The Overly Candid Missionary Historian: C.G.A. Oldendorp’s Theological Ambivalence over Slavery in the Danish West Indies

This article examines the depictions of slavery and the Afro-Caribbean slave population in C.G.A. Oldendorp’s history of the Moravian mission to the Danish sugar islands S t T homas, S t John and S t Croix. Comparing the original manuscript with the heavily edited version authorized and published by the radical-pietistic Moravian church in 1777, it discusses Oldendorp’s theological and emotional ambivalences over the issue of slavery. S truggling to reconcile the socially conformist Moravian mission theology with his personal impressions from a voyage to the Caribbean in 1767–68 and close encounters with Afro-Caribbean Christian converts, Oldendorp presented an ambiguous critique of slavery. T he cuts, omissions and alterations to his manuscript made by the editor, Johann Jakob Bossart, point to significant tensions within the Moravian church over this issue in the 1760s–1770s.