Emancipation in the West Indies: a Six Months Tour in Antigua, Barbados and Jamaica in the Year 1837
New York: American Anti-Slavery Society, 1838. First Edition. Octavo. Item #026102
xi, 489 pages. More than 600,000 women signed a petition to end the so-called "apprentice system" in an appeal directly to Queen Victoria. While some of the smaller editions were issued by the Anti-slavery examiner with only 128 pages (and a few at 32 pages) this is the largest edition with an index. The map was not included in this particular edition though the index has been expanded. The Appendix also has the records of sugar market. It shows that once slaves were emancipated, the markets for sugar, rum, coffee and other products actually increased. This is one of the reasons Southern Planters sought to destroy copies of this book. In other words, if its conclusions were correct the abolition of slavery would ultimately be beneficial from an economic point of view. The authors, of course, did not understand the deepest fears of the Southern aristocracy that saw any abridgement of the Southern way of life as detrimental to all that was good. Even the poorest dirt farmer who could not afford to buy a slave longed for enough wealth to have slaves to help him rise to the wealth from the cotton market. Bound in the original brown embossed cloth, spine lettered and decorated in gilt, some chipping to spine ends and light wear along edges and corners but overall in good condition with some light scattered foxing.
Price: $275.00