June 2004

History Unit 1

Section A

Question 1

Study the documents below on Spanish settlements and Empire in the Americas and then answer
questions a to d that follow.

Document I

An infinite number of people have left Spain to dwell in these countries. They generally touch at
Hispaniola, which is a very fertile island, and is become very famous The continent, which is above
250 leagues distant from it, is of a vast extent

Bartolome de Las Casas, An Account of the First Voyages and

Discoveries made by the Spaniards in America (1540)
F.R. Augier and S. Gordon, Sources of West Indian History
London: Longman Group Ltd., 1962, p. 3.

Document II

They are generally fairly tall and good looking, well made They ought to be good servants and of good
skilland I believe that they would easily be made Christians, because it seemed to me that they
belonged to no religion.

Jounal of Columbus (1492), F.R. Augier and S. Gordon,

Sources of West Indian History, 1962, p.1.

Document III

The Indians are vicious, especially in their lust, gluttony and laziness If they were set at liberty, they
would revert to their nakedness, idolatry and superstitions [I]t was [therefore] necessary to give them in
trust to the Spaniards.

Report of the Jeronimite Commission to Cardinal Cisneros (1516),

E Williams, Documents of West Indian History, Vol I,
Trinidad: PNM Publishing Ltd., 1963, p. 134.

Document IV

A s a result of the sufferings and hard labour they endured, the Indians choose and have chosen suicide;
occasionally a hundred have committed mass suicide.

Unnamed Franciscan Friar in Santo Domingo (1517).

S. Gordon, Caribbean Generations,
London: Longman Group Ltd., 1986, p. 25.
 a. With reference to Document I, explain why the Spaniards settled in the Americas in the
sixteenth century. (6 marks)

b. With reference to Document II, how did the Spanish colonists regard the indigenous
population of the Americas? (6 marks)

c. With reference to Document III, to what extent did the Spanish exercise their trust over
the Indians in a fair and judicious manner? (4 marks)

d. With reference to Document IV, what forms of resistance, other than suicides, were used
by the Indians against Spanish treatment? (8 marks)

e. What do Documents I IV suggest about the nature of Spanish settlement in the

Americas? (6 marks)

Total 30 marks

Question 2

Examine the factors that assisted the development of advanced social and political structures of
any ONE mainland indigenous group in the Americas in the per-Columbian period

Total 30 marks

Question 3

Evaluate the evidence of West African presence in the Americas in the pre-Columbian period

Total 30 marks
 Section B

Question 4

Study the documents below on European Abolition and then answer questions a to e that follow

Document I

Liberty is the right of every human creature, as soon as he breathes the vital air; and no human
law can deprive him of that right which he derives from the law of nature.

John Wesley, Thoughts upon Slavery, 1774

Michael Craton, James Walvin and David Wright (eds.)
Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation,
London: Longman Group Limited, 1976, p. 217

Document II

[W]ork done by slaves, though it appears to cost only their maintenance, is in fact the dearest of
any.

Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776.

Craton, Walvin and Wright (eds.)
Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, p. 217

Document III

The oppression and cruelty exercised to the unhappy negroeshave at length reached the British
legislature, and they are now deliberating on its redresseven several persons of property in
slaves in the West Indies, have petitioned Parliament against its continuance, sensible that it is as
impolite as it is unjust and what is inhumane must ever be unwise

Petition of Olaudah Equiano, March 21, 1788

Craton, Walvin and Wright (eds.)
Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, p. 258

Document IV

That it is notorious that the Negroes now consider an Abolition of the Slave Trade to be
synonymous with a general emancipation [and] they willbecome less contentedthey will be
urged to acts of desperate revolt, and involve themselves, their master, and the Colonies, in one
common ruinof the Sugar Colonies [which are vital] to the manufactures, agriculture,
commerce, navigation, and revenue, of the British Empire

Petition to British Parliament of West Indian planters and merchants

Against Abolition, March 1792.
Craton, Walvin and Wright (eds.)
Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, p. 271
 a. What does Document I suggest about the intellectual basis of the European anti-slavery
movement? (4 marks)

b. With reference to Document II, outline TWO economic criticisms of slavery that were
used by abolitionists. (6 marks)

c. What does Document III suggest about the campaign for abolition in Britain by 1788?
(4 marks)

d. With reference to Document IV, briefly explain the timing of the pro-slave trade lobbys
petition to the British Parliament. (6 marks)

e. With reference to Documents I, II, III and IV, comment on the British campaign for
abolition between 1770 and 1792
(10 marks)

Total 30 marks

Question 5

Discuss the view that the systems of labour under the encomienda and European indentureship
were similar in some respects, but different in others.

Total 30 marks

Question 6

Discuss the extent to which ineffective leadership was responsible for the failure of any ONE of
the following anti-slavery rebellions:

i. Kofis (Berbice, 1763)

ii. Bussas (Barbados, 1816)
iii. Nat Turners (Virginia, 1831)
iv. Sam Sharpes (Jamaica, 1831)
 Section C

Question 7

Study the documents below on the peasantry in the British Caribbean and then answer questions a to e
that follow.

Document I

The first property I bought contained 120 acres of good land The cost, with expenses of conveyance
and surveying was about 700 pounds sterling. Of this amount rather more than 400 pounds sterling was
paid down by about eighty or ninety of the people, and the remainder by instalments and by additional
purchases. Nearly 100 building lots, and an equal number of acres for provision grounds, were surveyed.

Rev. John Clark, Baptist missionary in Jamaica, 1852.

Sidney Mintz, Caribbean Transformations
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1974, p. 161.

Document II

I should say that [in British Guiana] the conductgenerally....of managers of estates towards the negroes
has not been conciliatorythe result has been a great dissatisfaction on the part of the negroes [who]
have thought it necessary to become purchasers of lots of land, and to render themselves by that means
independent of that kind of conduct against which they have objected

John Scoble, Select Committee on West India Colonies, 1842.

Hilary Beckles and Verene Shepherd (eds.)
Caribbean Freedom: Society and Economy from Emancipation to the Present
Kingston; Ian Randle Publishers, 1993 p. 62

Document III

[The peasants] wife acts the part of Domestic, Gardener, and Marketer, whilst he readily earns one
shilling a day on an Estate when he likes to work, or he may cultivate canes on the metaire [cropping]
system.

Stipendiary Magistrates Report, Tobago, 1850.

Bridget Brereton and Kevin Yelvington (eds.)
The Colonial Caribbean in Transition: Essays on Post-emancipation Social and Cultural History
Kingston: University of the West Indies Press, 1999, p. 99

Document IV

If there ever was a time when it was necessary that something should be done by a government for [the
peasantry]now is the time. The country has hitherto done little or nothing or worse than nothing for
them.

Report of Stipendiary Magistrate for St Thomas in the Vale, Jamaica, 1854.

F.R. Augier and S.C. Gordon, Sources of West Indian History
London: Longman Group Ltd., 1962, p. 176
 a. With reference to Document I, explain how the ex-slaves obtained money to purchase
land after 1838 (6 marks)

b. With reference to Document II, state TWO actions by planters that contributed to the
former enslaved acquiring their own land after 1838 (6 marks)

c. With reference to Document III, briefly describe TWO economic strategies used by the
peasant family after 1838 to earn a living (4 marks)

d. With reference to Document IV, state TWO ways in which governments in the British
Caribbean in the nineteenth century were hostile to the peasantry (4 marks)

e. With reference to Documents I, II, III and IV, comment on the rise of the peasantry
(10 marks)

Total 30 marks

Question 8

Discuss the view that Indian immigration transformed Caribbean society and economy between
1845 and 1900

Total 30 marks

Question 9

Discuss the view that the efforts at political and economic integration in the British Caribbean
between 1958 and 1980 had mixed results.

Total 30 marks