One of the reasons why it is being claimed that there was a holocaust during slavery is the number of slaves sent to the British Caribbean compared to the number of slaves who were alive in 1834. The “small” fraction of remaining slaves has been cited as a strong case for these holocaust claims. However, a good look at the numbers will reveal that there was indeed no holocaust.
Jamaica’s case can be used as the standard for most of the British Caribbean. It is claimed that the three hundred thousand slaves that remained out of the over one million that were imported proves that a holocaust occurred. However, any statistician who values his credibility will tell you that population growth is not so straight-forward.
It must be noted that while the average life expectancy of a slave in the 1600s was under thirty years, that for the rest of the world wasn’t much better – just under forty, at best. Excluding slavery, and considering that Africans were imported during the prime of their lives, we can expect that the average person would live for another twenty years once here.
As such, after twenty years, Jamaica’s slave population would have been one hundred and fifty thousand (the seven thousand five hundred yearly importation times the twenty years). However, the following year that number would drop by a third – on account of the fact that two thirds of the slave importation was male. Therefore, after the death of half of the males, on account of an inability to reproduce, the population would be one hundred thousand in around 1670.
After 1670, the population replacement mechanism (PRM) would chip in, as the new slave imports would just be replacing those who would have been here twenty years before – and who would have died. As such, the true population base and year that should be used to determine the population of Jamaica without slavery in 1830 was one hundred thousand and 1670 respectively. Now, what was the non-slavery growth rate like?
Up to the first few decades of the 1800s, the global population was growing slowly. Rapid growth actually started in the mid-1800s. Between the years 1600 and 1800, the world’s population grew from five hundred million to nine hundred million or eighty percent. In the absence of any credible birth, death or infant mortality rates for Jamaica at that time, the global growth rate must be applied. That would move Jamaica’s African population, without slavery, in 1830, to one hundred and eighty thousand.
Now some will argue that conditions in a Jamaican society without slavery would still have been much better than in Africa. As such, I will be very generous and increase that number by a further eighty percent, to over three hundred and twenty thousand. This is very consistent with the three hundred thousand slaves in Jamaica at that time.
Even if we should inflate the variables some more, there is no way that Jamaica’s African population in 1830 would be anywhere near one million, as some would want us to believe. The same is also true of the other British islands. As such, it is very clear: As far as the African population in the British Caribbean is concerned, there was no slavery holocaust.
Has cooking of the books and fiddling of the accounts been taken into account? Just another paid advertisement…that’s all it is.
It is not even worth it to reply to such ridiculous article; the author seems determined to deny basic historical fact. Sigh, the power of slavery……to deny its existence to begin with. Sir I implore you to research on the facts of the West African slavery as perpetuated by the Europeans and the lasting ramifications, including your denial, of its widespread detrimental effects. Please start with the ancient Egyptians, the Mali, Songhai and Ghana empire, the Moor conquest and control of Western Europe and the actual african slave trade. Understand that the tens of millions of slaves were not only sent to Jamaica, but mostly to Brazil. Understand that Europe’s and Americals economies were built on free labour, together with stolen land allowed for a society where people were free to engage in other activities and commerce and not solely mere survival hence triggering the industrial revolution, mechanization on a large scale and free thought into the scientific process. This further allowed them to further expand and develop massive economies, which ultimately let to the modern world.
I do agree with you, the African slave trade should not be compared to the Jewish Holocaust….it was a thousand fold worse.Not only did it kill and enslave millions of individuals, it destroyed the development of not just a country, but an entire continent. It empowered the enslavers to heights of economic, military and scientific progress that probably wont be matched for centuries. So…
Hello ! ! What is this ?? So where is the comparison Grasshopper ? I see you tread lightly with the Zionist why can’t some editor BE BOLD WITH BALLS OF FIRE like that famous White House Journalist. Why did you not equate your research on the horrors of The Middle Passage to that of at Auschwitz ? D- !! Poorly researched . As we would say in Jamaica “wheel and come again”.
So how would slavery be defined? The difficulty of placing this horrible event in history, is that one must find words that will resonate with the the dominant class/victor/masters. While holocaust does mean “a mass slaughter of people; especially : genocide” It can also mean a “thorough destruction involving extensive loss of life” and may be the most appropriate term to convey the destruction of African culture, many African countries and tribes caused over the extensive period of slavery.
This is a very weak agument as it ignores other variables that would have impacted on population growth , the fact that it was cheaper to breed on island as opposed to importing slaves, that even though only 1 in 3 were females does not mean that the birthrate was low. So even though there was a die off every 20 yrs due to natural causes the writer does not account for new births which should at least dent the rate of decline… also if over 2 centuries only a third of slaves brought in actually survived it means that barring some dangerous diseases or calamity wiping out these slaves that they died from the toughness of slavery itself, their life expectancy being 10 yrs below the average white shows that their lifestyles were incompartible with long life. That they werenot fed properly, not afforded medical attention, killed at the whim and fancy of the owner or not protected from the elements which is in keeping with holocaust levels of treatment!!! Wish i could enslave you and makeyou live as these ppl did for a year to see how your argument is comical