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The Origin of Rum- A Quest Part 5
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Marco Pierini
Marco Pierini, Rum Historian
THE ORIGIN OF RUM - A Quest Part 5: Back to Richard Ligon
Ligon’s book is not only the story of a journey, written to entertain its readers. It is also a practical guide for merchants and investors eager to start doing business with Barbados.
Therefore, Ligon is always extremely precise and accurate. Opportunities, resources, risks, techniques and costs are analyzed painstakingly, in details, including the scale drawing of a sugar mill and the best months to bring to Barbados the goods the island needs. And, naturally, special attention is paid to sugar, the great wealth of the island.
However, when he speaks about how sugarcane cultivation in Barbados started, Ligon is uncharacteristically vague, almost reticent. Let us examine his words closely.
As we know, the first colonists tried to grow various crops, including tobacco, but with little success. Then came the breakthrough.
“At the time we landed on this Island, which was in the beginnings of September, 1647, we were informed, partly by those Planters we found there, and partly by our own observation, that the great works of Sugar-making, was but newly practiced by the inhabitants there. Some of the most industrious men, having gotten Plants from Pernambuco, a place in Brazil, and made trial of them at the Barbados; ”
The English colonists did not possess the technical knowledge necessary to grow sugarcane and then produce sugar in an efficient, profitable way, so for “ two or three years” their attempts yielded poor results.
“But they finding their errors by their daily practice began a little to mend; and, by new directions from Brazil, sometimes by strangers, and now and the by their own people … were content sometimes to make a voyage thither, to improve their knowledge in a thing they so much desired.”
Anyway, concludes Ligon, only at the time of his departure, in 1650, had sugarcane cultivation and sugar production become really efficient and extremely profitable.
Drawing on the memory of my University readings I would say that these are troubled, obscure passages, where the author drops hints, a long way from his usual clarity and preciseness.
The facts are clear: sugarcane cultivation and sugar production in Barbados are, as of 1647, quite recent. The sugarcane plants were brought from Pernambuco, in Brazil, and so was the necessary technical knowledge. Also with the help of unidentified foreigners who, it is hard to understand why, give away to the English colonists, i.e., sure competitors and potential enemies, the know how indispensable to succeed.
In order to try and decode the obscurity of these passages by Ligon, we have to get back to the context in which the English colonization of Barbados took place, to History with a capital letter. We started from the English Revolution and now we are going to finish with the European Colonial Empires in America.
But it ’s enough for now. Goodbye until the next, and final installment.
This article was written by Mr. Marco Pierini from Tuscany, Italy