Issues settled by bullet: what two crimes can reveal about the worlds of work

Abstract

Looking at the similarities between two crimes that happened in the province of Bahia, Brazil, in 1889, this article aims, through its turning points, to discuss the complex and multiethnic worlds of work in a Brazil recently purged from slavery. This is done by focusing on the role of workers in search of what they believed to be their right, guided by a kind of sense of justice apart from the judicial institution itself. Thus, we seek to contribute to a historiography interested in unveiling the daily lives of workers and their relations with capitalists who, in the case of this article, were represented by British bosses. It shows that some of the foreigners who ventured into Brazil came across workers who sought to live their freedom and were not always willing to ignore certain excesses from their bosses. The main documents used for such a discussion are the lawsuits generated from the respective crimes, aided by a wide range of documents that supports the debate, such as correspondence that was sent to Secretaries of the province of Bahia’s government and to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in the UK.