440 HISTORY 



of compliance with the recommendations of the Ministry, still there were 

 legitimate objections to the imposition of this regulation upon the Bahamas, if 

 the interests of this Colony alone were to be considered. Registration, as has 

 been stated, was designed to work towards the suppression of the slave-trade. 

 The foreign slave-trade had not been carried on in the Bahamas since about 

 the year 1810, or perhaps before the British Parliament had abolished the 

 slave-trade in British territory. 67 Crop failures, and the uncertainty as to the 

 tenure of the lands which they held, were additional reasons for apprehension 

 on the part of the Bahama slaveholders. Furthermore, the expense that 

 would inevitably attend such an establishment in this Colony would be out of 

 all proportion to the benefits to be derived from it. The slave population, 

 here numbering 10,808, according to the registration of 1822, was distributed 

 over seventeen islands and groups of islands, which extended over a distance 

 of 600 miles of ocean. Most of the other West Indian colonies consisted each 

 of a single island, or compact group of islands. N"o other colony formed such 

 a chain as the Bahamas. Easy access to the seat of government, 'where the 

 registration books were to be kept, was an essential condition to the successful 

 operation of the system. Communication between the different islands of this 

 government was so infrequent, and so difficult, as to render it practically im- 

 possible for the same system to be applied here as in the other colonies, unless 

 by the assumption of an expense which the colonial revenues could not bear. 

 Other features of this system were difficult to adapt to this Colony, owing to 

 the varied occupations of the slaves. 



Great Britain was taking the lead of the world in giving effect to her abo- 

 lition laws. Her West Indian colonies were compelled to submit to the impo- 

 sition of this regulation as one measure for this purpose. Not one of them 

 could be excepted from it, for no door must be left unclosed by which slaves 

 could be brought into the British possessions. The exception of one colony, 

 however small, would have served for the introduction of slaves into all the 

 colonies at a great profit to the carriers. The plan of the Ministry was to 

 recommend to all the colonies the same system, and to insist on its adoption, 

 and the enforcement of its regulations, until the introduction of slaves from 

 the outside should be entirely cut off. Such a plan would allow no part of the 



07 H. V., 1815, app., pp. 46-47. It was claimed by local men in 1815 that the 

 depreciation in the value of their slaves had amounted to one-fourth of their total 

 value during the first decade of the nineteenth century. In 1825 it was estimated 

 that the depreciation had amounted to 500,000 or one-half of the former value of 

 this property. Loc. cit., 1825-26, pp. 124, 125. 



