Jamaica's Chinese and Indians

The Jamaican motto, "Out of Many, One People" speaks volumes about the country's diversity.  Meet our Asian brethren.

Transcript

To tell the story of Asian Jamaicans in such a short time span was a bit daunting.  I would like to start by describing the existing circumstances prior to the migration of Asians to Jamaica. The official reading of Jamaica’s Emancipation Proclamation occurred on August 1, 1834, declaring the end of slavery in Jamaica.  The news was met with jubilation – singing, dancing and drum playing by the Black people on the island.  Slavery was essentially illegal; however, it was replaced by a new system of obligatory labor called apprenticeship.  What followed in the years after the emancipation proclamation were former slave owners, now just planters, ignoring the new post bondage laws of the apprenticeship.  The requirements of the apprenticeship included a work week of only 40 hours, medical aid to sick workers, and better food and clothes to be provided to the workers.  The planters either could not afford it or simply refused to implement these changes and it would eventually be to their detriment.  The widespread disregard demonstrated by the planters under the apprenticeship system led to its abolishment after three years, an entire year earlier than intended.

Welcome to Small Excellence where I discuss various nations around the world.  I'm your host Ngai.  If you enjoy this podcast, please subscribe and share.  Also take a look at the Small Excellence website at www.smallexcellence.com; that address again is www. S m a l l e x c e l l e n c e .com.  This season we are speaking about my homeland, Jamaica.  In this episode, I will be discussing the history of Indian and Chinese Jamaicans.

“Former slaves were finding new ways to make a living, formed villages and communities of their own…[grew] their own crops – [ginger, banana, and sugarcane among many other crops] and sold them at the nearest markets” (https://scholar.library.miami.edu/emancipation/jamaica5.htm).  The creation of these black communities led to the establishment of schools, churches, businesses and ultimately less available workhands for planters.  It is at this time that planters attempted to financially pressure the former slaves into working the land by levying exorbitant taxes on items like imported foods; however, that strategy did not work.  The Afro Jamaicans on the island also recognized that education played an enormous role in the upward mobility of many free citizens and chose school over work requiring extensive physical labor. In addition, the sugar industry was in a state of flux.  Declining sugar prices and former slaves rejecting the unchanged conditions of field work led to a financial crisis among the planters which would negatively affect Britain’s wealth. Enter the Indian and Chinese migrants.

The Jamaican government was unable to entice European immigrants to the island to supplement the workforce in any substantial number and had to look elsewhere for potential labor.  Indentured service contracts were the solution.  Jamaica considered the success of an East African English colony, Mauritius, which commissioned Indian laborers.  In turn, Jamaica embarked on a campaign to recruit Asians to the island.  The first group of migrants from Northern India, who were mostly practitioners of the Hindi faith, arrived on the SS Blundell to Old Harbor Bay, May 10, 1845, to begin their contracted servitude.  A total of 261 people - 200 men and 28 women under 30 years old along with 33 children under 12 years old.  The next year proved more promising with the arrival of 1,852 South Asians followed by 2,439 arriving the year after that.  Laborers were “given one suit of clothing, agricultural tools and cooking utensils.  Groups of 20 to 40 were [transported] to plantations in Portland, St. Thomas, St. Mary, Clarendon and Westmoreland... Once on the plantation…they were forced to work five to six days a week for one shilling a day and lived in squalid conditions. Barracks of no more than 3 or 4 rooms were expected to accommodate several individuals and families in each room. Two shillings and six pence were deducted weekly for their rice, flour, dried fish or goat, peas and seasoning rations” (https://old.jamaica-gleaner.com/pages/history/story0057.htm).  After 3 years of receiving laborers from India the initiative was halted by the Indian government to investigate reports of mistreatment of the migrants.  The program was discontinued for 11 years from 1848 to 1859.  Once reestablished the practice continued until World War I in 1921.  At that point approximately 36,000 South Asians had entered Jamaica as laborers with about two thirds of them making the island their permanent home.  India supplied a large number of people into indentureships globally because the cost of their labor was significantly less than European and even African labor.  Both Calcutta and Madras which are located in India had dedicated recruitment sites for laborers destined abroad.

In 1854, the first of the Chinese indenture servants, who were mostly of Hakka ancestry, arrived in Jamaica in three groups.  The first group of 267 people arrived on July 30th directly from Hong Kong via a ship called ‘Epsom’.  A second and third group of laborers originally bound for work in Panama arrived via the ships, ‘Vampire’ on November 1st and ‘Theresa Jane’ on November 18th; 195 people and 10 people respectively.  This group initially hired to assist with the building of the Panama railroad were fearful of contracting yellow fever and demanded they be placed elsewhere.  Many of them who arrived in Jamaica were already sick and required medical attention; less than 50 of these laborers from Panama lived. Another ten years would pass before another group of 200 Chinese laborers would be sent to Jamaica from Panama, British Guiana and Trinidad.  The last of the Chinese migrants from Hong Kong arrived in Jamaica on the ‘Prinz Alexander’ July 1884; a total of 694 people – 509 men, 109 women, 59 boys and 17 girls.  Of that last group it is estimated that 179 had abandoned their assignments. 

There was very little difference between chattel slavery and indentureship in practice.  Laborers endured grueling work conditions, were even whipped and many were housed in the same barracks used during slavery.  Arguably the only difference between indentured servitude and slavery is that indentured servants were paid and had a contractual time limit to their service; everything else was basically the same. The terms of the indentureship which established the required years of service was typically expressed in five-year increments but in rare cases could be as little as one year.  Conditions of contract completion were also stated and included repatriation, the return to one’s country of origin and a certificate of freedom indicating the completion of service.  The contract also included stipulations regarding the circumstances of early release such as illness, disability and manumission or commutation when the worker can pay their employer for the remaining time on the contract.  Unable to read or write, these contracts became legally binding with a thumb mark from the laborer on the specified area of the document.  Interestingly, but not surprisingly, the planters often violated the terms of the contracts and would lobby the government to alter previously agreed on conditions that were not monetarily beneficial.  Repatriation for example was costly and the planters were able to garner government support to not honor that portion of the contract.

While the Chinese were brought to the island for the same arduous purpose they fared better as a collective with many of them demonstrating an acuity for business and after finishing their contracts established businesses.  Robert Jackson Chin (Chin Pa-kung), one of the survivors of the first group of Chinese laborers from Panama had opened a wholesale house on downtown Kingston’s Pechon Street and with that usher in the rise of the Chinese grocery.  Chang Si-Pah and Lyn Sam soon opened groceries of their own.  These three men in turn provided guidance to incoming lots of Chinese immigrants to the island; they also served as examples to their community of what was attainable post-indentureship.  The success of the Chinese groceries was in part due to offering goods in smaller quantities which made the items more affordable.  They also extended credit to preferred customers and “[provided] round-the-clock service” (https://old.jamaica-gleaner.com/pages/history/story0055.htm).  In fact, food items such as rice, cornmeal, flour and saltfish became dietary fixtures on the island because of these groceries import endeavors.  In an effort to further their interest and welfare, Chung Fah Fuicon, founded the Chinese Benevolent Society in 1890.  This society also promoted charitable activities and mutual assistance among themselves, and [acted] as arbitrator in the settlement of their disputes (https://nlj.gov.jm/history-notes/history-notes.htm).  Due to the economic success of the Chinese in the island the powers that be implemented the country’s first immigration policies to stop what had been described as “the Chinese Invasion” in the hopes of halting this strong demonstration of financial wherewithal thus the Chinese are only 2% of the Jamaican population.

The Indian and Chinese diaspora is vast, and this is only the tiniest snippet of their story in a little part of the world.  They have integrated into what is the story of Jamaica, contributing to the foods we eat, the music we produce, our jewelry design and our overall culture.  Their very presence make them active participants in the Jamaican motto “out of many, one people”.

I hope that you have garnered some knowledge from this episode. Walk good, my friends.

References

https://scholar.library.miami.edu/emancipation/jamaica5.htm

https://scholar.library.miami.edu/emancipation/whites1.htm

https://old.jamaica-gleaner.com/pages/history/story0057.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgWU_EUcWlc

https://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20110403/arts/arts5.html

http://www.jnht.com/disndat_people.php

https://gal-dem.com/tracing-roots-of-the-chinese-jamaican-diaspora/

https://www.mychinaroots.com/places/651539/jamaica

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Jamaicans

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakka_people

https://nlj.gov.jm/history-notes/history-notes.htm

https://statinja.gov.jm/Census/PopCensus/Popcensus2011Index.aspx

https://www.embassyofjamaica.org/about_jamaica/history.htm#:~:text=Jamaica%20was%20settled%20by%20the,to%20work%20in%20Jamaica%20began.

https://publications.iom.int/books/migration-jamaica-country-profile-2018