History of the Caribbean

The Caribbean

The history of the Caribbean reveals the significant role the region played in the colonial struggles of the European powers between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. In the twentieth century the Caribbean was again important during World War II, in the decolonization wave in the post-war period, and in the tension between Communist Cuba and the United States (US). Genocide, slavery, immigration and rivalry between world powers have given Caribbean history an impact disproportionate to the size of this small region.

The Caribbean before European contact

The oldest evidence of humans in the Caribbean is in southern Trinidad at Banwari Trace where 7,000-year-old remains have been found. These pre-ceramic sites, which belong to the Archaic (pre-ceramic) age, have been termed Ortoroid. The earliest archaeological evidence of human settlement in Hispaniola dates to about 3600 BCE, but the reliability of these finds is questioned. Consistent dates of 3100 BCE appear in Cuba. The earliest dates in the Lesser Antilles are from 2000 BCE in Antigua. A lack of pre-ceramic sites in the Windward Islands and differences in technology suggest that these Archaic settlers may have Central American origins. Whether an Ortoiroid colonisation of the islands took place is uncertain, but there is little evidence of one.

Between 400 BCE and 200 BCE the first ceramic-using agriculturalists, the Saladoid culture, entered Trinidad from South America. They expanded up the Orinoco River to Trinidad, and then spread rapidly up the islands of the Caribbean. Some time after 250 CE another group, the Barrancoid entered Trinidad. The Barancoid society collapsed along the Orinoco around 650 and another group, the Arauquinoid, expanded into these areas and up the Caribbean chain. Around 1300 a new group, the Mayoid entered Trinidad and remained the dominant culture until Spanish settlement.

At the time of the European discovery of most of the islands of the Caribbean, three major Amerindian indigenous peoples lived on the islands: the Taíno in the Greater Antilles, The Bahamas and the Leeward Islands, the Island Caribs and Galibi in the Windward Islands and the Ciboney in western Cuba. The Taínos are subdivided into Classic Taínos, who occupied Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, Western Taínos, who occupied Cuba, Jamaica, and the Bahamian archipelago, and the Eastern Taínos, who occupied the Leeward Islands. Trinidad was inhabited by both Carib speaking and Arawak-speaking groups.

The colonial era

Christopher Columbus was the first European explorer to travel to the Americas, but soon afterward both Portuguese and Spanish ships began claiming territories in Central and South America. These colonies brought in gold, and other European powers, most specifically England, the Netherlands, and France, hoped to establish profitable colonies of their own. Colonial rivalries made the Caribbean a cockpit for European wars for centuries.

Spanish conquest

See also: Spanish colonization of the Americas

During the first voyage of the explorer Christopher Columbus (mandated by the Spanish crown to conquer) contact was made with the Lucayans in the Bahamas and the Taíno in Cuba and the northern coast of Hispaniola, and a few of the native people were taken back to Spain. Small amounts of gold were found in their personal ornaments and other objects such as masks and belts. The Spanish, who came seeking wealth, enslaved the native population and rapidly drove them to near-extinction. To supplement the Amerindian labour, the Spanish imported African slaves. Template:Seealso'''Although Spain claimed the entire Caribbean, they settled only the larger islands of Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Jamaica and Trinidad.

Other European powers

The other European powers established a presence in the Caribbean after the Spanish Empire declined, partly due to the reduced native population of the area from European diseases.

• Francis Drake was an English privateer who attacked many Spanish ships and forts in the Caribbean, including San Juan harbour in 1595. His most celebrated Caribbean exploit was the capture of the Spanish Silver Train at Nombre de Dios in March, 1573.

• British colonisation of Bermuda began in 1612. British West Indian colonisation began with St. Kitts in 1623 and Barbados in 1627. The former was used as a base for British colonisation of neighbouring Nevis, Antigua, Montserrat, Anguilla and Tortola; the latter used as a base for colonisation of the Windward Islands and the wider Caribbean area.

• French colonisation too began on St. Kitts, the British and the French splitting the island amongst themselves in 1625. It was used as a base to colonise the much larger Guadeloupe (1635) and Martinique (1635), but was lost completely to Britain in 1713.

• The English admiral William Penn seized Jamaica in 1655, and it remained under British rule for over 300 years.

• The Caribbean was known for pirates, especially between 1640 and 1680; see piracy in the Caribbean. The term "buccaneer" is often used to describe a pirate operating in this region.

• In 1697 the Spanish ceded the western third of Hispaniola (Haiti) to France. France also held control of Tortuga.

• The Dutch took over Saba, Saint Martin, Saint Eustatius, Curaçao, Bonaire, Aruba, Tobago, St. Croix, Tortola, Anegada, Virgin Gorda, Anguilla and a short time Porto Rico, together called the Dutch West Indies, in the seventeenth century.

• The Danish ruled first part, then all of the present U.S. Virgin Islands since 1672, selling sovereignty over these Danish West Indies in 1917 to the United States which still administers them.

Wars

The Caribbean region was war-torn throughout much of colonial history, but the wars were often based in Europe, with only minor battles fought in the Caribbean. Some wars, however, were borne of political turmoil in the Caribbean itself.

• Thirty Years' War between the Netherlands and Spain.
• The First, Second, and Third Anglo-Dutch Wars were battles for supremacy.
• Nine Years' War between the European powers.
• The War of Spanish Succession (European name) or Queen Anne's War (American name) spawned a generation of some of the most infamous pirates.
• The War of Jenkins' Ear (American name) or The War of Austrian Succession (European name) Spain and Britain fought over trade rights; Britain invaded Spanish Florida and attacked the citadel of Cartagena de las Indias in present-day Colombia.
• The Seven Years' War (European name) or French & Indian War (American name) was the first "world war" between France, her ally Spain, and Britain; France was defeated and was willing to give up all of Canada to keep a few highly profitable sugar-growing islands in the Caribbean. Britain seized Havana toward the end, and traded that single city for all of Florida at the Treaty of Paris in 1763.
• The American Revolution saw large British and French fleets battling in the Caribbean again. American independence was assured by French naval victories in the Caribbean.
• The French Revolution allowed for the creation of the Republic of Haiti.
• The Spanish-American War ended Spanish control of Cuba and Puerto Rico and heralded the period of American dominance of the islands.

Independence

Haiti, the former French colony of Saint-Domingue on Hispaniola was the first Caribbean nation to gain independence from European powers when in 1791, a slave rebellion that became Haitian Revolution under leadership of Toussaint l'Ouverture established Haiti as a free, black republic by 1804. Haiti became the world's oldest black republic, and the second-oldest republic in the Western Hemisphere, after the United States. The remaining two-thirds of Hispaniola were conquered by Haitian forces in 1821. In 1844, the newly-formed Dominican Republic declared its independence from Haiti.

Some Caribbean nations gained independence from European powers in the nineteenth century. Some smaller states are still dependencies of European powers today. Cuba remained a Spanish colony until the Spanish American War.

Between 1958 and 1962 most of the British-controlled Caribbean became the West Indies Federation before it separated into many separate nations.

Relations with the US

Since the Monroe Doctrine, the United States gained a major influence on most Caribbean nations. In the early part of the twentieth century this influence was extended by participation in The Banana Wars. Areas outside British or French control became known in Europe as "America's tropical empire".

Victory in the Spanish-American war and the signing of the Platt amendment in 1901 ensured that the United States would have the right to interfere in Cuban political and economic affairs, militarily if necessary. After the Cuban revolution of 1959 relations deteriorated rapidly leading to the Bay of Pigs venture, the Cuban Missile Crisis and successive US attempts to destabilise the island. The US invaded and occupied Hispaniola (present day Dominican Republic and Haiti) for 19 years (1915-34), subsequently dominating the Haitian economy through aid and loan repayments. The US invaded Haiti again in 1994 and in 2004 were accused by CARICOM of arranging a coup d'état to remove elected Haitian leader Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

In 1965, 23,000 US troops were sent to the Dominican Republic to quash a local uprising against military rule. President Lyndon Johnson had ordered the invasion to stem what he claimed to be a "Communist threat", however the mission appeared ambiguous and was roundly condemned throughout the hemisphere as a return to gunboat diplomacy. In 1983 the US invaded Grenada to remove populist left-wing leader Maurice Bishop. The US maintains a naval military base in Cuba at Guantanamo Bay. The base is one of five unified commands whose "area of responsibility" is Latin America and the Caribbean. The command is headquartered in a Miami, Florida office building.

See also

• History of Latin America

Sources and references

• Ferguson, James: Far From Paradise. Latin American Bureau, 1990. ISBN 0-906156-54-8 (Good first read, from Columbus to present. Concentrates on slavery, the colonial period, struggles for independence and the rise of US influence. Lots of references.)
• Rogozinsky, Jan: A Brief History of the Caribbean. Plume, 1999. ISBN 0-452-28193-8 (Thorough history of the Caribbean up to the end of the twentieth century.)

Further reading

• Kurlansky, Mark. 1992. A Continent of Islands: Searching for the Caribbean Destiny. Addison-Wesley Publishing.

External links

• Caribbean Geology & Tectonics
• Caribbean settlement in Britain