The history of Africans in the Americas is as much a history of slavery as it is a history of resistance to enslavement. From the moment they set foot on American soil, Africans plotted against their masters. Haiti and Brazil were two regions where slavery was as especially important as it was harsh. An African, upon touching Brazilian soil, had a life expectancy of sixteen years-eight years if he was sentenced carrying coffee. (Conrad 125) One third of all Haitian slaves died within several years. (Klubock) Both nation

The same document also claims that the slaves of Bahia had knowledge of the slave rebellion of Haiti, which had come to a close ten years earlier. "They know about and discuss the disastrous occurrences that took place on the island of Saint Domingue, and one hears mutinous claims that by St. John's Day there will not be one white or mulatto alive." (Conrad 405)

However, The ties to plantation slaves in Haitian maroon colonies were stronger than those maintained by the Brazilian quilombos. Slaves would frequent maroon colonies to attend maroon religious festivals and dances, and members of maroon colonies would sometimes travel to plantations to meet with plantation slaves. Whereas Brazilian quilombos represented a retreat from Brazilian society, the Haitian maroons were a source of revolutionary energy and ideas. (Klubock)

In both Brazil and Haiti, a hierarchy existed among the African descendants, with free mulattos at the top, followed by free blacks, then skilled slaves, house slaves, and foremen at the top, and the field hands at the bottom. The high ranking slaves were the recipients of better food, clothing, treatment were more frequently manumitted. In Brazil, free blacks and mulattos often assimilated with Euro-American society, and the high ranking slaves often maintained distance from the lower slaves. However, it is from among the ranks of the better off slaves that the Haitian revolution found its most valuable participants and leaders. (Klubock)

Many of the African slaves were adherents of Islam, and among these a number were literate in Arabic. A document written in 1814, following a slave uprising states that "almost all of them can read and write in unknown characters which are similar to the Arabic used among the Ussas, who now evidently have made an alliance with the Nagos." This passage also demonstrates that Africans often had to overcome their own ethnic differences in order to form a united front. (Conrad 410)

Manumission was also not uncommon as a relief from slavery. In Brazil, manumission was often purchased by a slave who had accumulated wealth on his own. Frequently these slaves were mulattos and more often than not women. In Haiti, children of the master, born of a slave concubine, were frequently manumitted. Haitian and Brazilian manumission created sizable populations of free blacks and mulattos, some of whom became very successful in Euro-American society.(Klubock)

Gathering together in the jungles of frontier Brazil, runaway slaves formed towns and villages called quilombos (Conrad 367). These quilombos became centers of African culture where African languages and customs predominated. As in Africa, quilombos were often governed by a king. And given enough time, authority in a quilombo could become her

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Approximate Word count = 1866
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)