Slavery and Freedom in the German Colony of São Leopoldo in Brazil Empire

Abstract

The article analyzes African slavery among German immigrants established in the Colony of São Leopoldo in Empire Brazil. German immigrants also used slave labor, which contradicts part of the immigrant historiography that denies that Africans were used on their properties. The German immigrants from the south of Brazil, as soon as their economic conditions made it possible, adopted the same slave practices as the Portuguese-Brazilian society.
This behavior of the Brazilian elite, condemned in 19th century Europe and adopted by immigrants and their descendants, was not seen as problematic in colonial areas. Likewise, slaves used the current abolitionist laws to undertake their struggle for freedom and alleviate the bad conditions to which they were subjected in the slave regime, giving meaning and practical content to freedom before the abolition of Brazilian slavery in 1888.