “'Carry Her to Barbados': Coerced Mobility and the Problem of Return in the 18-Century British Atlantic World"

Joseph Biggerstaff (GLC Research Affiliate; Research Associate, Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies)

In recent years, historians have highlighted the stories of individuals of African descent who accompanied their enslavers to England and sought freedom or autonomy in the metropole. This paper addresses the complex issue of coerced mobility by tracing the often-overlooked history of captives who returned to the colonies. Using a variety of records, it reconstructs the story of Ama, who in 1734 was sent from Richmond, Surrey, to a plantation in Barbados, where she was born and where her relations had resided for decades. The paper begins by examining the context of Barbados and its firm control by a relatively small group of resident proprietors. It then delves into correspondence and ship records to retrace Ama’s coerced journey as an example of an unfree individual ensnared in networks of ownership, kinship, and commerce.