A Bristol, Rhode Island, and Matanzas, Cuba, Slavery Connection

The book offers a deep dive into a little-known diary. It adds to the burgeoning literature on the dark and deep connection of slavery that bound Bristol, Rhode Island and Cuba together. -- C. V. Carrington-Farmer, Roger Williams University
Diarist, naturalist, poet, painter, and prolific letter writer, George Howe was a man of many parts. He was also the manager of a Cuban slave plantation at the height of the island’s sugar boom. In this work of historical recovery and literary analysis, Rafael Ocasio brings Howe and his long forgotten, utterly unclassifiable oeuvre back to life. -- James T. Campbell, Stanford University
Rafael Ocasio provides for us a thorough examination of the popular nineteenth century artistic travelogue opening our understanding of the critical relationship between Rhode Island and Cuba during the slaving era. Ocasio’s book will be the go-to book on slaving for all interested in the aesthetics of the nineteenth century bringing alive an otherwise hidden history. -- Autumn Quezada-Grant, Roger Williams University
Ocasio brings to life not only the American encounter with colonial Cuba, and the business practices of the ingenios, but also the labor demanded of the enslaved themselves and, through a close reading of this literary text, how a New Englander navigated the glaring contradictions between the highly profitable exploitation of enslaved labor (and the illegal slave trade closely tied to it) and complicity with that system’s inherent inhumanity and brutality. -- James DeWolf Perry, editor (with Kristin Gallas) of Interpreting Slavery at Museums and Historic Sites