The Berbice Slave Uprising was a slave revolt in Guyana

Guyana

Guyana , officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, previously the colony of British Guiana, is a sovereign state on the northern coast of South America that is culturally part of the Anglophone Caribbean. Guyana was a former colony of the Dutch and of the British...

. It began in February 1763 and lasted into 1764.

The uprising began on Plantation Magdalenenberg on the Canje River

Canje River

The Canje River, located in northeastern Guyana, is the main tributary of the Berbice River. It runs roughly parallel to the Atlantic Ocean coast....

 in Berbice

Berbice

Berbice is a region along the Berbice River in Guyana, which was between 1627 and 1815 a colony of the Netherlands. After having been ceded to the United Kingdom in the latter year, it was merged with Essequibo and Demerara to form the colony of British Guiana in 1831...

. The slaves rebelled, protesting harsh and inhumane treatment, and took control of the region. As plantation after plantation fell to the slaves, the European population fled. Eventually only about half of the whites who had lived in the colony remained.

Led by Cuffy

Cuffy (person)

Cuffy, or Kofi , was an Akan person who was captured in his native West Africa and sold into slavery to work in the plantations of the Dutch colony of Berbice in present-day Guyana. He became famous because in 1763 he led a revolt of more than 2,500 slaves against the colony regime...

 (now the national hero of Guyana), the rebels came to number about 3,000 and threatened European control over the Guianas

The Guianas

The Guyanas or the Guianas refers to a region in north-eastern South America which includes the following three territories:* French Guiana, an overseas department of France;...

. The insurgents were defeated with the assistance of troops from neighboring French and British colonies and from Europe.