| Fireburn | |||
|---|---|---|---|
Illustration from Illustreret Tidende, November 1878.
| |||
| Date | 1 October – Mid-october 1878 | ||
| Location |
Danish West Indies, modern day US Virgin Islands
| ||
| Caused by | Lack of freedom for the laborers, debt peonage | ||
| Goals | More freedom to the laborers | ||
| Methods | Deadly riots, protests | ||
| Resulted in | Revolt suppressed 879 acres burned | ||
| Parties | |||
| |||
| Lead figures | |||
|
"Queen Mary" Thomas | |||
| Casualties and losses | |||
| |||
| 14 women 60 laborers | |||
|
Danish colonial conflicts
| |
|---|---|
Baltic Sea North Atlantic Africa
Asia
Caribbean |
The 1878 St. Croix labor riot, locally also known as Fireburn, was a labor riot on Saint Croix, one of the Virgin Islands, then part of the Danish West Indies. The revolt started on October 1, 1878, and was suppressed after several days of looting and burning. Among the leaders were several women—"Queen Mary" Thomas, "Queen Agnes" Salomon, and "Queen Mathilda" McBean—who became known as "Queens of the Fireburn".
In July 1848, the slaves of Danish West Indies staged a protest and gained their freedom. For many laborers this freedom was short-lived, as plantation owners quickly began devising new regulations. The now free laborers were forced by law to sign contracts that bound them and their families to the plantations where they worked. By signing these contracts, the laborers became debt peon slaves again in all but name.[1][2]
In October 1878, laborers gathered in Frederiksted to demand higher wages and better working conditions. Although it was initially a peaceful gathering, the crowd began to become violent after rumors circulated, including a rumor that a laborer had been hospitalized, but was mistreated and died in police custody. The rioters threw stones and the Danish soldiers retaliated with gunfire. As violence escalated, the soldiers barricaded themselves inside a fort. Unable to scale the gates to access the fort, the rioters turned their focus on the town and began looting it, using torches to burn many buildings and plantations.
On October 4, British, French, and American warships arrived and offered to help stop the riot. But Governor Garde was confident he and his men had the situation under control and turned the ships away, though some soldiers borrowed guns from the British ships. The next day, Garde ordered all laborers to return to their plantations or be declared "rebels". Laborers were forbidden to leave their plantations without written permission from the plantation owner. By mid-October, the riot had died down and peace was returning to the islands.[3][4]
Among the prominent leaders of the riot were three women, Mary "Queen Mary" Thomas, "Queen Agnes", and "Queen Mathilda." The three were sentenced to prison, and served their terms in Denmark. A folk song from the 1880s, "Queen Mary", was written about Mary's role in the riot.[3][5]
In 2004, historian Wayne James uncovered Danish documents, including photographs of the prison where the women served their sentences, a storybook they wrote, and "a host of other historically significant documents and photos." According to him, these documents reveal the existence of a fourth "queen", Susanna Abramsen, who was known as "Bottom Belly."[6]
The riots caused great destruction to property on the islands. 879 acres were burned, and the damage caused was estimated at hundreds of thousands of dollars. Direct casualties of the riot include the deaths of 60 black laborers and two soldiers, and 14 women who died in an explosion. In addition, 12 laborers were condemned to death and hanged on October 5, 1878.[4]
A year after Fireburn, in October 1879, new contracts were written that would supposedly increase laborers' wages. But they contracts were weighted in favor of the plantation owners and resulted in little to no improvement in the laborers' lives.[7]
In 2018 artists Jeannette Ehlers and La Vaughn Belle unveiled a 7 meters (23 ft)-tall statue of Mary Thomas, seated on a throne with a cane knife and torch. Its installation in Copenhagen made the statue Denmark's first public monument to a black woman.[8]
Virgin Islands oral tradition is filled with such heroic, history-telling folk songs as 'Queen Mary,' [...] which celebrates the courageous and semi-mythical woman Mary Thomas, who led the 'Fireburn,' the St. Croix Labor Revolt of 1878.
The liberalization of labor conditions in the 1879, then, did not necessarily result in any improvements in the laborers' conditions, on balance, since it was obtained on the planters' and not the laborers' terms.
