Poisonings 241through the use of poisons and other deadly substances.
Victims of poisoning were not only white masters and
overseers; more oft en, they were other enslaved people or
animals. Although many poisons were made from deadly
substances, such as arsenic, ground glass, or toxic plants,
poisoners also sought to infl ict harm by manipulating
the supernatural through religious rituals and conjuring.
Whether magical or material, whites and blacks used the
term “poisoning” to describe a range of activities and sub-
stances designed to injure their target. One of many tools
creatively used to resist enslavement, poisons were also em-
ployed by slaves to exact power, express frustration, punish
wrongdoers, and wield social control.
Th e practice of poisoning took hold as a form of slave
resistance because it proved to be an eff ective tool for slaves
to retaliate against whites and to gain positions of power
in their own communities. Th ough African religious and
cultural practices did include the use of poisons and harm-
ful magic, it was the particular conditions of slavery that led
to poisoning’s popularity. Because slaves were responsible
for agriculture, livestock, and food preparation, their daily
work gave them access to goods that could be poisoned or
could deliver poison. Th us, rather than poison slavehold-
ers, slaves oft en used poison to kill livestock. Poisoning
livestock was safer than killing whites but still undermined
white authority and delivered a fi nancial blow. As the ani-
mal’s caretakers, slaves could portray poisonings as sickness
or epidemic. Furthermore, slaves sometimes poisoned or
killed livestock when their own food supplies were meager
as a way to procure meat that would be rejected by whites
for fear of disease.
It is important to remember, however, that poisonings
were targeted not only at those outside of the slave commu-
nity. Intra-black poisonings dominate reports and illustrate
the complex conditions of slavery. As with any community,
tensions existed between slaves. Whether those confl icts
occurred in the Americas or originated from individual
or national confl icts in Africa, poisons were one of the few
weapons available to slaves looking to harm or kill each
other. Intra-black poisonings also occurred when individu-
als were perceived as threats to the slave community. Slaves,
particularly domestic slaves, who were favored by masters,
who gave information to whites, or who collaborated with
whites were likely targets. In this way, poison-induced
death or sickness was a form of social control intended to
discourage slaves from cooperating with masters andcontroversy over retention, syncretism, and borrowing in
the African American tradition. Clearly Pinkster had its
roots in Dutch culture, but through the process of cultural
contact, it ceased to be something purely “Dutch.” Indeed,
the absence of whites in performance roles and the relega-
tion to them as spectators signaled the processes by which
whites slowly acculturated to African American ritual. It is
not clear why or how the African king emerged as the sym-
bolic fi gure of the Pinkster boys. However, historic evidence
suggests that African determination rather than Dutch co-
lonial paternalism was responsible for the reinvention of
Pinkster as an African American celebration.
See also: Dutch New Netherland; Middle Colonies
Jeannette Eileen JonesBibliography
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Poisonings
Th roughout the history of slavery in the Americas, and es-
pecially in the 18th century, enslaved Africans drew on in-
digenous African, European, and Native American cultural
and religious knowledge to resist the conditions of slavery