Monk Lewis also had cause to complain about a ‘Petticoat Rebellion’, when the women labourers on his estate downed tools and ‘one and all refused to carry away the trash … without the slightest pretence’. The mill was shut down for several days, yet the women stubbornly refused to go back to work. When the driver attempted to persuade them, ‘a fierce young devil of a Miss Whaunica flew at his throat and endeavoured to strangle him’.

Stella Dadzie, A Kick in the Belly- Women,…, loc. 288