Prize court politics and regional ordering in the Caribbean.

This article examines Caribbean prize courts around the turn of the nineteenth century, focusing on their daily operations, intercolonial relationships, and roles within wider trans-imperial networks in a volatile maritime region. Prize courts, which adjudicated the legality of captured vessels, goods, and enslaved people during wartime, functioned both as instruments of imperial legal order and as sites where local actors—merchants, plantation owners, and officials—could exploit, resist, or circumvent official regulations. The article highlights how knowledge about these courts circulated through informal regional networks, including newspapers and private correspondence, facilitating practices such as court shopping and smuggling across imperial boundaries. It also discusses the courts' involvement in enforcing abolitionist policies while simultaneously enabling illicit trade and the auctioning of so-called "prize slaves," illustrating the complex interplay between imperial authority and local interests. Overall, Caribbean prize courts served as key nodes in maritime legal regimes that both shaped and reflected the contested and negotiated nature of imperial and regional order in the colonial Caribbean.