This research examines the changes over time in British Newspaper reports covering the Jamaican rebellions of 1760, 1832 and 1865. The uprisings: Tacky’s Rebellion, the Baptist War and the Morant Bay Rebellion respectively, represented three key moments in the history of race, slavery and the British Empire. Though all three rebellions have been studied, this work compares the three events as moments of crisis challenging the British public discourse on slavery, race and subjecthood as it related to the changing Atlantic Empire. British newspapers provided the most direct way in which popular readers and the growing literate public examined and explored distant relations with colonial peoples. This research sheds light on the significant impact these rebellions had on rhetorical choices regarding race and slavery, and establishes that by forcing a public discourse on the topics of subjecthood and race, the rebellions in Jamaica had a dramatic trans-Atlantic impact.