Berbice in the Atlantic World

Abstract

Berbice was a small colony in northeastern South America. Along with Suriname, Essequibo, and Demerara, Berbice was colonized by the Dutch. The four contiguous colonies were located on the so-called Wild Coast, the area between the Orinoco and Amazon Rivers. Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo were captured by the British in 1803. The were ceded by the Dutch to the British in 1814 and collectively became British Guiana in 1831. At independence in 1966, the country became known as Guyana. Berbice was first colonized in 1627, some 70 miles up the Berbice River as a private patroonship, or hereditary fief, granted by the Dutch West India Company to Abraham van Pere, a merchant from the province of Zeeland. Aided by Native Arawak (Lokono) and Caribs (Kali’na), colonists initially focused on Native trade and farming tobacco. Over time the Van Peres developed a few sugar plantations worked by enslaved Africans and Amerindians. In the 1670s, Amerindians and enslaved Africans rose in rebellion against the Dutch, who used divide-and-conquer tactics to pull apart the coalition and enlist powerful Natives on their side. With Native help, a tiny European minority managed to make chattel slavery of Africans a viable enterprise. Early in the eighteenth century, the Van Pere family sold the colony to a group of investors in Amsterdam who formed the Society of Berbice. The “Company,” as it was known, henceforth ran the colony. Under its government, Berbice grew rapidly, though it remained small and underdeveloped. Plantations, strung along the Berbice River and its tributary, the Canje River, focused on growing coffee, cotton, and cacao. Only on “company plantations” did enslaved people grow sugar. On the eve of a massive slave rebellion that began in 1763 and lasted more than a year, Berbice counted at most 350 Europeans and 4,500 to 5,000 enslaved Africans spread over 135 plantations. The rebellion devastated the colony, which only continued thanks to massive loans from the Dutch government, which the Company never repaid. Tired of bailing out private companies, the Dutch government took over management of the Wild Coast colonies in 1795. After the British takeover, Berbice briefly thrived. While the historiography of Suriname is well developed, we still know little about the other three Wild Coast colonies, though change is in the air. Attracted by rich and unexplored records, historians have begun to study the nature of Dutch colonialism in the area, the history of African-descended people in Berbice, and Dutch-Native relations. Much work remains to be done.