Enterprising women: Gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic
Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). Enterprising women: Gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. University of Georgia Press: Athens/London. ISBN 978-0-8203-4455-3. 241 pp.
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| Content |
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). Elisabeth and her sisters, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 1-14, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). The free colored moment: war and revolution in a brave new world, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 15-31, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). Bars, brothels, and business: Rachael Pringle Polgreen and Rosetta Smith, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 32-56, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). By labors and fidelity: Judith Philip and her family, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 57-79, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). A lasting testament of gratitude: Susannah Ostrehan and her nieces, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 80-102, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). The queen of Demerara: mrs. Dorothy Thomas, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 103-125, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). By habit and repute: the intimate frontier of empire, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 126-146, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). Uncertain aspects: mixed-race descendants at the heart of empire, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 147-168, more
- Candlin, K.; Pybus, C. (2015). Conclusion, in: Candlin, K. et al. Enterprising women: gender, race and power in the revolutionary Atlantic. pp. 169-180, more
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| Abstract |
In the Caribbean colony of Grenada in 1797, Dorothy Thomas signed the manumission documents for her elderly slave Betty. Thomas owned dozens of slaves and was well on her way to amassing the fortune that would make her the richest black resident in the nearby colony of Demerara. What made the transaction notable was that Betty was Dorothy Thomas’s mother and that fifteen years earlier Dorothy had purchased her own freedom and that of her children. Although she was just one remove from bondage, Dorothy Thomas managed to become so rich and powerful that she was known as the Queen of Demerara. Dorothy Thomas’s story is but one of the remarkable acounts of pluck and courage recovered in Enterprising Women. As the microbiographies in this book reveal, free women of color in Britain’s Caribbean colonies were not merely the dependent concubines of the white male elite, as is commonly assumed. In the capricious world of the slave colonies during the age of revolutions, some of them were able to rise to dizzying heights of success. These highly entrepreneurial women exercised remarkable mobility and developed extensive commercial and kinship connections in the metropolitan heart of empire while raising well-educated children who were able to penetrate deep into British life. |
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