'A most active, enterprising officer': Captain John Perkins, the Royal Navy and the boundaries of slavery and liberty in the Caribbean

HAMILTON, Douglas (2017). 'A most active, enterprising officer': Captain John Perkins, the Royal Navy and the boundaries of slavery and liberty in the Caribbean. Slavery and Abolition, 39 (1), 80-100.

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Official URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0144039...
Link to published version:: https://doi.org/10.1080/0144039X.2017.1330862

Abstract

John Perkins was the most senior black officer in the Royal Navy during the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He rose through the ranks from a carpenter's enslaved servant in 1759 to post captain in 1800, and went on to be one of the very first British officials to land in newly-independent Haiti in 1804. His career as a spy, gun-runner, naval officer and land owner was one of almost implausible adventure and speaks to the capacity of the maritime service to challenge and subvert race and slavery in the Caribbean. His very uniqueness, however, highlights the profound challenges for slaves and ex-slaves in trying to remake themselves as free people.

Item Type: Article
Research Institute, Centre or Group - Does NOT include content added after October 2018: Humanities Research Centre
Departments - Does NOT include content added after October 2018: Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities > Department of Humanities
Identification Number: https://doi.org/10.1080/0144039X.2017.1330862
Page Range: 80-100
Depositing User: Douglas Hamilton
Date Deposited: 18 May 2017 11:22
Last Modified: 18 Mar 2021 01:19
URI: https://shura.shu.ac.uk/id/eprint/15527

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