Slavery, Geography and Empire in Nineteenth-Century Marine Landscapes of Montreal and Jamaica

443 Pages·2016·5.898 MB·English

by  Charmaine A. Nelson

Slavery, Geography and Empire in
Nineteenth-Century Marine Landscapes
of Montreal and Jamaica
Slavery, Geography and Empire in Nineteenth-Century Marine Landscapes of Montreal
and Jamaica is among the first Slavery Studies books – and the first in Art History – to
juxtapose temperate and tropical slavery. Charmaine A. Nelson explores the central role
of geography and its racialized representation as landscape art in imperial conquest. One
could easily assume that nineteenth-century Montreal and Jamaica were worlds apart, but
through her astute examination of marine landscape art, the author re-connects these two
significant British island colonies, sites of colonial ports with profound economic and
military value. Through an analysis of prints, illustrated travel books, and maps, the author
exposes the fallacy of their disconnection, arguing instead that the separation of these colonies
was a retroactive fabrication designed in part to rid Canada of its deeply colonial history as
an integral part of Britain’s global trading network which enriched the motherland through
extensive trade in crops produced by enslaved workers on tropical plantations. The first
study to explore James Hakewill’s Jamaican landscapes and William Clark’s Antiguan genre
studies in depth, it also examines the Montreal landscapes of artists including Thomas
Davies, Robert Sproule, George Heriot, and James Duncan. Breaking new ground, Nelson
reveals how gender and race mediated the aesthetic and scientific access of such – mainly
white, male – artists. She analyzes this moment of deep political crisis for British slave
owners (between the end of the slave trade in 1807 and complete abolition in 1833) who
employed visual culture to imagine spaces free of conflict and to alleviate their pervasive
anxiety about slave resistance. Nelson explores how vision and cartographic knowledge
translated into authority, which allowed colonizers to ‘civilize’ the terrains of the so-called
New World, while belying the oppression of slavery and indigenous displacement.
Charmaine A. Nelson is Professor of Art History, Department of Art History and
Communication Studies, McGill University, Canada.

Slavery, Geography and
Empire in Nineteenth-Century
Marine Landscapes of Montreal
and Jamaica
Charmaine A. Nelson
First published 2016
by Routledge Publishing
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge Publishing
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2016 selection and editorial matter, Charmaine A. Nelson; individual chapters,
the contributors
The right of Charmaine A. Nelson to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs
and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered
trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to
infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nelson, Charmaine.
Slavery, geography and empire in nineteenth-century marine landscapes of
Montreal and Jamaica / By Charmaine A. Nelson.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4094-6891-2 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Slavery in art. 2. Landscapes in art. 3. Imperialism in art.
4. Art and society—Québec (Province)—Montréal—History—19th century.
5. Art and society—Jamaica—History—19th century. I. Title.
N8243.S576N45 2015
704.03′96073—dc23
2015014015
ISBN: 978-1-4-094-6891-2 (hbk)
Typeset in Perpetua
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
To Mom (Barbara Elaine Nelson)
and Dad (Maxwell Barrington Nelson)
with love, respect, and gratitude

Contents
List of illustrations xi
Acknowledgments xv
Introduction 1
Slavery studies and its absences 2
Contesting the erasure of black Canada and Canadian slavery 4
Postcolonial geography: Understanding landscapes as racialized 8
The case of two islands: Comparing Montreal and Jamaica 13
Societies-with-slaves vs. slave societies 15
Montreal and Jamaica: Colonized landscapes 17
The chapters 24
Terminology 29
1 Colonialism and art: Landscape and empire 41
Critical geography and art history: Of landscape representation, imperialism,
and power 41
Art-making as empire-making: Whiteness, travel, and imperial vision 43
Montreal and Jamaica: Imperial connections 48
Transoceanic art 52
Maps, landscape painting, and topographical landscapes 54
2 A tale of two empires: Montreal slavery under the French and the British 59
A transition of power: From French to British slavery 59
Liminal bodies: “Loose” women, drunken soldiers, and vagrancy 62
Adapting slavery under the British 75
Situating Montreal’s black minority 79
The face of slave ownership in Montreal: James McGill 86
3 Representing the enslaved African in Montreal 111
Portraiture and slavery 111
Geographical alienation and the hierarchy of enslavement 116
Marie-Thérèse-Zémire, revolutionary St Domingue, and the politics of fl ight 119
viii Contents
Critiquing Canadian museum practice: The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts’ installation
of Portrait of a Haitian Woman 125
The conditions of African enslavement in eighteenth-century Montreal and St Domingue 126
Life after François: “Portrait” of a Montreal slave mistress 128
Minuets of the Canadians and African cultural survivals 133
The tambourine 140
Connecting black Canadian music to the African diaspora 143
4 Landscaping Montreal 157
Montreal as British military stronghold 157
Re-imagining Montreal as a colonial trade and slave port 170
St Helen’s island 177
5 Landscaping Jamaica 195
John Seller’s Atlas Maritimus: Jamaica in the early modern
British imagination 195
Sloane’s natural history 199
The Beckfordesque landscape tradition 200
Beckford, slavery, and sugar cultivation 203
The picturesque and Beckford’s debt to European landscape (painting) 205
The planter’s vantage point: The tropical picturesque 207
6 Imaging slavery in Antigua and Jamaica: Pro-slavery discourse
and the reality of enslavement 217
William Clark’s Antigua 217
The tropical picturesque as pro-slavery discourse 223
Thomas Thistlewood and Vineyard Pen 235
White male sexual exploitation of black women 240
Thomas Thistlewood, Agostino Brunias, and cross-racial sexual relations
in the Caribbean 245
The price of excess: White male promiscuity and the spread of venereal disease 247
The state of Jamaican Slavery 249
7 James Hakewill’s Picturesque Tour: Representing life on nineteenth-century
Jamaican sugar plantations 277
Sugar cane or slaves: Representing and sublimating labour 277
William Clark’s labouring slaves 285
Animalizing slaves, humanizing animals 291
James Hakewill’s white women 296
“I am the only woman”: Politeness and the erasure of black and coloured women 310
Riding side-saddle: White femininity, modernity, and privilege 317
8 Beyond sugar: James Hakewill’s vision of Jamaican settlements,
livestock pens, and the spaces between 341
Caretaking animals: Identity and penkeeping 341
The limits of mobility and the pervasiveness of surveillance: Exploring wainage 349
Contents ix
“Other” whites: Representing British soldiers in the Caribbean 355
White anxiety: Cross-racial mixing and coloured populations 367
Conclusion: Deception in the life and art of the white Jamaican creole
planter class 395
Index 407
Plates