I think there was a massive death rate, often of tropical diseases, there would be few women so the reproduction rate would be v. low so very few had descendants. But I have the suspicion too that the much of black population of the West Indies is descended from those who came there surprisingly late because the earlier it was the more likely the slaves were worked to death without descendants. I do not know what work has been done on this but the proportion of "Africans" rather than "creoles" listed in the Jamaican slave registers of 1817, ten years after the official end of the slave trade seems very high to me. Perhaps it was as much as a third. The free black population was a pretty small proportion of the total in the 1820s. For example Colonoal Office returns then say in St Thomas in the East there were 442 whites, 196 free blacks & "people of colour" and 25,648 slaves. In St Andrews there were 476 whites, 336 free blacks & persons of colour and 15,215 slaves. Edward Crawford ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ann Whiting" <aqw8326@hotmail.com> To: <CARIBBEAN-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Tuesday, April 01, 2003 4:35 PM Subject: Re: Irish Slaves > The question begs to ask, and this is for pondering, where did all to people > go? If not to Barbados, Jamaica and Montsarrat, what did Cromwell do with > them? > Ann > > > >From: RichardBond@webtv.net (Richard Bond) > >Reply-To: CARIBBEAN-L@rootsweb.com > >To: CARIBBEAN-L@rootsweb.com > >Subject: Re: Irish Slaves > >Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2003 00:33:52 -0500 (EST) > > > > I have seen a thesis on the migration of Irish to the Caribbean and > >Jamaica. The thesis makes the same observation that there are many > >people in Jamaica who claim descent from Cromwellian Irish emigrants. > >However census records of Jamaica do not show it as having a large > >poulation until later and few Irish in the time of Cromwell. The thesis > >goes on to conclude that in the first generation most Irish transports > >were actually going to Barbados. Many died and or left no children. The > >island of Barbados could not carry as many people with opportunity as > >lived there by the second or third generation. Most of the Irish > >descendants born on Barbados then migrated to the other British colonies > >including Jamaica. > > > > > >==== CARIBBEAN Mailing List ==== > >ROOTSWEB MAILING LIST HELP PAGES > >What is a Mailing List? > >http://helpdesk.rootsweb.com/help/mail1.html > > > > > "Sharing the information." > > _________________________________________________________________ > MSN 8 with e-mail virus protection service: 2 months FREE* > http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus > > > ==== CARIBBEAN Mailing List ==== > all messages posted to CARIBBEAN-L are archived at http://archiver.rootsweb.com/ > Before posting a query, see if the question has already been asked > > > ______________________________________________________________ > This message has been scanned by the Datanet VirusScreen Service, > powered by BT Ignite and Messagelabs. For more information please > visit http://www.VirusScreen.co.uk. > ______________________________________________________________ This message has been scanned by the Datanet VirusScreen Service, powered by BT Ignite and Messagelabs. For more information please visit http://www.VirusScreen.co.uk.