The Slave Master of Trinidad: William Hardin Burnley and the Nineteenth-Century Atlantic World

388 Pages·2018·4.478 MB·English

by  Selwyn R. Cudjoe

CUDJOE
WILLIAM HARDIN BURNLEY (1780–1850) was the largest slave owner in Trinidad
during the nineteenth century. Born in the United States to English parents, he settled (cid:7)
on the island in 1802 and became one of its most influential citizens and a prominent
agent of the British Empire. A central figure among elite and moneyed transnational
slave owners, Burnley moved easily through the Atlantic world of the Caribbean,
the United States, Great Britain, and Europe, and counted among his friends Alexis de
Tocqueville, British politician Joseph Hume, and prime minister William Gladstone.
In this first full-length biography of Burnley, Selwyn R. Cudjoe chronicles the life of
T
Trinidad’s “founding father” and sketches the social and cultural milieu in which he lived.
Reexamining the decades of transition from slavery to freedom through the lens of h
Burnley’s life, The Slave Master of Trinidad demonstrates that the legacies of slavery e

persisted in the new post-emancipation society. S
“Beautifully written and meticulously researched, Cudjoe has written a volume essential
l
to a full understanding of the history of Trinidad.”
a
—HENRY LOUIS GATES JR., ALPHONSE FLETCHER UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR, HARVARD
v
UNIVERSITY
e
“Cudjoe’s resurrection of William Hardin Burnley is both an invaluable piece of Carib-

bean and British cultural history and a work buoyed by its moving central irony M
—that the former English slave master Burnley lives again, rescued from oblivion only
because of the intellectual diligence and generosity of a direct descendant of the very
community of people in Trinidad that Burnley lorded over and saw mainly as brainless a The
property. Professor Cudjoe gives us here another judicious, disciplined lesson in the s
importance of scrutinizing our past, warts and all.” t
—ARNOLD RAMPERSAD, AUTHOR OF RALPH ELLISON: A BIOGRAPHY e Slave Master
r
“The dynamic ending of the transatlantic trade system and the processes of slave eman-

cipation in the British West Indies are brought into sharper focus in Cudjoe’s meticulous
o
biography of William Hardin Burnley.” f

—WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON, AUTHOR OF MORE THAN JUST RACE: BEING BLACK AND Trinidad
POOR IN THE INNER CITY T of
r
“Well researched and highly readable, Cudjoe’s engrossing study is a classic.”
i
—ROBIN BLACKBURN, AUTHOR OF THE AMERICAN CRUCIBLE: SLAVERY, EMANCIPATION
AND HUMAN RIGHTS n
i (cid:7)
SELWYN R. CUDJOE is professor of Africana studies at Wellesley College and author
of V. S. Naipaul: A Materialist Reading. d
a
Cover design: Milenda Nan Ok Lee
Cover photograph: Portrait of William Hardin Burnley, colorized photograph of black and white daguerreotype found in From
d
Colonial to Republic: One Hundred and Fifty Years of Business and Banking in Trinidad and Tobago, 1837–1987 (Port of Spain:

Paria Publishing, 1987). WILLIAM HARDIN BURNLEY AND THE
NINETEENTH-CENTURY ATLANTIC WORLD
SELWYN R. CUDJOE
umnivearsisty sofachusetts
press
AMHERST AND BOSTON
www.umass.edu/umpress MASSACHUSETTS

Advance Praise for
The
Slave Master
of Trinidad
�
“An original work that will appeal to academics, university students,
and general readers studying Trinidad and Caribbean history in the
late slavery and emancipation periods.”
—Bridget Brereton, author of
A History of Modern Trinidad, 1783–1962
“The Slave Master of Trinidad is an unbelievably bold book that
retells the story of slavery, emancipation, and indentured labor
through an account of Burnley’s life and work.”
—Nicholas Draper, author of The Price of Emancipation:
Slave-Ownership, Compensation, and British Society
at the End of Slavery

The
Slave Master
of Trinidad
�

The
Slave Master
of Trinidad
�
WILLIAM HARDIN BURNLEY and the
NINETEENTH- CENTURY ATLANTIC WORLD
SELWYN R. CUDJOE
University of Massachusetts Press
Amherst and Boston
Copyright © 2018 by University of Massachusetts Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN 978- 1- 62534-370- 3 (paper); 369- 7 (hardcover)
Designed by Sally Nichols
Set in Adobe Minion Pro and Dear Sarah
Printed and bound by Maple Press, Inc.
Cover design by Milenda Nan Ok Lee
Cover art: Portrait of William Hardin Burnley, colorized photograph of
black and white daguerreotype found in From Colonial to Republic: One
Hundred and Fifty Years of Business and Banking in Trinidad
and Tobago, 1837–1987 (Port of Spain: Paria Publishing, 1987).
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Cudjoe, Selwyn R. (Selwyn Reginald), author.
Title: The slave master of Trinidad : William Hardin Burnley and the
nineteenth-century Atlantic world / selwyn R. Cudjoe.
Description: Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, [2018] |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Identifiers: LCCN 2018019142 (print) | LCCN 2018045985 (ebook) | ISBN
9781613766163 (e-book) | ISBN 9781613766170 (e-book) | ISBN
9781625343703 | ISBN 9781625343703?(pbk.) | ISBN 9781625343697?(hardcover)
Subjects: LCSH: Burnley, William Hardin, 1780–1850. |
Slaveholders—Trinidad
and Tobago—Trinidad—Biography. | Slavery—Trinidad and
Tobago—Trinidad—History—19th century.
Classification: LCC F2120 (ebook) | LCC F2120 .C83 2018 (print) | DDC
306.3/62097298309034—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018019142
British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
For my grandsons: William, Joshua, and Christopher