learning, like religion, was at a low ebb. The ordinary planters were content that their sons should receive the most rudimentary education. The richer sort were taught by tutors and then sent to the English schools, universities, or Inns of Court.1 The first printing press was set up in Jamaica in 1718. The Weekly Jamaica Courant is said to have been first published at Kingston in 1722,2 more than nine years before the first issue of the Barbados Gazette,3 if that date is correct. The varied climate and soil of Jamaica, stretching up from the sea to the high limestone ranges of the Blue Mountains, not only yielded a great variety of produce, but also enabled the planters to follow the pursuits of English country gentlemen. They rode, fished, and shot amidst their pastures, and indulged in sumptuous hospitality in which wine and brandy figured largely. Their houses were for the most part one-storied dwellings of wood, designed to withstand the frequent earthquakes and hurricanes. They were generally handsomely panelled with mahogany and furnished with a "piazza" for coolness. But the churches were little better than decent houses with small cupolas. Negroes of both sexes were allowed to go naked, except in the towns.4 The destruction of Port Royal by earthquake and fire had occasioned the rise of Kingston. As the headquarters of the West Indian squadron, its importance and riches were enhanced by the wars of the eighteenth century. As a depôt for the slave trade it was affected by the Asiento agreement of 1713; but it reaped a rich harvest as the port of the logwood-cutters of Honduras and Yucatan and of the Spanish-American trade, valued at one and a half millions a year at the beginning of the eighteenth century.5 For after the Treaty of Utrecht Jamaica became the emporium of the illegal trade by which the Spanish colonies were supplied with British goods. The Asiento ship, which by a series of tricks managed to carry to Porto Bello more goods than half a dozen galleons, always touched at Jamaica. But this profitable trade declined after the middle of the century, when the restrictions upon their colonies were relaxed by the court of Madrid. In 1730-to take a half-way date-exports of sugar, rum and ginger from Jamaica to Great Britain alone were valued at £362,000, apart from minor produce such as cotton, fustick, indigo, pimento, ebony, and lignum vitae. The island possessed 200,000 head of cattle and 400 sugar works, valued at £1000 each. Some of this great wealth was spent in Spanish Town, on the opposite side of the harbour to Kingston. Here the rich planters and merchants had town houses, and attended balls, assemblies and concerts. There was a play-house, 1 C.O. 28, 42; Pitman, p. 24; Leslie, pp. 28 seqq.; Long, 1, 438. 2 Isaiah, Thomas, History of Printing; Cundall, Frank, Press and Printers of Jamaica, etc. 3 Schomburgk, p. 124. Leslie, pp. 28 seqq. Edwards, I, p. 292. A Voyage to S. America, 1735, by Don Juan and Don Antonio de Ulloa, 1, 107. Cf. Hotblack, Kate, Chatham's Colonial Policy, p. 5. 7 C.O. 137, 18, f. 102. REVOLT OF THE MAROONS 383 and the streets were crowded with chariots and coaches. The Jamaicans, too, had their own imitation of "The Wells" at Bath, where they indulged in dancing, music, and card-playing in the intervals of taking the waters.1 It was unhappily almost inevitable that, as the proportion of blacks increased, the planters should become not less but more oppressive, and too often brutal towards their slaves. Fears of insurrection, sometimes justified, sometimes exaggerated, here as on the continent led to cruel legislation, and prompted opposition to all attempts by Wesleyan or Moravian missionaries to educate the negroes and convert them to Christianity, lest a common language and religion should enable them to unite.2 The natural result was a long series of revolts by runaway slaves. To these, in Jamaica, was added the horror of the Maroons. The Maroons were descendants of slaves of the Spaniards who took refuge in the mountains when the English captured the island. Their chief resort was among the Blue Mountains, where they lived in a state of savagery, hunting and raiding neighbouring plantations. Runaway slaves, too, had formed large settlements in the fertile valleys of the midland districts. Both found a skilful leader in the negro Cudjoe, under whom they began to offer an organised resistance. Patrols of planters met with ignominious reverses. Fortified posts, garrisoned with trained whites and free negroes and dogs for watching and tracking, were then established near the rebels' hunting grounds. A few years before, in spite of Governor Hunter's warnings, the Jamaicans had been petitioning for the removal of the two companies of regular soldiers which they described as a standing army. But the very dangerous situation was now saved only by the arrival of two regiments from Gibraltar (1731).3 Later, a couple of hundred Indians, proficient in bush fighting, were brought from the Moskito coast. Nanny, the chief town of the Maroons, was at length captured and destroyed (1734). Four years later Cudjoe was compelled to accept the terms offered by Governor Trelawney. The Maroons were guaranteed their freedom on condition of rendering aid against foreign invasions and insurrections of slaves. They were restricted to definite reserves of land. The last terrible Maroon war in 1795 was the perhaps inevitable result of thus segregating them in settlements isolated from all civilising influences. The Indians of the Moskito coast, which extended from Cape Honduras to St John's River, had always maintained their allegiance to Great Britain. A garrison and a civil officer under the government 1 Leslie, pp. 28 seqq.; Neish, G. F., in Journal of Institute of Jamaica, 1895. 2 Debates on the Slave trade, 1806, p. 13; Report of Committee of Privy Council on the Slave trade; Buchner, J. H., The Moravians in Jamaica; Edwards, 1, 487-95. 3 C.O. 137, 19. Ibid. 18-25; Dallas, R. C., History of the Maroons; Pitman, pp. 114 seqq.; Edwards, 1, Sloane, Sir Hans, Voyage to Jamaica, etc. p. 76. 522-35. of Jamaica were established there between 1741 and 1749. The three British settlements of Black River, Cape Gracias à Dios and Blewfields boasted 1400 inhabitants in 1770, 206 of whom were whites. Besides exporting considerable quantities of mahogany, sarsaparilla, cocoa and tortoiseshell, Black River served as a refuge for the logwood-cutters driven from the Bay of Honduras in 1730. It also offered a valuable starting point for trade with the neighbouring Spaniards, or for attacking their settlements by way of Lake Nicaragua.1 Whilst Barbados and the Leeward Islands turned almost wholly to sugar planting, the soil of the Bermudas proved suitable only for raising vegetables. These the inhabitants exported in the sloops they built, serving also as carriers between the West Indies and the continent, raking and carrying salt for the Newfoundland and New England fisheries, "fishing" for wrecks, and sometimes turning privateers or pirates. But the principal "nest" of pirates was in the Bahamas. For some time after 1713 the coasts of North America were infested by them. They met with no little secret support in Pennsylvania, Carolina, and Virginia. But two expeditions, one from Carolina and one from Virginia, which resulted after desperate fighting in the capture of Bonnet and Thatch in 1718, put an end to their activities there.2 In spite of their strategic importance, the Bahamas, left derelict by the lords proprietors, were allowed to be so reduced by Spanish raids that only twelve scattered families remained there in 1716.3 In 1718 Captain Woodes Rogers, the famous seaman and adventurer, was sent to drive out the pirates and to resettle the Islands. New colonists were introduced, including some Germans from the Palatinate, and constitutional government was established in due course.5 In Newfoundland, Placentia on being surrendered by the French was placed under a military governor. The need for a civil governor was increasingly felt. The system by which the master of the first vessel to arrive at any fishing ground acted as "fishing admiral” and sole dispenser of justice until the coming of the commodore of the convoy had definitely broken down. When the fishing season was over, the few inhabitants who remained for the winter relapsed into a state of semi-barbarism. From 1728 onwards, therefore, the convoy captains were appointed as governors. But they could, of course, only act during their brief summer visits with the fishing fleets. The first such governor commissioned resident justices who could act in his absence. Courts of law were presently instituted. The permanent 1 Edwards, V, 202 seqq. See McLeish, J., "British Activities in Yucatan and on the Moskito Shore", an unpublished thesis in the Library of the University of London. 2 N.C. Col. Rec. 11. 3 Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1716, no. 108. See Rogers, Woodes, A Cruising Voyage round the World, ed. Mainwaring, G. E., Introduction. 6 5 C.O. 37, 10 seqq. Reports by Commodores and Lt.-Gov. Moody, Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1715, passim, and 1716, no. 70, i, etc. THE AMERICAN COLONIES 385 population, largely recruited from Irish Roman Catholics and convicts, now began to grow rapidly, rising from 1800 to 2400 during this period.1 After the Peace of Utrecht, British territory on the continent reached from Hudson Bay to Savannah. From a coast line roughly 1000 miles long, it extended 100 miles inland. To the hinterland an indefinite claim was laid. The accession of George I was welcomed in the Plantations as a guarantee of the continuance of their political and religious liberties.2 The Jacobite minorities, whether in Barbados or New York, could not challenge the fait accompli, and the colonies settled down to enjoy an era of comparative political calm and rapid economic development. All the political questions which were to cause the disruption of the Empire after the Peace of Paris, had been raised after the Peace of Utrecht. Already the West Indies had demanded that the importation of foreign sugar into the northern Plantations of the continent should be prohibited; already enquiries were afoot as to how the colonies could be made to pay the cost of their governments and a standing army. But as yet the threat of the French had not been removed from America, and at home there was urgent need of political calm. 3 The risings of the 'Fifteen and 'Forty-five confirmed Newcastle and Walpole in their attitude of not interfering more than could be helped in colonial affairs. Gradually the opposite policy, for which the Board of Trade and Plantations stood, was shelved. That policy aimed at stricter control over the trade and development of the colonies, and the establishment of a homogeneous system of administration by converting all proprietary and chartered governments into Royal Provinces, governed directly by the Crown. Between 1700 and 1720 seven bills for the resumption of the charters were introduced into the House of Commons. They were rejected. The charters of Carolina and New Jersey were subsequently resumed, but those of Connecticut and Rhode Island, of Massachusetts Bay, Pennsylvania and Maryland were allowed to stand. Maryland provided an early instance of the new policy. There the new Lord Baltimore was allowed to resume proprietary government, from which, as a Catholic, his grandfather had been suspended.5 William Penn died without signing the surrender of his proprietorship of Pennsylvania (1718). His successors passed into the position of absentee landlords without his prestige, and of governors acting through deputy-governors. Proprietary government in South Carolina had proved incompetent, arbitrary and unpopular. To help them in the devastating war with the Yamassee Indians which broke out in 1715, the 1 C.O. 194, 5 seqq., and 195, 6 seqq.; Prowse, Hist. of Newfoundland; Rogers, J. D., Hist. Geog. of Brit. Col., Newfoundland. 2 Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1714-15, p. v. CHBE I 3 Ibid. 1712-14, pp. vi, vii. 5 Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1714-15, pp. xv, xvi. 25 Carolinians appealed for aid to the lords proprietors and the other colonies, and to the Crown to take them under its protection. The proprietors refused to surrender their charter, but confessed that they could render no effective aid.1 The majority of the settlers were AngloIrish dissenters. They were equally disgusted by the neglect of the proprietors and their Anglican policy, by their exercise of the prerogative in disallowing their laws and by their interference with the distribution of the lands of the conquered Yamassees. A threatened invasion by the Spaniards in 1719 brought matters to a head. The governor was obliged to call out the militia. They marched upon Charleston. An Assembly was elected, styled itself a convention, and again appealed to the King. Clearly the proprietors had failed to defend the country and preserve order. The veteran, Sir Francis Nicholson, was appointed by the Crown to carry on the government. The surrender of the charter was completed in 1729, a strip of North Carolina being reserved for Lord Carteret, who refused to part with his share of the soil. Alarmed by the repeated representations of the Board of Trade in favour of resuming the charters, notably in 1721,2 and its success in the case of South Carolina, Massachusetts presented to the King an address for the continuance of its privileges. It was supported by its colony's agent, Jeremiah Dummer, in his Defence of the New England Charters. That pamphlet closed a discussion which had been active for a generation and which was not seriously reopened for another forty years. 3 In direct conflict with the ideal of stricter control steadily urged by the Council of Trade, stood the ideal of the colonies. In royal and chartered governments alike that ideal was almost complete independence after the Connecticut model. There, and in Rhode Island, the executive and legislature were appointed by the voters. They chose their own governors, carried on illegal trade with impunity, and had no correspondence with the Government at home, except when they stood in need of assistance from the Crown.4 Deep devotion to the Crown was expressed in all addresses. But certainly, even at this early period, a strong current of feeling for independence was running in the colonies, or at least a desire to manage their own affairs in a way which involved disowning the sovereignty of the Crown. It was so interpreted not only by the Board of Trade and the Privy Council, but by governors of such different characters as Hunter and Clarke of New York, Belcher of New England, and Lord Archibald Hamilton of Jamaica, and by independent observers on both sides of the Atlantic. It was, indeed, 1 Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1714-15, nos. 517, 524; N.C. Col. Rec. 11, 191 seqq. 2 N.Y. Col. Docs. v, 591. * Cf. Osgood, H. L., Amer. Col. in the Eighteenth Century, п, 294-9. 4 C.O. 5, 752, no. 45; 5, 1294, p. 27. Cal. St. Pap. Col. 1711-12, pp. 103, 104; C.O. 5, 752, nos. 44, ii, iv, 45; 5, 898, no. 84. |