Historical Organization
colonial courts and magistrates
colonial courts and magistrates
Details
Organization Timeline
The 1825 act mandates provision grounds and food allowances
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 2 required plantation owners to allot land suited to growing provisions, allow twenty-eight working days between May and January for cultivation, and provide food, clothing, bedding, and...
Enslaved people could complain about unmet subsistence duties
📅 26 April 1825Clause 3 allowed an enslaved person’s complaint—or information from another person—to trigger a justice’s inquiry into food, clothing, housing, and treatment. Justices could inspect an estate and...
Grenada’s 1825 act directs enslavers to arrange Christian instruction
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 4 urged owners and their agents to instruct enslaved people in Christianity and required parish clergy to baptize adults deemed ready and infants within six months of birth. Clergy were also to...
Enslaved couples could marry only with written owner permission
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 5 allowed two enslaved people belonging to the same owner to marry through an authorized clergyman or priest, but required written permission from that owner. Clergy were also to judge...
Plantations had to maintain hospitals and illness registers
📅 26 April 1825Clause 6 required each plantation to maintain a hospital in a suitable, healthy location for enslaved people who were sick, injured, or infirm. An “hospital-book” was to record names, admission and...
The 1825 law limits some hours of plantation labor
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 7 prohibited compelling most enslaved plantation workers to leave home before daybreak, work through breakfast or dinner, or continue after sunset. It allowed an exception for production...
The law grants extra cultivation days to some mothers
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 8 gave a woman with five living children attached to a plantation fifty-two days during the year to cultivate provision grounds. Its stated purpose was to encourage the increase and...
Grenada bars owners from discarding sick, aged, or infirm people
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 9 forbade owners from turning away enslaved people considered unable to work because of illness, age, or infirmity. Owners had to keep and support them; magistrates could investigate neglect...
The act places limits on plantation floggings
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 10 required a free person to be present when punishment exceeded fifteen lashes and capped punishment at twenty-five lashes for an offense in a day. It restricted repeated flogging before...
A court could free a person abused by an owner—but could also sell them
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 13 allowed prosecution for cruel wounding, mutilation, or confinement without support. Where the enslaver was convicted, a court could order the person sold to another buyer or declare them...
An enslaved person could testify in a prosecution for abuse
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 14 permitted an enslaved person alleged to have been wantonly punished or confined to testify in the trial of the person accused of that abuse. In that specific setting the witness did not need...
Complaints about abuse could lead to inquiry—and reprisals
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 15 authorized justices to investigate reports that an enslaved person had been improperly punished or confined, and to arrange an allowance during an inquiry. But if officials judged the...
Forty-eight hours away without a pass defined someone as a runaway
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 16 defined an enslaved person absent from an owner or employer for forty-eight hours on working days, without a ticket or permit, as a runaway. The definition converted unlicensed mobility into...
The 1825 act orders public notices for people jailed as runaways
📅 26 April 1825Clause 19 required the Provost Marshal to keep captured runaways in custody, post their names at the courthouse, and advertise their names and owners—or physical descriptions if owners were unknown—in...
The law provides an inquiry for people jailed who claimed freedom
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 20 directed magistrates to investigate when someone jailed as a runaway claimed to be free. If the justices found the claim credible, they had to release the person; if not, they could remand...
Long-term escape could bring hard labor or transportation
📅 26 April 1825Clause 24 prescribed punishment for an enslaved person who remained away for more than six months: hard labor or transportation for life, depending on magistrates’ judgment. For shorter absences, it...
Magistrates could authorize searches of enslaved people’s homes
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 25 allowed justices to issue warrants to search houses occupied by enslaved people for fugitives or people suspected of sheltering them. Searches could occur by day or night after notice to the...
Grenada restricts night drumming and gatherings
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 28 prohibited enslaved people from beating drums or using other loud instruments for diversion after ten at night, while penalizing owners who knowingly permitted it. Clause 33 separately...
St George’s curfew law continued in the 1825 consolidation
📅 26 April 1825Clause 32 authorized free people to apprehend enslaved people found in St George’s streets between 9 p.m. and 4 a.m. unless they were attending an owner or held written permission. Those detained...
The act criminalizes obeah and other African-derived spiritual practice
đź“… 26 April 1825Clause 35 criminalized practices officials labeled obeah, including healing or ritual work and possession of listed materials. It grouped spiritual practices with grave threats, allowed severe...
The act classifies many offenses by enslaved people as felonies
📅 26 April 1825Clause 37 subjected enslaved defendants accused of rebellion, murder, burglary, robbery, arson, and several other serious offenses to the Supreme Court’s criminal process. The court was to assign...