Indentured servitude and convict labour in the Danish-Norwegian West Indies, 1671–1755

Abstract

The article explores how indentured servitude and the use of convict labour began and evolved in the Danish-Norwegian West Indies in the period 1671–1755. It examines the intentions and realities behind indentured servitude and convict labour on the islands, and compares these with the workings and use of indentured servants in the British West Indies.

Similar to conditions in the British West Indies, the lowest social strata of white society in the Danish-Norwegian West Indies consisted of a small population of convicts and indentured servants. The use of these groups as part of the labour force took place from the onset of colonisation in 1672 until 1755, the period in which the islands were governed by the West Indian and Guinean Company, WIGC (Vestindisk-Guineisk Kompagni). The analysis reveals that the importation and deployment of indentured servants and convicts can be divided into two distinct periods. Until 1700, the objective of the WIGC was to provide cheap labour for the colony. After 1700, however, the aim was to recruit qualified personnel and to secure the planters against slave rebellion by increasing the white Danish population. As convicts provided neither qualifications nor security, convict transportations to the Danish-Norwegian West Indies ceased after 1700. After 1755, when the Danish-Norwegian Crown purchased the colonies from the WIGC, Danish convict labour and indentured servants were no longer imported to the colony. By contrast, in the British West Indies, imports of indentured servants and convicts continued to play a significant role.

The article explores the physical and legal conditions of the indentured servants and convicts, who constituted the lowest social group in white colonial society and were in some respects considered slaves.

Keywords:

• Indentured servants
• convict transportations
• early Danish colonization

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Beckles and Downes, ‘The Economics of Transition’, 225–47.

2. Beckles and Downes, ‘The Economics of Transition’, 239–40.

3. Hvid, ‘Dend Arme Blancke Slave’, 38–41.

4. DNA, WIGC/B 446:12, Board of Directors’ minute book A, 11 March 1671 – 7 April 1680, 11.

5. Henningsen, ‘Misericordia’, 18–56.

6. Hvid, ‘Dend Arme Blancke Slave’, 87.

7. Hvid, ‘Dend Arme Blancke Slave’, 42–3.

8. DNA, WIGC/B 446:6, Book of participants’ resolutions 1675–1690. DNA, WIGC/B 446:12, 22 May 1675.

9. DNA, WIGC/B 446:77, Incoming and outgoing letters and documents, 1624–1681, 28 August 1680.

10. Hornby, Kolonierne i Vestindien, 84–6.

11. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181, Concerning the West Indies 1671–1753. Correspondence concerning the expatriation of delinquents, prisoners and paupers to the West Indies. 28 November 1747. Letter from WIGC directors to Privy Counsellor von Holstein.

12. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. May 1701. Correspondence between Company directors, chief constable and the King concerning a convict.

13. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 14 August 1737. Letter from the King’s chancellor to the directors. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 4 November 1747. Letter from the Chancellery to the Board of directors.

14. Quotations from archival material and Danish accounts have been translated from Old Danish into English by the author unless otherwise stated. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 1 September 1746. Letter sent to the Chamberlain (Overkammerherren): ‘Ey heller bør eller kand en Blanck tracteris udi de lande som en Sort Slave; thi de Sorte maae altiid holdes til at bære frygt for de Christne og blancke…’

15. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 21 September 1737. Letter from the board of directors to the Chancellery. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 1 September 1746. Letter sent to the Chamberlain (Overkammerherren).

16. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181. 28 November 1747. Letter from the directors to the Privy Council (von Holstein).

17. Smith, Colonists in Bondage, 3; Galenson, White Servitude, 51–3.

18. Only a few of the indentured servants are mentioned by name in the ship’s muster rolls. In such cases, it is not clear if they reached the colonies or perhaps died en route. They have been included in the group of ‘arrived’.

19. DNA, WIGC/B 446:138, Calculations of Company affairs etc., 1671–1750.

20. The cost of provisions during passage per person per week was set to 1 Rigsdaler (Rixdollars). After arrival, the provision costs of servitude labour was set to only 0.5 Rigsdaler.

21. DNA, WIGC/B 446:205, Documents concerning voyages to the West Indies and Guinea, XV, 1735–1736. The ship Laarburg Galley.

22. DNA, WIGC/B 446:205, XV, 1735–1736. The ship Laarburg Galley.

23. DNA, WIGC/BCDAC 446:291–292, Bookkeeper’s copy book 1731–46. 21 June 1736. Letter from the Company bookkeeper to the Kings Counsellor.

24. Galenson, White Servitude, 23–5.

25. An estimate based on data from Westergaard, The Danish West Indies, 318, Appendix H, and calculations of indentured servants and convicts based primarily on DNA, WIGC/GST 446:731–732 Tax records for St. Thomas 1688–94 and DNA, WIGC/GST 446:181.

26. Average based on a total of 262 individuals; 224 shipped to the DNWI before 1700 and 38 shipped after 1700.

27. Gøbel and Degn, Dansk søfarts historie, 151, 165–71.

28. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:496, Journal of incidents on St. Thomas 1686 – 1691. Journal for the months of August and September 1686.

29. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:496, 25 February – 6 March 1688.

30. Carstens, ‘En Almindelig Beskrivelse’. Written in the 1740s. Although the original account was probably not written by Carstens, it is by his name historians know the source.

31. DNA, WIGC/B 446:41–42, Letter copybook A, 16 December 1671 – 7 November 1676. Letter to Governor Iversen from the Directors, 15 December 1673.

32. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:509, Copybooks kept on St. Thomas 1686–1709, 5 July 1686 – 12 March 1688. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:510, Copybooks kept on St. Thomas 1687–92. Instructions for the Steward (hovmester), April 1688.

33. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:510. 17 January 1691.

34. DNA, WIGC/SCST 446:488, Secret minute book kept on St. Thomas, 1703–1714. 30 August 1706.

35. Carstens, ‘En Almindelig Beskrivelse’, 59.

36. DNA, WIGC/B 446:138. 4 October 1676. Expenses were respectively 2 and 1 Mark per week. 6 Mark equalled 1 Rixdollar.

37. Carstens, ‘En Almindelig Beskrivelse’, 148.

38. Watts, The West Indies, 201.

39. DNA, WIGC/B 446:230, Letters and documents concerning inheritance and settlement of estates left by deceased individuals in the West Indies 1671–1754. 14 June 1679. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:497, Journal of incidents on St. Thomas 1686–1688. 4 December 1686.

40. DNA, WIGC/B 446:192. Description of the buildings of Fort Christian, St. Thomas, September 1680.

41. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:496–497. Notes from 26 November 1686 – 15 March 1687.

42. Carstens, ‘En Almindelig Beskrivelse’, 148–9.

43. The Danish word serving does not necessarily imply a contract as the English term indentured servant. Krog and Islænder most likely did not sign a contract, but were given tasks of indentured servants.

44. DNA, WIGC/B 446:89, Letters and documents from the West Indies, 1674–1675. 5 October 1686, letter from Heins to the Directors. DNA, WIGC/B 446:497: ‘Niels Krog och dend anden Sørren Iislender nu om dagen i arbeyd med de andere Jern fanger, och om Natten drifves de (af een som er giort til Bødel her) i Tiuf fanghullet, de ere snart de aller Elendigste Mennischer, och forsult, og bederfvet af fengsel har icke en Traa Klæder paa deris Legem, er Siuge og schrøbelig’. 4 December 1686. During their servitude, Krog and Islænder were sentenced to banishment because of yet another attempted escape, but this sentence does not seem to have been executed.

45. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:510. 1 September 1689.

46. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:510. 15 May 1690.

47. RA, VGKDNA, WIGC/B 446:192. Dokumenter vedr. skibsekspeditioner til Vestindien og Guinea. Account book from 1684. RA, VGKDNA, WIGC/SCST 446:489. 1723–37. Det Sekrete Råd. Sekretprotokoller, ført på St. Thomas. 16 January 2016, 1736.

48. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:1.1.1, General registers, 6 March 1672 – 2 October 1684. 8 August 1672. These regulations were still effective in 1680.

49. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:509. 9 October 1686. DNA, WIGC/B 446:89. Married 10 November 1686.

50. Haagensen, Beskrivelse over Eylandet, 18–19. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:497. 1686–87.

51. DNA, WIGC/SCST 446:489. 16 January 1736. DNA, WIGC/B 446:205. With the ship Andreas c. 1735. The Secret Council consisted of the Governor, the bookkeeper, treasurer, secretary and the senior merchant. Gøbel, A Guide to Sources, 222.

52. DNA, WIGC/B 446:210. 1749. Muster roll of the frigate Prins Christian. DNA, WIGC/B 446:211. 1748. Muster roll of the frigate Christiansted. DNA, WIGC/B 446:213. 1750. Muster roll of the ship De Tre Princesser. DNA, WIGC/BST 446:730, Muster rolls of functionaries and soldiers on St. Thomas 1710–15, 1753–54. 1753. Muster roll of the people at Fort Christian.

53. DNA, WIGC/B 446:181, list from the King of convicts for transportation. DNA, WIGC/GST 446:510, 1688, Letter from Gerhard, letters from vice governor Heins. DNA, WIGC/BST 446:733, Landlist of St. Thomas 1718. DNA, EC/ST 775–1, Church register 1691–1870, 1691–1795.

54. DNA, WIGC/B 446:191. The voyage of the ship Den Kronede Grif to St. Thomas, 1680.

55. Concerning Danish-Norwegian colonies: DNA, WIGC/B 446:41. Letter to Governor Iversen from the Directors, 7 September 1675; and Carstens, ‘En Almindelig Beskrivelse’, 148. Concerning English colonies see Ligon, A True and Exact History.

56. See Galenson, White Servitude, 3–8.

57. See Beckles and Downes, ‘The Economics of Transition’, 225–47.

58. Kong Christian den Femtis Danske Lov. Book 3, chapter 19 concerns rural and town servants and vagrants.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mirjam Louise Hvid

Mirjam Louise Hvid (b. 1975) has a Master’s degree in history from the Department of History of the Saxo Institute, University of Copenhagen, Denmark (2006). Her thesis concerns the indenture system and convict transportation in the early Danish-Norwegian colonization of the Virgin Islands. During her studies, she worked with the St. Croix African Roots Project (SCARP) at the National Archive (Rigsarkivet) in Copenhagen and was involved in research and transcription of archival material concerning the Frederiksgave Project (Danish plantation in Ghana c. 1830). Currently she works as a secretary at the Deanery of Gentofte, Denmark.