Mary Thomas

Mary Thomas, known as Queen Mary (c. 1848–1905), was one of the leaders of the 1878 "Fireburn" labor riot, or uprising, on the island of St. Croix in the Danish West Indies.

Biography Mary Thomas was from Antigua and arrived in St. Croix in the 1860s to take work on the plantations in the island. In 1878 she resided at the Sprat Hall plantation. Historians have suggested that such sentences were used by the authorities to discredit people who opposed them. Thomas played a leading role and referred to herself as a "captain" in the rebellion. Allegedly, during one the uprisings Thomas had called for those unwilling to participate to be decapitated.

Legacy Thomas obtained semi-mythical status in the Virgin Islands oral tradition, where a popular song commemorates her actions in the uprising:

The Queen Mary Highway on St. Croix is named after her.

In 2018, the artists Jeannette Ehlers and La Vaughn Belle created a monumental public sculpture, I Am Queen Mary, depicting a statue of Mary Thomas seated on a throne wielding a torch and a cane knife. The statue was unveiled in Copenhagen in 2018; it is Denmark's first public monument to a Black woman.

A book titled Fireburn The Screenplay: A story of passion ignited, based on the history of St. Croix written by Caribbean-American writer Angela Golden Bryan was published in 2018. The book pays tribute to Queen Mary and other leaders of the revolt.