New insight into the lives of Caribbean labourers in Panama

Documents held at the National Archives, which chart the lives of West Indian labourers in Panama over 100 years ago, were added last week to the UNESCO Memory of the World Register. The National Archives submitted the documentary heritage to UNESCO in collaboration with archives, museums and libraries in Barbados, Jamaica, Panama, Saint Lucia and the USA.

The records, which date from the 1900s to 1930, chronicle the mass movement of over 100,000 West Indians to Panama as a result of the recruitment process launched by the American Isthmian Canal Commission in order to recruit labourers to work on the Canal project. The migration of these West Indians to Panama is one of the most significant movements of voluntary migration to emerge during the post emancipation period after 1838. Most of them never returned.

The British colonial government in particular sought to control their migration, which risked eroding the power of the British Empire. The documents include reports and correspondence between officials in the British Colonial and Foreign Offices and British West Indian governors and representatives, such as British consuls in Panama. As well as documenting official reactions to this mass migration, they also provide insights into the daily lives and working conditions of the West Indians in Panama, their cultural contributions and influence, the social impact of their migration and the continued contacts which they maintained with their families. Other documents chart their political agitations for better working conditions and provide information about West Indians recruited into the British West Indian Regiment during the First World War.

Guy Grannum, Discovery Product Manager at the National Archives, said:

'It is a real stamp of approval that our records relating to the West Indian experience in Panama are acknowledged in this way. They are vital to the collective Memory of the World, demonstrating the value and importance of archives for preserving the history, heritage and experience of people and their families'.

The UK Memory of the World National Register was launched by the UNESCO UK National Commission in 2010. It is an online catalogue created to help promote the UK’s documentary heritage as part of a UNESCO programme to support and raise awareness of archives.