An indigenous history

Part 2: Indigenous Guyanese and the slave trade

On the early Dutch Essequibo plantations, the Indian slave trade, as it is known, is said to have begun in the late 17th century. The trade also existed alongside early African slavery, and there is mention of an Arawak-African slave uprising in Berbice in 1687. The Indian Slave Trade was eventually abolished in the 1790s during the time of the later African Slave Trade on the colony.

Like the African slave trade, it is documented that the Indian Slave Trade was often carried out by the local tribes against other local tribespeople. In early Guyana, it was the Caribs, who were considered the most dominant group at the time, which captured and enslaved the other nations for the Dutch plantations, in exchange for European goods.
The indigenous slaves endured the same fate as the enslaved Africans of the Trans Atlantic slave trade: they too were forced to work long hours on plantations and were treated as property by their Dutch owners; many ran away to escape enslavement, but were hunted by the Caribs to be returned to slavery if they survived their re-capture.
As the African slave force increased on the plantations, indigenous Indians were also recruited by plantations owners to re-capture runaway Africans dead or alive. According to one source, the first record of such a transaction was in 1743 when a Dutch Commandeur paid ten axes upon receipt of “three… right hands” of runaway African slaves. The Caribs were also recruited to guard early Dutch settlements on the colony against African slave insurrections.
The first large scale massing of indigenous runaway slave hunters is said to have been officially sanctioned during the 1763 rebellion when Governor Gravesande sent indigenous Indians from Demerara to Berbice to “capture or kill” the remaining rebellious slaves who had scattered into the jungles after the uprising was suppressed.
According to an article in the Timehri Journal, for their efforts, the natives from the Akawois, Arawak and Carib tribes received “silver collars on which were engraved the monogram of the West India Company”. When another revolt in 1772 was suppressed, the company presented the indigenous chiefs with “silver ornaments” and their men received “presents of salempores, trumpets, looking glasses etc. from the colonial authorities.”
A new post was planned to be established on the Moruca, after Arawak chiefs were assembled in October 1784 at Fort Zeelandia to hunt for runaways heading to Venezuela. The post was to be manned by 40 or 50 Indians, and no one was allowed past this post without approval from the governor. Posts such as these were maintained until after indigenous Indian slavery was abolished.