Barbados Molten Memories

Bitter Molten Memories: The Iron Trains of Sugar's Past

In 18th-century Barbados, sugar production relied on cast-iron syrup kettles, a technique later on adopted in the American South. Sugarcane was squashed utilizing wind and animal-powered mills. The extracted juice was warmed, clarified, and vaporized in a series of kettles of reducing size to create crystallized sugar.

The Sweet Land: Barbados Sugar Economy. Barbados, frequently called the "Gem of the Caribbean," owes much of its historical prominence to one commodity: sugar. This golden crop changed the island from a little colonial outpost into a powerhouse of the international economy throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. Yet, the sweet success of sugar was built on a structure of enslaved labour, a truth that casts a shadow over its tradition.





Boiling Sugar: A Grueling Task

Sugar production in the 17th and 18th centuries was  a highly dangerous procedure. After gathering and crushing the sugarcane, its juice was boiled in massive cast iron kettles until it crystallized into sugar. These pots, often arranged in a series called a"" train"" were warmed by blazing fires that enslaved Africans had to stir continuously. The heat was suffocating, the flames unforgiving and the work unrelenting. Enslaved workers withstood long hours, often standing close to the inferno, running the risk of burns and exhaustion. Splashes of the boiling liquid were not uncommon and might cause extreme, even fatal, injuries.

A Life of Peril

The dangers were ever present for the enslaved workers entrusted with working these kettles. They laboured in sweltering heat, inhaling smoke and fumes from the burning fuel. The work demanded intense effort and precision; a moment of negligence could result in accidents. Despite these difficulties, enslaved Africans brought remarkable skill and ingenuity to the procedure, guaranteeing the quality of the end product. This product fueled economies far beyond Barbados" shores.


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


HISTORICAL RECORDS!


 Abolitionist Accounts Expose The Hotrrors of Boiling Sugar
 
Abolitionist works, consisting of James Ramsay's works, expose the ruthless dangers enslaved workers dealt with in Caribbean sugar plantations. The boiling home, with its big open barrels of scalding sugar, became an area of inconceivable suffering and fatal accidents.


The Dark Side of Sugar: A History in Iron - See the Blog for More

The Iron Kettles of Sugar