Dr Rita Pemberton

The transformation of Tobago from a First People occupied island with their scattered settlements and its forest cover intact to a deforested British sugar plantation colony which was occupied by a small ruling group of British landowners and a large labour force of enslaved Africans, resulted in the establishment of the primacy of land owning. At the behest of the new occupiers, both the First People occupants and the island's forest had to make way for the establishment of sugar plantations. Despite valiant attempts to defend their territory, the First People were forced out as the land they once possessed was carved into sugar estates. The lush forest cover was removed to establish sugar plantations and the white plantation owners became the island's ruling class with the ability to determine what was in the best interests of the island, which was closely aligned with their interests. Land ownership was the empowering factor. Tobago's society was, therefore, divided on colour - white and black - which correlated with the other division, the landed and the landless.

The power of land owing was well demonstrated by the island's landowners who used the land to generate wealth which enabled them to hold - and wield - the reins of power on the island. They assumed that the prevailing state of affairs - enslavement, wealth generation, white rule and black enslavement would remain ad infinitum with the support of their oppressive laws, having convinced themselves that the enslaved population, as inferior people, had no ambitions of their own and would remain malleable subject people. They were rudely shocked by the spate of resistance which occurred during the 1770s, which threatened to wipe out the newly established plantations and demonstrated the desires of the enslaved Africans with which plantation owners did not intend to contend. Their response was to develop hardened lines of control, apply more brutal punishments to the resistors and shore up defence arrangements to prevent the escalation of any internal resistance movement. Without open admission, the ruling class's reaction was an indication of their awareness that the enslaved Africans were not naturally inferior people who could be easily controlled and had to be forced into inferiority and subjectivity.

Instances of the refusal of the determination of the enslaved population to defy their enforced slave status, the termination of the trade in captive Africans and the implementation of the Emancipation laws were seen as dark clouds over the island which the planters were determined to prevent. In 1838 when full emancipation was implemented, the ruling class was determined to prevent the freed Africans from being able to elevate themselves from slave status. Since the years of Apprenticeship, 1834-1838, the Africans had demonstrated strong desires to own land which was more strongly evidenced during the years after 1838. The white ruling land-owning class was determined to prevent the development of a black land-owning class whi