Poem by Alanah Hill
In Kingston, Jamaica on the 3rd of August 1777,
Benjamin Satterthwaite communicates the recent Jamaican Slave Insurrection,
It was a response to the inhumane mass forced migration of human beings,
adults and children across the Atlantic Ocean’s treacherous passings.
The subsequent rebellions emerged in all different forms,
in plantations, on ships, all to fight against societal norms.
That some were inferior due to the colour of their skin,
exploited, beaten and forced to work wherein.
Enslaved people fought back, written in the letterbooks as forcing an embargo,
in which Black resistance, agency and power were overshadowed.
The power to delay the exporting of goods on ships the ‘Molly’ and ‘Dolphin’,
was a testament to the strength and autonomy of enslaved people in the face of abhorrent discipline.
Benjamin Satterthwaite saw the 1776 insurrection as economically inconvenient,
rather, the revolt became part of a wider transatlantic freedom movement.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Poem by Alanah Hill, who participated in the community research in 2021. Alanah’s poem has been shortlisted for a prize at ‘Welcome to Britain”‘ as part of the 9th annual Leicester Human Rights Arts and Film Festival.
How to cite
Alanah Hill (2021) An Account of Black Agency in the Satterthwaite Letterbooks, Lancaster Black History Group (Poem), available at https://lancasterblackhistorygroup.com/2022/12/06/an-account-of-black-agency-in-the-satterthwaite-letterbooks/
LANCASTER BLACK HISTORY GROUP 
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