Boiling Down Sweetness

Boiling Down Sugar: The Steel Heart of Barbados' Sugar


In 18th-century Barbados, cane sugar was made in cast-iron syrup kettles, a method later on adopted in the American South. Sugarcane was squashed utilizing wind and animal-powered mills. The drawn out juice was warmed, clarified, and evaporated in a series of iron pots of reducing size to produce crystallized sugar.



Barbados Sugar Economy: A Bitter Success. The introduction of the "plantation system" reinvented the island's economy. Big estates owned by wealthy planters dominated the landscape, with shackled Africans supplying the labour needed to sustain the demanding process of planting, harvesting, and processing sugarcane. This system produced immense wealth for the colony and solidified its place as a key player in the Atlantic trade. But African slaves toiled in perilous conditions, and many died in the infamous Boiling room, as you will see next:



Boiling Sugar: A Grueling Job

Sugar production in the 17th and 18th centuries was  a perilous procedure. After collecting and squashing the sugarcane, its juice was boiled in massive cast iron kettles until it turned into sugar. These pots, often organized in a series called a"" train"" were warmed by blazing fires that workers had to stir continually. The heat was extreme, and the work unrelenting. Enslaved workers sustained long hours, frequently standing near the inferno, running the risk of burns and fatigue. Splashes of the boiling liquid were not uncommon and could cause severe, even fatal, injuries.




Now, the large cast iron boiling pots function as reminders of this uncomfortable past. Spread across gardens, museums, and archaeological sites in Barbados, they stand as quiet witnesses to the lives they touched. These antiques encourage us to reflect on the human suffering behind the sweet taste that when drove international economies.


HISTORICAL RECORDS!

Abolitionist Voices Vouch for the Deadly Fate of Boiling Sugar

Accounts, such as James Ramsay's works, clarified the gruesome risks shackled staff members dealt with in Caribbean sugar plantations. The boiling house, with its open barrels of scalding sugar, was a site of inconceivable suffering -- one of lots of Dangers of plantation life.



Boiling Down Sweetness: The Iron Heart of Barbados' Sugar Industry - See the link for Details

The Iron Kettles of Sugar