Madras in Focus: Rebecca's Dolls

In 1786 an enslaved woman named Rebecca Snagg was partially freed by her enslaver, an Englishwoman named Maria Ahmuty. After only two years in Grenada, Maria had been widowed and was returning to England, leaving Rebecca to work out the remainder of what her freedom cost. Over the next thirty years the two women kept up a correspondence.

One of Rebecca's letters and a set of three dolls, believed to have been made by Rebecca, were preserved by the Ahmuty family in England. The dolls are dressed in exquisitely made ensembles in the style fashionable in Grenada in the late 1700s, complete with miniature Madras headwraps. Precious and unique, these dolls are a powerful expression of the intersection between Madras and African Caribbean fashion history.