1. It is widely accepted that contract labor was a strategy to impose lower wages and more discipline on the existing work force; see Rodney, Walter A.A., A History of the Guyanese Working People, 1881–1905 (Baltimore, 1981), 31–42;Google ScholarAdamson, Alan H., “The Impact of Indentured Immigration on the Political Economy of British Guiana,” in Indentured Labour in the British Empire, 1834–1920, ed. Saunders, Kay (London, 1984), 47.Google Scholar

2. British Indian indentured immigration in the Caribbean was distributed as follows: British Guiana, 238,909; Trinidad, 143,939; Guadeloupe, 42,326; Jamaica, 36,420; Suriname, 34,304; Martinique, 25,509: St. Lucia, 4,350; Grenada, 3,200; St. Vincent 2,472. van derVeer, Peter and Vertovec, Steven, “Brahmanism Abroad: On Caribbean Hinduisim as an Ethnic Religion,” Ethnology 30 (1991):150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Destinations outside the Caribbean included Mauritius, South Africa, Réunion, Fiji, and East Africa.

3. Vollenhoven, J. van, Rapport over de werving, emigratie en immigrarie van arbeiders en de kolonisatie in Oost-Indië en Suriname (The Hague, 1913), 32.Google Scholar

4. The percentage of recruited adult women was between twenty-eight and thirty-one percent. On women migrants see Hoefte, Rosemarijn, In Place of Slavery: A Social History of British Indian and Javanese Contract Laborers in Suriname (Gainesville, FLGoogle Scholar, forthcoming), chap. 7.

5. On culture and cultural resistance see Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 9.

6. Emmer, Pieter C., “Between Slavery and Freedom: The Period of Apprenticeship in Suriname (Dutch Guiana), 1863–1873,” Slavery and Abolition 14 (1993):101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar During state supervision, sugar and its byproducts represented eighty percent of the total export value. In the following decade this fell to fifty percent. From then until World War One the value of sugar in exports declined to between twenty and thirty percent. The Great Depression caused another sharp decline, and by 1939 only six percent of the total value of exports was derived from sugar products. van Lier, R.A.J., Samenleving in een grensgebied: een sociaal-historische studie van Suriname (Amsterdam, 1977), 146–47.Google Scholar

7. Hoefte, Rosemarijn, De betovering verbroken: de migratie van Javanen naar Suriname en het Rapport-Van Vleuten (1909) (Dordrecht, 1990), 102–3.Google Scholar

8. On the role of the consul see Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 5.

9. Public Record Office, London (hereafter PRO): Foreign Office (hereafter FO) 37 piece 642, Consul to FO, March 20, 1883.

10. Algemeen Rijksarchief, The Hague (hereafter ARA), Nederlandsche Handel Maatschappij (hereafter NHM) 9473, Reisverslag Bierens de Haan, 13; Stichting Surinaams Museum, Paramaibo (hereafter SSM) 14 Mariënburg (Mb) 29-11-1929, 987.

11. See the Suriname newspaper Onze West, November 8, 1910. Dodd, David J., “The Well Springs of Violence: Some Historical Notes on East Indian Criminality in Guyana,” Caribbean Issues 2 (1976):3–16;Google ScholarDodd, David J., “Rule Making and Rule Enforcement in Plantation Society: The Ideological Development of Criminal Justice in Guyana,” Social and Economic Studies 31 (1982):11–23;Google ScholarLai, Walton Look, Indentured Labor, Caribbean Sugar: Chinese and Indian Migrants to the British West Indies, 1838–1918 (Baltimore, 1993), 115, 133;Google ScholarKandhi, Pulandar, “Indentured Insurgency on the Sugar Estates of British Guiana: 1869–1913,” History Gazette 8 (05 1989):7.Google Scholar

12. PRO: FO 37 piece 728 Report of Consul Wyndham on the Coolie Immigration to Surinam for the Year 1885.

13. Koloniale Verslagen (hereafter Ky), relevant years.

14. See, for example, Breman, Jan, Taming the Coolie Beast: Plantation Society and the Colonial Order in Southeast Asia (Delhi, 1989);Google ScholarStoler, Ann Laura, Capitalism and Confrontation in Sumatra's Plantation Belt, 1870–1979 (New Haven, 1985);Google ScholarLai, Look, Indentured Labor; Hugh Tinker, A New System of Slavery: The Export of Indian Labour Overseas 1830–1920 (London, 1974);Google ScholarTayal, Maureen, “Indian Indentured Labour in Natal, 1890–1911,” Indian Economic and Social History Review 14 (1977):519–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15. See Brereton, Bridget, Race Relations in Colonial Trinidad, 1870–1900 (Cambridge, MA, 1979), 188;Google Scholar Look Lai, Indentured Labor, argues that the British Indians “found a new application of the notion of caste superiority in their attitudes towards the Black population, whom they incorporated into their traditional world view as the lowest caste level, partly out of an inner cultural judgment on the mores and culture of the Black strangers, partly as a result of the racially charged setting into which they had been deliberately placed in the politics and economics of post-Emancipation society” (255). Ehrlich, Allen S., “Race and Ethnic Identity in Rural Jamaica: The East Indian Case,” Caribbean Quarterly 22 (1976)CrossRefGoogle Scholar states that British Indians had a “built-in negative bias” toward Creole people (21).

16. Brereton, Race Relations; Look Lai, Indentured Labor, 255–56; Ehrlich, “Race and Ethnic Identity”; Rodney, Guyanese Working People. See Bronkhurst, H.V.P., Among the Hindus and Creoles of British Guiana (London, 1888)Google Scholar for a contemporary account. For Suriname see, inter alia, KV 1908, Bijl M; Karsten, Rudolf, De Britsch-Indiërs in Suriname: Een korte schets benevens een handleiding voor de beginselen van het Hindi (The Hague, 1930), 5;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and SSM 4 Mb. 6-5-1893, 247.

17. The shortage of women and the resulting system of informal polyandry challenged traditional values and the competition for women was strong. Thus it is not surprising that marital fidelity on the wife's part was imperative to her husband. If a wife was suspected of adultery it could have brutal consequences. Contemporaries regarded “wife chopping” as the one proof of the barbarous and bloodthirsty nature of the Hindustani. Although reliable data for Suriname are lacking, data for Trinidad and British Guiana show the dimensions of the problem of wife murders. In British Guiana the occurrence of murder of women was six to seven times higher than in India itself. As the sex ratio improved the rate of wife-murders decreased. Brereton, Race Relations, 182; Reddock, Rhoda E., “Women, Labour, and Struggle in 20th Century Trinidad and Tobago: 1898–1960” (Ph.D. diss., Universiteit van Amsterdam, 1984), 101;Google ScholarPoynting, Jeremy, “East Indian Women in the Caribbean: Experience and Voice,” in India in the Caribbean, ed. Dabydeen, David and Samaroo, Brinsley (London, 1987), 232;Google ScholarTrotman, David Vincent, Crime in Trinidad: Conflict and Control in a Plantation Society, 1838–1900 (Knoxville, TN, 1986), 170.Google Scholar

18. See, inter alia, ARA, NHM, Z 1144–9185, 1913; Indische Mercuur no. 19, 1895 and nos. 12 and 42, 1900; as well as no. 16, 1908; SSM 4 Mb. 8-16-1899 Bijl. 349; Mb. 6-5-1893, 247; Mb. 11-26-1891 aan Gouverneur; KV 1908 Bijl. M; and Traa, A. van, Suriname 1900–1940 (Deventer, Neth., 1946), 41.Google Scholar

19. Verhey, Elma and van Westerloo, Gerard, “De weg terug naar Java,” Vrij Nederland (12 22, 1984); 34;Google ScholarIsmael, Joseph, De Indonesische bevolkingsgroep in Suriname (Amsterdam, 1951), 22–24;Google Scholar and Suparlan, Parsudi, “The Javanese in Surinam: Ethnicity in an Ethnically Plural Society” (Ph.D. diss., University of Illinois, 1976), 115–17.Google Scholar

20. Suparlan, “Javanese in Surinam,” 95–117. Adas, Michael, “From Avoidance to Confrontation: Peasant Protest in Precolonial and Colonial Southeast Asia,” in Colonialism and Culture, ed. Dirks, Nicholas B. (Ann Arbor, MI, 1992)Google Scholarconsiders wayang kulit as a (possible) form of protest because of its satirical comments and the creation of fantasy worlds (107, 116).

21. ARA, NHM, Q 1122–9184, 1891.

22. This apparently was also the case in British Guiana and Trinidad. See Rodney, Guyanese Working People, 189; Brereton, Race Relations, 188–89. Suparlan, “Javanese in Surinam,” writes about his research in the 1970s: “a Javanese will express his dislike or hatred toward a Creole or a Hindustani only to another Javanese or by just grumbling” (90).

23. Letter published in Onze West, November 16, 1909.

24. KV 1908. According to Stoler, Ann Laura, “Perceptions of Protest: Defining the Dangerous in Colonial Sumatra,” American Ethnologist 12 (1985):644CrossRefGoogle Scholar, this obsession with peace and order captures the spirit of Dutch rule in the East Indies as well. Of course, peace and order referred to the social order and labor discipline in particular. Stoler, Capitalism and Confrontation, 56, also argues that in Sumatra many estates handled incidents themselves and that administrators were silent on the subject because they preferred not to have it known that their contract workers were not “in hand.” The same may very well have occurred in Suriname.

25. Michael Adas, “From Avoidance to Confrontation,” 89.

26. On messianic movements in Java see Adas, “From Avoidance to Confontation,” 100, 116; Poeze, Harry A., Politiek-politioneele overzichten van Nederlandsch-Indië: bronnenpublikatie deel I, 1927–1928 (The Hague, 1982), xxx;Google ScholarScott, James C., Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance (New Haven, 1985), 333.Google Scholar On “theatrical satire,” see note 20 above.

27. On Anton de Kom in Suriname see Wicart, Ellen, “Wanhoop en heilsverwachting: Oorzaken van het succes van Anton de Kom onder de Javaanse bevolking,” Oso 9 (1990):83–99;Google Scholar Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 9; Hoefte, , “Het politiek bewustzijn van Hindostaanse en Javaanse contractarbeiders, 1910–1940” Oso 6 (1987):25–34.Google Scholar

28. SSM 6 Verslag 1906; SSM 7 Mb. 2-24-1908, 499. As early as 1904 newspapers reported that many runaways visited Paramaribo; Onze West, August 3, 1904.Planters in Deli, for example, reacted in the same way to desertion: it was not the conditions on the estates but the wayward behavior of the workers that was the cause of desertion. See Breman, Jan, Koelies, planters en koloniale politiek: het arbeidsregime op de grootlandbouwondernemingen aan Sumatra's Oostkust in het begin van de twintigste eeuw (Dordrecht, 1987), 24.Google Scholar

29. Onze West, January 4, 11, 25, February 1, 1908. Some of the maroon camps were said to house thirty people.

30. Verhey and VanWesterloo, “De weg terug,” 10.

31. Breman, Taming the Coolie Beast, 148.

32. KV 1886–1920. Kondapi, C., Indians Overseas, 1838–1949 (Bombay, 1951), 27Google Scholar, found that the rate of suicide among British Indian populations in several countries correlated inversely with the number of women amongst them. The suicide rates per million in Trinidad and British Guiana (1902–1912) were 406 and 100 respectively, compared to 63 per million in the United Provinces in India. See also Tayal, “Indian Indentured Labour in Natal,” 544–45. Although more British Indians than Javanese committed suicide in Suriname, Breman, Taming the Coolie Beast, believes that “suicide, although the sources are silent on this except [for] rare exceptions,” might have been the third-leading cause of death in the Netherlands East Indies (148).

33. Adas, “From Avoidance to Confrontation,” 128.

34. KV, relevant years. Tinker, A New System of Slavery, 194 gives the following data for other colonies in 1907–1908: British Guiana, twenty percent; Trinidad, sixteen percent; Jamaica, eight percent; Fiji, twenty percent; Mauritius, three percent.

35. McNeill, James and Lal, Chimmam, Report on the Condition of Indian Immigrants in the Four British Colonies Trinidad, British Guiana or Demerara, Jamaica and Fiji, and in the Dutch Colony of Surinam or Dutch Guiana (London, 1915), 27.Google Scholar

36. The targets of theft often were the wealthier contractors (mostly drivers) or the plantation itself. This is, of course, no evidence that the perpetrators viewed thefts as a means of resistance. The motivation of the bandits determines whether theft is an act of resistance or a criminal act. It is important, however, that the unequal distribution of wealth and the character of the plantation system made banditry a “logical” option for the indentured; on this topic see Scott, Weapons of the Weak, 267.

37. After the first years of indentured labor the deliberate burning of cane declined in Suriname and in other colonies. See Tayal, “Indian Indentured Labour in Natal,” 544; Look Lai, Indentured Labor, 107–53. A possible explanation may be that the destruction of cane fields cut into the livelihoods of the workers who were paid per task.

38. Stoler, Capitalism and Confrontation, 49–50. For similar observations on the British Caribbean see Look Lai, Indentured Labor, 142.

39. KV, relevant years.

40. Djwalapersad, R. I. and MacDonald, R.W., De laatste stemmen van immigranten (Paramaribo, 1988),2.Google Scholar

41. KV 1885. See also SSM 3 Paramaribo 9-27-1884; Hira, Sandew, Van Priary tot en met De Kom: de geschiedenis van het verzet in Suriname, 1630–1940 (Rotterdam, 1983), 205–206.Google Scholar

42. See Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 10 for a in-depth description of this incident and the following reactions.

43. SSM 4 Mb. 8-26-1891, 212.

44. SSM 4 Mb. 10-3-1891, 214.

45. SSM 4 Mb. 10-12-1891, 215. For the petition, see SSM 4 Brief aan de Minister van Koloniën te Den Haag 10-10-1891. The court sentenced the accused murderer to death, but the governor pardoned him, giving him a prison sentence instead. The convict later committed suicide. SSM 4 Mb. 10-3-1891, 214; 11-23-1891, 218; 12-30-1891, 221; 2-15-1892, 224; 3-1-1892, 225.

46. SSM 4 Mb. 2-15-1892, 224 and Mb. 11-23-1891, 218.

47. It seems that this was the second deadliest uprising of indentured workers in the Caribbean. Only the uprising at Rose Hall in British Guiana in 1913 was bloodier: There, fifteen men were killed and forty wounded. Tinker, A New System of Slavery, 229–30.

48. This account is based on the government version of the events, published in KV 1902. Bijlage M. The plantation's correspondence on these events is missing and the reports to the shareholders do not give a detailed account of the disturbances. For a more detailed description see Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 10.

49. Extensive reports on the court sessions are published in Onze West, October 12. 25, 1902.

50. Handelingen der Staten-Generaal (The Hague: Algemeene Laudsdrukkerij, 1902–1903), December 24. 1902.

51. PRO: FO 97 piece 884 Consul to FO, December 3, 1902.

52. ARA, NHM, T 1133–9185, 1902.

53. SSM 7 Mb. 3-6-1908, 505.

54. SSM 7 Mb. 24-2-1908, 499 and 27-7-1908, 508.

55. Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 9; Hoefte, “Het politick bewustzijn.”

56. On the “Red danger”in Deli see Stoler, Capitalism and Confrontation,74–86.

57. Rodney, Guyanese Working People, 151.

58. Trotman, Crime in Trinidad, 195.

59. E.g., Griffiths, Percival, The History of the Indian Tea Industry (London, 1967), 379–80;Google Scholar Tinker, A New System of Slavery, 146; Mangru, Basdeo, A History of East Indian Resistance on the Guyana Sugar Estates, 1869–1948 (Lewiston, NY, 1996), 65, 121. 169.Google Scholar

60. Breman, Taming the Coolie Beast, 169.

61. Immigrant organizations all proclaimed a rather curious attachment to the queen; see Hoefte, In Place of Slavery, chap. 9.

62. Breman, Taming the Coolie Beast, 170.

63. Kolff, Dirk H.A. “From Hindustani Diaspora to Indian Expansion: The Context of First Phase of the Transition” (paper presented to the workshop “South Asian Labour,” International Institute for Social History, Amsterdam, October 26–27, 1995), esp. 15–17.Google Scholar