Slave Register, New Grange Estate, Trinidad and Tobago, Nov. 23, 1824.

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This rare document provides detailed records of the annual return of plantation slaves to the New Grange Estate in Trinidad and Tobago. The extremely well-preserved parchment provides accounts of names, gender, skin color, occupation, the date of births and deaths, and cause of death. In the table, “Decrease of Deaths,” a female slave Rose died “under the idea of obiah”—religious beliefs associated with voodoo practices that were introduced to the Caribbean Islands and Guyana by African slaves. The red wax insignias are still outstandingly intact.

From the Caribbean Documents Collection.