“Considering Him Not as a Prisoner, but as a Refugee”: The Categorisation of French Refugees in Jamaica during the Time of the Haitian Revolution and the Revolutionary Wars

Abstract With the outbreak of the Haitian Revolution, thousands of people sought refuge in neighbouring British Jamaica, or ended up there as prisoners of war. This contribution examines how colonial authorities responded to a mass influx of people in a time characterised by political uncertainty. It sheds light on a system of registration employed in 1790s Jamaica to manage refugees and to gauge who would be entitled to assistance. This system was built on surveillance, categorisations of people, and a language of deservingness, made use of both by colonial administrators, on whose deliberations access to support effectively depended, and refugees in their own narratives. The article shows how refugee registration was not a top-down process but rather one that was actively influenced from below, as refugees themselves made use of the unclearness of categorisations and hijacked the system in order to gain access to specific sets of relief funds.