Barbados Sugar’s Unseen History\ Sugar Iron and Fire

Molten Memories: The Iron Kettles of Sugar





Barbados Sugar Economy: A Bitter Success. The start of the "plantation system" changed the island's economy. Big estates owned by wealthy planters controlled the landscape, with shackled Africans supplying the labour required to sustain the requiring process of planting, harvesting, and processing sugarcane. This system created immense wealth for the colony and solidified its place as a key player in the Atlantic trade. But African slaves toiled in perilous conditions, and many died in the infamous Boiling room, as you will see next:



Boiling Sugar: A Grueling Job

Sugar production in the 17th and 18th centuries was  a highly dangerous procedure. After gathering and squashing the sugarcane, its juice was boiled in enormous cast iron kettles until it took shape as sugar. These pots, typically arranged in a series called a"" train"" were heated up by blazing fires that workers had to stir continuously. The heat was extreme, the flames unforgiving and the work unrelenting. Enslaved workers withstood long hours, typically standing near to the inferno, running the risk of burns and fatigue. Splashes of the boiling liquid were not unusual and could trigger serious, even deadly, injuries.

A Life of Constant Peril

The risks were constant for the enslaved employees tasked with tending these kettles. They worked in sweltering heat, inhaling smoke and fumes from the boiling sugar and burning fuel. The work demanded extreme effort and precision; a minute of negligence could lead to mishaps. In spite of these difficulties, oppressed Africans brought exceptional skill and resourcefulness to the process, making sure the quality of the final product. This item sustained economies far beyond Barbados" coasts.


Now, the large cast iron boiling pots work as reminders of this painful past. Spread across gardens, museums, and historical sites in Barbados, they stand as silent witnesses to the lives they touched. These antiques motivate us to reflect on the human suffering behind the sweet taste that when drove global economies.


HISTORICAL RECORDS!

Abolitionist Voices Attest to the Deadly Fate of Boiling Sugar

Accounts, such as James Ramsay's works, clarified the gruesome threats oppressed employees dealt with in Caribbean sugar plantations. The boiling house, with its open barrels of scalding sugar, was a website of inconceivable suffering -- among many horrors of plantation life.


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The Bitter Side of Sweet |The Fatal Side of Sugar: |Sweetness Forged in Fire: The Sugar-Boiling Legacy |
Molten Memories: The Iron Kettles of Sugar's Past |

The Iron Heart of Barbados' Sugar