Bermuda naval base: management, artisans and their enslaved workers, 1795-1797 - the heritage of the 1950 Bermudian apprentices

Arising from a project to identify Bermuda Dockyard apprentices from 1795–1950 within their history and community, this article confirms that enslaved workers were present in Bermuda naval base from the 1790s. Pay Lists and Navy Board In-Letters (ADM106) held at the National Archive show that the earliest artisans owned enslaved workers and that the navy acknowledged slavery (legal until 1834) and benefited from enslaved workers’ labour, although it did not itself own slaves. However, there is further evidence that not only did a naval commander initiate the freedom of a key enslaved worker, but that enslaved Bermudian workers were earning the means of acquiring their freedom through working in the naval base. Enslaved Bermuda workers in 1800 were in a transitional stage, earning money, deciding where to work, supporting themselves and buying their freedom or simply leaving their owners. Appendices identify apprentices and enslaved workers