H.M.S. Romany arrives in Havana to take on a load of freed slaves, carrying a regiment of black soldiers. In a tense standoff, Cuban authorities refuse to allow these men to land in Havana, and the British refuse to withdraw the vessel. After over a year, the Spanish government grudgingly gives ground. In the British West Indies, colonial assemblies dismantle the system of apprenticeship that has replaced slavery. Laws against vagrancy and squatting attempt to keep the social and labor system of the plantation economy intact, with varying results.
Spanish officials demand the return of the assassins and mutineers.
Nicholas Trist is dismissed as U.S. Consul in Havana, amid allegations he connived at the illegal sale of U.S. vessels to Spanish slave traders. Slavery abolished in Brazil, ending slavery in the Americas.