Race

Introduction

A British colonial administrator and historian, Edward Long was born in Cornwall in 1734, and published his influential book, The History of Jamaica, in 1774. The Long family had been connected with Jamaica since the 1660s, and Edward ran the wealthy Lucky Valley sugar plantation on the island himself, before leaving for England due to ill health in 1769. The three-volume work offers a panoramic political, social and economic history, along with a detailed, parish-level overview of the island, for the period 1665 to 1774. It argues for the rights of plant owners as against the imperial government, and that slavery was a benevolent institution which instilled order and discipline into the lives of Africans transported to the Caribbean. The work also paints a striking picture of Jamaican conditions on the eve of the American Revolution, an event that was to prove the downfall of numerous planters and slavers. Long died in Sussex in 1813.

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