ABSTRACT
This chapter describes two cases which demonstrate the legal significance of recaptives’ resistance: the Activo and the Perpetuo Defensor. It provides the legal discussion of recaptivity in its broader factual context, arguing that recaptivity was precarious in fact and law. The chapter focuses on the law’s preoccupation with intervention, rather than enslavement and shows how this focus excluded certain categories of enslaved Africans from the law’s largesse. It explores the cases of the Activo and Perpetuo Defensor, cases in which recaptives effectively liberated themselves, achieving de facto, albeit not formal emancipation. Far from representing a smooth legal transition from capture to liberation, the seizure of slave ships impelled recaptives into an uncertain factual and legal terrain. For one thing, recaptivity was physically and psychologically hazardous. For another, it did not necessarily augur emancipation. The chapter concludes with some brief reflections on how recaptives’ resistance might be written into international legal histories as a result.
