A Brief History of Jamaica

One of the popular theories as to why the dinosaurs disappeared from the planet is the impact of a large meteor on the spinning dirt ball we call Earth. That impact was such a large explosion and produced such a large quantity of debris, the atmosphere of earth was covered with a blanket of dust. This blanket of dust completely hid the sun from the vegetation and lingered for many years. Without sunlight, vegetation would not grow and the dinosaurs died off from starvation. No sun, no vegetation, no dinosaurs. Those who embrace this theory also feel that the exact location where the collision took place is now the Gulf of Mexico, and the impact cut the land into it's highly circular shape as water rushed in to form the gulf itself. This impact occurred in the same neighborhood as the Caribbean islands and, millions of years later, another impact occurred - a swarm of humans who made this part of the world the center of world trade. And again, the peaceful inhabitants who lived there died off.

Geologically, the Caribbean nations are hilly islands formed by volcanoes over a period of 25 million years. They are all peaks of submerged mountains, most of them extinct volcanoes, rising from a submarine plateau.  The British West Indies is the common name given to several island groups that were formerly Brisith colonies.  Among them are Monserrat, Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, the Turks and Caicos Islands and the focus of this brief history, Jamaica.  The group of larger islands are also referred to as the Greater Antillies - Cuba, Hispaniola (Haiti and Dominican Republic), Jamaica, and Puerto Rico.  The Lesser Antillies are the smaller islands south of Puerto Rico and west along the Venezuelan coast.

The first inhabitants of the Caribbean islands were the Ciboney Indians some 1,500 to 3,000 years ago depending on which anthropologist you believe.  These Indians were nomads living off fish and vegetation.  In Jamaica, around 200 AD, the Arawak Indians arrived and stayed until the 15th century.  The Carib Indians were last to arrive and all of these Indian tribes arrived from South America.  Another Indian culture referred to as the Taino Indians seems to be a broad classification for the indigenous Indian cultures of the Caribbean, Florida and even parts of New Jersey.  In any case, when Christopher Colombus sighted "the Fairest of them all" in 1494, he named the island Santiago while claiming the island as the property of Spain.   The Arawak Indians were the peaceful aboriginal people who greeted him and they called their home Xaymaca - "land of wood and water". 

For most of Europe, and indeed the rest of the world, the new world was the Caribbean. One needs only to look at the detail of most world maps to see how true this was. The map below was published in 1544 and you can see that the center of the new world is the Caribbean, with Cuba being labeled specifically. North America was considered to be just a long sliver of land of no real significance.

The island of Jamaica remained under Spanish rule until the mid-1600's when Oliver Cromwell decided that the proprietorship of the Caribbean trading center should be dominated by Britain.  Few decisions in western history have had equal impact. In 1655 British war ships fired a handful of canon balls at the island and the Spanish surrendered that day. By then, Spain wasn't as interested in becoming the huge collection of properties that Britain was becoming. Also the Spanish guardians of Jamaica weren't too keen to try and fight off to try and fight off the world's most formidable naval power.

The Caribbean was the center of trade for the new world and by most accounts the most influential world center of trade for the forseeable future.   Alcohol, tobacco, sugar and slaves were things one went to Jamaica to buy and sell.  Just after the "battle" where England took Jamaica from Spain, the Spanish, realizing that all was lost, released the slaves.  Those slaves took refuge in the mountains of Jamaica and later were referred to as Maroons.   They were never taken back into slavery and, for hundreds of years were at odds with the ruling British government.

And whenever huge wealth is concentrated in one place there are those who are inclined to simply take what they can get away with.  Jamaica was a well known center for pirate activity along with ordinary trade.  The area that is now Kingston harbor was the home and hangout for a number of infamous pirates and earned the reputation for being one of the wickedest places on earth.  Many historians believe that this gentleman, Captain Henry Morgan was part of the British fleet that helped take Jamaica away from Spain.  Later in his career, he was taken to England in chains but he returned as deputy governor of Jamaica in 1674 after he forked over a large part of the booty he took when trying to capture Panama some years before.  By the way, before he was sent back to Jamaica England's King Charles II, the Merry Monarch, knighted him.

For Britain to maintain its dominance over Jamaica and the rest of its foreign properties, once again the British rulers were required to encourage it's citizens to go off and fight a different sort of battle.  This time it wasn't war in the traditional sense but a more sophisticated economic war.  For hundreds of years, British citizens were lured off to foreign lands to start businesses, seek wealth, but more importantly to help make British influence in these conquered lands more permanent.

Today, since the US trade embargo against Cuba, many things that Cuba was well know for have migrated to Jamaica.  In particular tourism, sugar and cigars.  Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee has always been very well known and continues to be the most expensive coffee one can buy anywhere.

For anyone doing genealogical research, I have created this Jamaican Parish Reference.

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