Growth in Afro‐Caribbean slave populations

Height data for African slave populations in Trinidad, Guyana and other British Caribbean colonies in the early nineteenth century are analyzed and compared with Cuban and United States slave populations. Slaves born in Trinidad and Cuba achieved final heights greater than their African‐born parents, but those born in Guyana were shorter. Afro‐Caribbean slaves living in sugar‐producing colonies showed inferior growth compared to those living in colonies based on less arduous forms of economic activity, such as the Bahamas and Bermuda. The latter groups achieved heights similar to those of the United States slaves. Menarche occurred in the United States about 2 years earlier than in Trinidad. These differences in growth cannot be explained adequately by genetic variations in growth potential or by heterosis, but were a result of differences in nutrition, infection and work regime. Superior growth was associated with high rates of natural increase, whereas apparent stature reduction occurred in slave populations subject to the heaviest mortality. Modern Afro‐Caribbean adult populations are about 10 cm taller than their genitor slave populations.