Thomas Thistlewood

Thomas Thistlewood (video) extract enacted.

The papers of Thomas Thistlewood (1721 - 1786) were recently purchased by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (Yale) and thankfully remain accessible to everyone. An English overseer and later plantation-owner, Thistlewood kept a diary that was both detailed and explicit. Many historians have used the diaries, and the renowned Jamaican historian Douglas Hall presented large  extracts in 'In Miserable Slavery Thomas Thistlewood in Jamaica 1750-85 (Kingston, 1999).

A different approach was taken a few years later by Trevor Burnard in Mastery, Tyranny and Desire - Thomas Thistlewood and his slaves in the Anglo-Jamaican World (London, 2004). He used the diaries in seminars and through these explored a number of different themes with the help of his students. The resulting book gives a fascinating snapshot of the eighteenth century Jamaica. Burnard tackles the issues of power, slave relations, the enlightenment and promiscuity in all its gruesome detail. Interestingly, where Thistlewood remained the central character, others now receive a prominent place.