Sugar Factory

THE SUGAR FACTORY

The habitation is the groundwork of the economy. It produce and transform the cane, the tobacco, the cotton,or coffee in order to sell the product on the metropolitan market. The cane represent the main production Caribbean, therefore the habitation is often a sugar factory

.

The extent of a habitation is: 180 hectares in Guadeloupe and about one hundred in Martinique. In 1742, Martinique count about 456 sugar factories.

The Habitation is a close space where the master reign. His family and the executives who surround him form: THE WHITE GROUP. The other group (the most important) entail black slaves who live and work in the habitation. The most are "

nègre de jardin ", there are too: "nègres de talent

" and to finish the commandant and domestics (cooker...) who receive some privileges. The master's home is high up to avoid noise, and domineer the slaves. One fabricate the sugar in the sugar factory,near the mill. The mill activeate rollers who permit to crush the cane. The "vesou" fall in a canal toward the sugar factory.

FUNCTION and CHARACTERISTICS of BUILDINGS

Differents buildings are:

a)The Mill

Slaves use mills to crush and squeeze out juice. There are four differents type of mills: water mill, windmill, animal mill and to finish steam mill. It is the same process for all the habitations: a pendulum is activated, give a movement of rotation to three cylinders who squeeze out cane's juice . The sugar cane juice, called "vesou" in Martinique was transferred to the boiling roomalng a channel hewn ot of stone "the cane juice channel" (the rapid oxydation of the "vesou" meant that he whole circuit had to be cleaned with ashes twice a day).

(Photos taken by Maithé)

b) The Furnace

In the 1èth century each cooper had its owne furnace. An improvement , called "the english system " dating from the beginning of the 18th century (about 1720), was composed of a single furnace, a heating tunnel under the coppers and a chimney to ensure the furnace drew well. Crushed sugar cane, called "bagasse", was used for fuel.

c) The Boiling Room

The "vesou" was boiled in four fixed coppers called the "crew". The syrup, which was ladled from one copper to the next , was purified ans stirred to aerate it throughhtout the boiling process, then cooled in the fight vat, called the "cooler".

d) The Ash box

Under the grate of the furnace, some of the ashes were usted to clean the cane juice channel.

e)The Curing house

Aftre the "cooler", the sugar was put into conicalshaped pots, called "moulds". The molasses dripped out thought a hole in the bottom. The moulds were placed on earthenware containers to collect the molasses and put to dry in the curing house, whose many windows meant that it was well-ventilated.

f)The Vinegar Factory

The moasse collected from the "moulds" was disilled to make "guildive", tafia, rum and "coco merlot", an industrial alcohol which was ancestor to our agricultural rum which is made from the pure "vesou".

g)The "Gragerie" or Cassava mill

The cassava root (manios is ths scientific name) was grated ("gragé" in creole) and the flour used to make cassava bread.

h)The "Case negre" alley (once worker's shacks)

Example of an Habitation