Burn 2012

In 1844, Sir William Walker (agent provocateur) was dispatched by the British Admiralty to Queimada, a Portuguese colony in the Lesser Antilles, with a singular mission: to orchestrate an uprising among enslaved Africans against the Portuguese regime and pave the way for the Antilles Royal Sugar Company to exploit the island’s economic potential. The British government sought to replace the Portuguese regime with a puppet administration controlled by white planters subservient to their interests.

Upon his arrival in Queimada, Walker formed a connection with José Dolores, a charismatic figure he persuaded to lead the rebellion against the Portuguese authorities. Through cunning manipulation, Walker induced influential landowners to reject Portuguese rule and backed Dolores’s successful insurrection. In the aftermath of this victory, Walker orchestrated the assassination of the Portuguese governor during a nighttime coup, establishing a regime beholden to the Antilles Company, led by Teddy Sanchez, an idealistic but ineffectual revolutionary.

As his mission accomplished, Walker departed Queimada, only to return in 1848 at the behest of the Admiralty and the Antilles Company. This time, he was tasked with quelling the growing rebellion on the island, which had been sparked by Dolores’s disillusionment with the new regime’s collaboration with the company. After six years of turmoil, Walker was summoned back to Queimada in 1854, determined to crush the uprising and restore order. However, his efforts were met with resistance from President Sanchez, who refused to cooperate with Walker’s plans.

The situation escalated, leading to a coup engineered by Walker, which resulted in Sanchez’s ousting and execution. Walker then established a regime completely subservient to the Antilles Company, inviting British forces to intervene and quell the rebellion. With Dolores captured, Walker attempted to save his former ally from certain doom, but was rebuffed when Dolores refused Walker’s assistance, insisting that freedom must be earned through struggle.

In the end, Dolores met his demise at the hands of the government, executed by hanging. As Walker prepared to depart Queimada once more, he was confronted by a man who mirrored the individual who had first welcomed him to the island years earlier. In a poignant moment, this figure stabbed Walker to death as he lay surrounded by the accusatory gazes of the poor people in the port, haunted by the memories of his own culpability in perpetuating the cycle of exploitation and oppression.