Cuba

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[Atlantic Slave Trade - Cuba - DeWolf Family] Wood, Captain JohnABAA

Worse Than an Assassin": A Newport Captain Accuses the Enslavers James DeWolf and Charles Collins of Forcing His Family from Their Cuban Plantation and Describes Ensuing Legal Actions

1823ref. BK0184Middletown Rhode Island 1823. Autograph letter signed three pages on a folded sheet with integral address panel to Charles E. Dudley in Albany and Newport postal markings. 7 ¾ x 9 ¾ inches. Old folds scattered staining and some marginal losses a few affecting text. Good to very good. A letter from Newport mariner John Wood concerning his acrimonious departure from the DeWolf family's Mary Ann plantation in Cuba and the ensuing legal dispute with James DeWolf and Charles Collins. Wood was almost certainly the same John Wood whose signature appears on an 1806 Newport agreement for an illegal voyage transporting enslaved Africans from Cape Coast to Havana now held by the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture.1 By 1823 he was residing on the Mary Ann plantation one of several Cuban estates belonging to the DeWolfs among the most prominent families involved in the American slave trade. His relationship with DeWolf and Collins had evidently collapsed over his obligations on the estate resulting in what he describes as his forced departure from Cuba under apparently dangerous conditions with his family and a contentious effort to settle their accounts. Writing to his friend Charles E. Dudley then mayor of Albany and a New York state senator Wood reports that three mechanics who had resided with him on the plantation had recently given depositions in Bristol Rhode Island. Two of the three had testified in his favor though all had been called by DeWolf. Wood was particularly incensed by the circumstances surrounding his family's departure from Cuba writing: "I must acknowledge that myself & family have been most shamefully abused & for no provocation we were set adrift liable to be murdered & robbed on Shore My Wife & Daughter exposed at Sea to be captured By pirates and in case of Capture to suffer more than Death; Not content in what they have done but still persevere in wishing to rob me of all I possess a Respectable Character. The assassin will stab you in the dark but the Wretch who will traduce and injure an Innocent family is worse than an assassin." Wood goes on to describe receiving two writs from DeWolf and Collins and transcribes an August 8 letter from James DeWolf explaining his decision to pursue legal action despite their previous discussions of an amicable settlement: "Lest you should think me inconsistent in causing an action to be brought after the last conversation we had I take leave to explain my wishes to come to an amicable settlement by referring to men as we talked remains the same my object is to put the business in a legal and proper train for bringing it to a close . & to enable me to avail of the testimony of the people who were on the Estate with you." Wood expected the Rhode Island Supreme Court meeting at Bristol the following month to appoint referees to settle the accounts. The precise origin of the disagreement is not stated though the depositions of the mechanics and the references to outstanding accounts suggest a dispute over Wood's contractual obligations or activities on the plantation. Wood 1770-1826 was a Newport merchant and captain with longstanding connections to Atlantic commerce. He died at Cape Coast West Africa in 1826 three years after writing the present letter. James DeWolf 1764-1837 then serving in the United States Senate had amassed a substantial fortune through the slave trade and his Cuban plantation interests. Charles Collins his brother-in-law had served as collector of customs at Bristol from 1804 to 1820 an appointment closely connected to the family's slave-trading operations. The Mary Ann plantation is documented in the DeWolf Papers at the Rhode Island Historical Society which include inventories from 1818 and 1820 and contemporary plans of the plantation grounds. The present letter preserves Wood's account of his treatment by the DeWolf family together with his transcription of DeWolf's explanation for pursuing legal action. 1 "Agreement facilitating illegal trade of enslaved Africans" National Museum of African American History & Culture accessed October 12 2026 https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_2019.28.1. . unknown books

Auger Down Books · Estados UnidosUS$ 1.750,00≈ € 1.560,41

Early Cuba Photo Album; Tourism and LeisureABAA

Cuba Under American Influence: Photograph Album of Western Travelers Rural and Afro-Cuban Communities Labor Havana and the Cuban Countryside 26 Photographs circa 1910s-1920s

1910ref. 235641910. Cuba photograph album depicting encounters between Western visitors and Cuban communities during the early republican period circa 1910s to 1920s when the island occupied an unusual position between formal independence and continuing American political and economic influence. The photographs move between Havana's monumental architecture hotels and waterfront districts and the rural landscapes villages rivers and agricultural communities that remained largely outside the tourist image promoted to foreign visitors. Repeated appearances of the same Western man often accompanied by a woman who appears to be his wife suggest an extended journey through both urban and remote regions of the island during a period when American travelers businessmen and government personnel moved through Cuba in growing numbers following the Spanish American War and the establishment of the Cuban Republic. Photo album of 26 silver gelatin photographs mounted on unbound album boards with blue covers boards measuring approximately 9 x 15 inches Cuba circa 1910s to 1920s. The photographs range from 6 x 6.5 to 8 x 9.5 inches. Images show waterfront houses built directly along riverbanks; tropical waterfalls and dense forest landscapes; interior courtyards and hotel spaces with colonnades and tiled floors; Morro Castle and lighthouse overlooking Havana Harbor; panoramic views of Cuban towns set among surrounding mountains; market scenes crowded with vendors women and children; cattle standing in shallow waterways; village gatherings outside rural buildings; and groups of local residents posed alongside visiting Westerners. Several photographs depict women standing in rivers holding broad metal pans possibly associated with washing river labor or mineral collection activities. Other images show children families agricultural workers and river communities while a series of portraits records the principal traveler and his companion at various points throughout the journey. One image depicts a group of local residents and Western visitors posed together in a forested region; another shows villagers gathered near a rural homestead while several photographs focus on transportation livestock and daily work in the countryside. The album belongs to the decades following Cuba's transition from Spanish colony to nominally independent republic a period shaped by the Platt Amendment American investment expanding tourism and intensive foreign interest in the island's economic resources and landscapes. Rather than concentrating exclusively on Havana's civic monuments and colonial architecture the photographer devoted substantial attention to rural communities Afro Cuban and mixed-race populations river labor village life and frontier environments seldom emphasized in commercial tourist imagery of the period. The contrast between hotels government-era landmarks village settlements cattle crossings market scenes and encounters with local residents documents the unequal worlds that coexisted within early twentieth century Cuba as foreign visitors moved between urban centers and agricultural regions. Light surface wear occasional toning minor album mounting wear and scattered edge wear to several boards; overall very good condition. A concentrated visual record of how Westerners experienced and represented Cuba's rural communities laboring populations landscapes and colonial-era urban centers during the first decades of the Cuban Republic. unknown books

Max Rambod Inc. · Estados UnidosUS$ 650,00≈ € 579,58

US Navy Sailors in CubaABAA

U.S. Navy Imperial Power in Cuba and Guantánamo Bay Photograph Archive 1914 to 1919

1914ref. 235561914. US Navy photograph archive 1914 to 1919 documenting American sailors in Cuba during the years when Guantánamo Bay served as a U.S. naval station for Caribbean fleet activity training and strategic movement. Verso inscriptions reading "25wyn" and "1914 to 1919" likely connect the group to USS Wyoming BB 32 whose documented service placed the battleship repeatedly in Cuban waters during this period. The photographs provide a sailor's vernacular record of Cuban streets roads transportation local residents agricultural hauling commerce and infrastructure within a wartime Cuba shaped by U.S. naval presence Caribbean patrol activity and the uneven modernization of industry under US Imperial rule. Photo archive of 14 silver gelatin photographs various sizes most approximately 5 x 3.5 inches Cuba 1914 to 1919. The images show U.S. Navy sailors posed among cactus and agave standing with Cuban men beside an open touring automobile and gathered in uniform at a public outdoor event with benches crowds buildings and hills beyond. Cuban infrastructure appears throughout the group: horse drawn carriages and wagons move through a town street lined with utility poles and commercial buildings; an ox team pulls a high wooden cart loaded with cut cane or brush along a rural road; a windmill or water pumping structure stands beside a group of local residents; a rail or tram line runs through a lightly built district; and a roadside scene combines naval uniforms automobile travel and undeveloped terrain. One commercial view shows a tourist photography and souvenir stand advertising "post cards made while you wait" "souvenirs & novelties" "Kodak films for sale" and "photo printing developing" placing commercial image making tourist exchange and modern photographic supply in the same Cuban landscape the sailors moved through during the US's imperial organization. The U.S. naval presence in Cuba began with the Spanish American War and the occupation that followed. The Platt Amendment which limited Cuban sovereignty after independence in 1902 and the 1903 lease agreements gave the United States a permanent base at Guantánamo Bay. By World War I Guantánamo was part of the working map of U.S. power in the Caribbean. It supported fleet exercises patrol movements and regional security from Cuban territory. These photographs show US imperial interest by depicting American sailors moving through streets and roads where motorcars utility poles photographic shops horse drawn traffic ox carts windmills rural tram lines and agricultural hauling all appear in the same landscape. Overall in good to fair condition with heavy image fading slight handling wear some curling. Some photographs have tears which do not obstruct the images. A visual record of U.S. naval presence in Platt Amendment Cuba and the roads shops vehicles animals and rural working systems during the World War I period. unknown books

Max Rambod Inc. · Estados UnidosUS$ 550,00≈ € 490,41

Caribbean and Cuba; LaborABAA

Post-Emancipation Era Caribbean Colonial Plantation Labor and Economy Export Stereoview Archive Martinique Dominican Republic Cuba

1890ref. 231711890. Stereoview archive of the post-emancipation Caribbean showing how the islands were marketed to western viewers through plantation labor export agriculture civic spectacle and catastrophe. As a group these photos function not only as an ethnographic travel archive but as evidence of the visual economy that followed slavery. The British West Indies moved through emancipation in 1834 to 1838 the French Caribbean in 1848 Puerto Rico in 1873 and Cuba in 1886 yet plantation production remained central to regional life well into the early twentieth century. These stereoviews preserve a colonial way of seeing in which Black and Afro-Caribbean labor rural discipline and extractive agriculture remained the background condition of "tropical" beauty and commercial modernity. Cuba's sugar economy in particular expanded through the nineteenth century and slavery was not abolished there until 1886 while Weyler's later reconcentration policy during the Cuban War of Independence violently reorganized rural life. Martinique after 1848 likewise shifted into new labor regimes including imported workers from India and China. Archive of 11 stereoview cards late 1890s to early 1900s depicting Cuba Jamaica Martinique Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Most black and white with a few colorized. Each measure 3.5" x 7". All with captions on the margins. "Reconcentrado Farming Scene Province of Havana Cuba" links agricultural production to the brutal displacements of Spain's reconcentration campaign; "Cutting sugar cane Montego Bay Jamaica W.I." records cane labor in a colony where emancipation had not ended plantation dependency; and "Harvesting Coconuts Porto Rico" likewise frames Caribbean land through export work rather than local life. Other views extend that economic framing through cacao and coffee scenes while the paired Havana cards shift into urban leisure and public display including "Beautiful Central Park Havana Cuba" and "Holiday in Havana Cuba" the latter with both Cuban and American flags visible a telling image of the new imperial order after 1898. The disaster views from Martinique and the Lesser Antilles show how stereoview publishers also turned Caribbean destruction into consumable spectacle. the Morne Rouge card is accompanied on the reverse by the grim printed text "Dead bodies which were to be seen in Morne Rouge." while the wider context is the 1902 eruptions of Mount Pelée in Martinique and La Soufrière on Saint Vincent two catastrophes that killed roughly 30000 and 1600 people respectively and devastated local communities and agriculture. Some corner wear light toning scattered surface and edge wear. Overall very good condition. This collection gives direct visual representation of Caribbean history Atlantic slavery and emancipation plantation labor and U.S. imperial expansion in the circum-Caribbean preserving the transition from slavery to post-abolition labor. unknown books

Max Rambod Inc. · Estados UnidosUS$ 550,00≈ € 490,41

Spanish Colonial CubaABAA

Spanish Colonial Cuba and Spanish Constitutional Governance Under the Regency of María Cristina Santiago de Cuba 27 November 1836

1836ref. 231491836. Diario Constitucional de Santiago de Cuba No. 57 November 1836 just months after the restoration of Spain's liberal Constitution of 1812. This newspaper records the transmission of Spanish constitutional government into eastern Cuba in late 1836 through decrees ministerial correspondence and public political dispute printed for circulation in Santiago de Cuba. Issued weeks after the political upheavals that restored constitutional rule in Spain this number shows how the language of the regency government the suppression and reorganization of state bodies and local declarations of loyalty to Isabel II reached colonial readers through the newspaper press. In a Cuban setting where metropolitan policy was filtered through governors ministries and municipal elites an issue such as this preserves the working connection between imperial administration and provincial print. Diario Constitucional de Santiago de Cuba. No. 57. Santiago de Cuba 27 November 1836. 4 pages. Folio newspaper issue. The masthead reads "DIARIO CONSTITUCIONAL / DE SANTIAGO DE CUBA" with the date line "DOMINGO 27 DE NOVIEMBRE DE 1836." Page 1 opens with "MINISTERIO DE LA GOBERNACION DEL REINO" followed by a circular and a substantial "EXPOSICION A LA REINA GOBERNADORA" leading into a "REAL DECRETO" concerning the suppression of the Consejo Real de España e Indias. Interior pages continue the decree and carry translatedly legible sections including "MISCELANEA" notices on "Las islas turcas libres" and "Noticias sobre Tejas" and a long exchange under "REMITIDOS" dated "Cuba 25 de Noviembre de 1836" addressing militia service volunteers of Isabel II and the political insult attributed to an earlier subscriber. The issue survives as a complete four page folio with dense double column text throughout and no wrappers as issued. Printed in Santiago the issue shows constitutional and monarchist language being adapted for a colonial audience that was expected to follow ministry decrees military loyalty and debates over public honor in the same sheet. Folded as issued with minor edge chipping small losses at corners and margins some toning and closed tears and pinholes; complete and legible. Overall good condition. The juxtaposition of metropolitan government text Caribbean and Atlantic news and the local controversy printed in "Remitidos" gives the number a documentary range broader than a routine official gazette placing state policy beside the contested language of provincial political life. unknown books

Max Rambod Inc. · Estados UnidosUS$ 450,00≈ € 401,25

Slavery in CubaABAA

Pre-Abolition Spanish Colonial Cuba Bill of Sale for 4 Enslaved Creole and African Persons 1870

1870ref. 231221870. Slavery Cuba Spanish colonial slave sale manuscript recording the transfer of four enslaved individuals in Cuba in 1870. Produced within the official bureaucratic framework of Spanish colonial governance the document reflects the legal normalization of slavery in Cuba even as abolitionist pressures mounted across the Atlantic world. The document records the sale of four enslaved people described as "criollos" and African-born individuals situating the transaction within a labor system that combined locally born and imported enslaved populations. Created at a time when Spain had formally restricted the transatlantic slave trade but continued to permit slavery itself the manuscript demonstrates the persistence of legalized human commodification and the integration of enslaved labor into the island's economic structure sixteen years prior to abolition in 1886. Official Cuban slave contract documenting the sale of four enslaved individuals to Don Pedro Catasús by Don Enfemia Ochoa for the sum of 1100 pesos on November 29 1870. Single manuscript leaf written in Spanish cursive in black ink measuring 8.25" x 12". A green "50 cs de escudo" revenue stamp is affixed at the top center with a blind embossed Spanish crest at the upper left and a circular black ink government seal impressed at the lower left. Large vertical docketing appears on the verso. A stylized watermark is visible within the paper. The text organizes the enslaved individuals within a standardized transactional structure while the signatures of Enfemia Ochoa Pedro Catasús and A. Díaz de Rada authenticate the exchange and identify participants within the slaveholding economy. By 1870 Cuba remained a central node in the late Atlantic slave system with plantation agriculture especially sugar dependent on enslaved labor despite mounting abolitionist pressure. Although Spain had curtailed official slave imports earlier in the century illegal trafficking persisted into the 1860s and other coerced labor systems including the importation of Chinese indentured workers overlapped with slavery into the 1870s. The presence of both Creole and African individuals in this document reflects the layered composition of the enslaved population during this period. Light toning scattered foxing and edge wear visible. A closed wormhole extends from the upper right margin approximately five inches into the sheet resulting in partial loss of text. Evidence of prior tape reinforcement visible on the verso along with offsetting from previously adjacent material. Overall in very good condition. This document provides named transactional evidence of late-period slavery in Cuba offering concrete material for examining race labor and legal practice within Spanish colonial society. unknown books

Max Rambod Inc. · Estados UnidosUS$ 1.250,00≈ € 1.114,58

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