The Christmas Rebellion (aka Baptist War) of 1831

“The Battle for Christmas” was the title of my Dec. 20 blog post. This article is about the battle that began on Christmas 1831 in the British Crown Colony of Jamaica. It is known as the Christmas Rebellion or as the Baptist War. 

Slavery in Jamaica

My initial impetus for writing this blog post came a year ago when I read Baylor University Professor Philip Jenkins’s article “Jamaica’s Baptist War” in the Dec. 16, 2020, issue of Christian Century.

According to Jenkins, from the 1520s through the 1870s, some 400,000 slaves were imported into what became and then was the United States. During that same period, Jamaica brought in almost a million enslaved Africans.

Slavery in Jamaica was largely due to Englishmen seeking to make a fortune from growing sugar cane in that island colony. England gained control of Jamaica in 1655, and soon some enterprising men were lured into creating sugar plantations there—and slaves were needed to work in the cane fields.

In 1662, Englishman Peter Beckford emigrated to the island, taking with him two or three enslaved Africans. By the time of his death in 1710, Beckford’s wealth included 20 Jamaican estates, 1,500 slaves, and a huge amount of bank stock.

“The Beckfords, Slavery In Jamaica” is an hour-long documentary produced by BBC and available to see here on YouTube. It graphically depicts the opulence of the Beckford family and the cruel treatment of the slaves who were forced to toil on their sugar plantations.

Baptist Slaves in Jamaica

The first Black missionary to Jamaica was George Lisle (sometimes spelled Liele), a Georgia slave who was freed by his “owner,” Henry Sharp, in 1778. While still a slave, he was the first African American to be ordained, and in 1783 he became the first Baptist to go to another land as a missionary.

By 1814, there were around 8,000 Jamaican slaves who had become Baptist Christians. Missionary Lisle, who died in Jamaica in 1828, didn’t openly challenge the system of slavery, but he prepared the way for those who did.

Samuel Sharpe was born into slavery in 1801. While he was still a young man, his fellow Baptists nicknamed him “Daddy” because he was literate, intelligent, and exhibited leadership qualities.

According to this 2020 article in The Gazette, UK’s “official public record” since 1665,

Sharpe led a plan for a peaceful general strike to start on Christmas Day in 1831, with the slaves demanding more freedom and a working wage and refusing to work unless their demands were met by the state owners and managers.

However, the peaceful strike morphed into the largest slave rebellion in the West Indies with as many as 60,000 of Jamaica’s 300,000 slaves arming themselves and seizing property across the island. But in just a few days the British forces and the Jamaican government quelled the rebellion.

Fourteen planters and 2-300 slaves were killed during the battles, and later over 300 more were executed. Just before Sharpe was hanged in May 1832, he declared, 

That slave rebellion, though, pushed Great Britain to pass the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833. Full emancipation throughout all Britain’s colonies was implemented in 1838. Quite an accomplishment for the Baptist (and other) slaves in Jamaica!

Baptist Deacons in Jamaica

Sam Sharpe, who led that Christmas Rebellion of 1831 was a Baptist deacon (and lay preacher)—and because so many of those who participated in the battles were Baptists, it is often called the Baptist War.

Another Baptist deacon, Paul Bogle, led a significant antipoverty uprising in 1865. According to Wikipedia, Bogle (b. 1822–24) “was a Jamaican Baptist deacon and activist” who led a march “for justice and fair treatment for all the people in Jamaica.” He was hanged by the government in Oct. 1865.

In 1968, though, the Jamaican government established The Order of National Hero, and seven Jamaicans have been inducted into that Order. Two of those seven are Deacon Sharpe and Deacon Bogle.

Also, Deacon Sharpe’s image is on the Jamaican $50 bill even now. 

Thank God for Sam Sharpe and Paul Bogle, Baptist deacons who led in the struggle for freedom and justice!