Waiting for Plantation Food Rations, Cuba, ca. 1866

Description

The author, who visited Cuba ca. 1866, describes a large sugar plantation, or estate. The bulk of the hands used in the general operations of the place, cutting cane, plowing, etc. are known as the gente, or people. They are pretty well taken care of as regards food . . . at least in quantity . The clothing . . . is limited, the children usually going about stark naked, the women with only a calico dress on, and the men wearing only their pants. it is rather a novel sight, at the eleven o'clock halt from work, to see these people gathering for their rations, which are served out to them once a day (pp. 360-61). Person in right foreground is playing a guitar. In its digital gallery, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (New York City), shows a photograph (stereograph) of a plantation view in Cuba (image 1657420) that is clearly related to the image shown here -- which was probably based on the photograph (thanks to Roberta Kilkenny for bringing this to our attention).

Source

Samuel Hazard, Cuba with pen and pencil (Hartford, Conn., 1871), p. 360.

Language

English

Rights

Image is in the public domain. Metadata is available under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International.

Identifier

LCP-04

Spatial Coverage

Caribbean--Cuba

Item sets

Plantation Scenes, Slave Settlements & Houses

Citation

"Waiting for Plantation Food Rations, Cuba, ca. 1866", Slavery Images: A Visual Record of the African Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Early African Diaspora, accessed March 20, 2023, http://www.slaveryimages.org/s/slaveryimages/item/1371
The author, who visited Cuba ca. 1866, describes a large sugar plantation, or estate. The bulk of the hands used in the general operations of the place, cutting cane, plowing, etc. are known as the gente, or people. They are pretty well taken care of as regards food . . . at least in quantity . The clothing . . . is limited, the children usually going about stark naked, the women with only a calico dress on, and the men wearing only their pants. it is rather a novel sight, at the eleven o'clock halt from work, to see these people gathering for their rations, which are served out to them once a day (pp. 360-61). Person in right foreground is playing a guitar. In its digital gallery, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (New York City), shows a photograph (stereograph) of a plantation view in Cuba (image 1657420) that is clearly related to the image shown here -- which was probably based on the photograph (thanks to Roberta Kilkenny for bringing this to our attention).
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