Trinidad and the Empire

The Seas around us hold our destiny

From climatic conditions over naval decisions to the petrochemical industry: our fate was always intertwined with the oceans around us.

Who controlled the high seas during the colonial era was always of great significance to us in these islands. When Sir Winston Churchill in 1913 as First Lord of the Admiralty altered the British ocean-going fleet from coal furnaces to oil burners, the economic future of Trinidad was forever altered.

If Admiral Lord Nelson's flotilla had encountered the French battlefleet in an unfortunate manner in the Gulf of Paria in 1805, we may all be French-speaking today. Or, for that matter, had Admiral Apodaca attacked Admiral Sir Henry Harvy's squadron as they sailed through the Dragon's Mouth instead of burning his fleet in Chaguaramas Bay in 1797, Spanish might be spoken here.

The seas around us hold our destiny. A significant period in the history of Trinidad and Tobago occurred at a time when we were hardly mentioned on the maps and charts of the world. Spain and Portugal had been given the New World, the entire western hemisphere, by the pope of the day, oblivious to the fact that it was not his to give away in the first place. This was challenged by the non-Catholic princes of Europe, particularly England. At the source of the circumstances lay the proverbial root of it all: money.

Had circumstances gone in favour of Spain, the direction of history would have changed. In the wake of the discoverers Columbus, Vespucci and others, came the adventurers Cortes, Pizzaro and de Berrio, to name but a few. These were followed by the privateers, bandits and buccaneers, many of whom were English seamen like Morgan, Drake, Hawkins and Raleigh.

Spain was then an underpopulated, comparatively backward European country which had recently driven out its intelligentsia, that is, the Jews and the Arabs. She had become enormously wealthy by her new colonies in the New World. Out of the mines of Peru and Mexico came gold and silver. From the Gulf of Paria came pearls of great worth. Vast areas of the southern continent, as yet without names, yielded emeralds and rubies. The power of the Spanish empire was so fortified by these riches, that King Philip could equip his armies and his navy as no other power had done before.

This was well appreciated in the ruling circles of England. Recently Protestant under Henry VIII, Spain, a powerful Catholic neighbour, posed a threat to the island nation. So long as Spain controlled the wealth of the New World, she could launch and equip battlefleets against England.

To get a piece of the treasure from Americas, England therefore had to arrest it at its source or capture it from the Spanish ships on the high seas. England's economy in those years, the 1580s, was agricultural. She had to strengthen her finances. The virgin Queen Elizabeth I accordingly sanctioned a quantity of unofficial expeditions against Spanish interest in the west. This brought Sir Francis Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh into the Gulf of Paria. Raleigh burnt down Port of Spain, captured Trinidad's capital, St. Joseph, kidnapped the Spanish governor and took him up the Orinoco river in search of El Dorado and the City of Gold.

Sir Henry Morgan raided out of Jamaica the Spanish-held coastlines of Mexico. British privateers would lie in hiding in Tobago's Pirates Bay, so as to spot Spanish treasure fleets making for the Galleons Passage, the narrows between Trinidad and Tobago in order to capture treasure beyond their wildest fantasies.

Avoiding open war, these raids continued. However, they made no lasting impact on Spain. It was only John Hawkins who rebuilt the British navy and put into place the sound foundation that would make it master of the open sea in the coming 17th century.

Sir Winston Churchill, writing in his "History of the English-Speaking Peoples", remarks:

"The Spaniards had long contemplated an enterprise against England."

They knew that England stood in the way of their reconquest of the Netherlands. Spain commenced the building and the assembling of a fleet. These preparations were delayed for a year by Drake's famous raid on Cadiz in 1587. He wrote that he had "singed the King of Spain's beard". In May of the following year, the armada was ready. 136 ships were assembled, carrying 2,500 guns and more than 30,000 men; 20,000 of them soldiers. There were 20 galleons, 44 were merchantmen and 8 were Neapolitan galleys. These were the main ships.

The Spanish armada set out to sail up the channel with a view to land on the south coast of England. They were under the command of the Duke of Medina-Sidonia. Hawkins' redesign of Britain's fighting ships was about to be tested. In fact, the best that they could put against the Spaniards was a fleet of 34 ships of the line plus another 150 privately owned vessels.

The British stationed small squadrons all along the southern coast. In the meantime, an Atlantic storm that had been broiling for several days swept the Spanish fleet, dismantling two 1,000 ton ships.  The storm in passing through the channel, forced the British to put out to sea.

If the Spanish Duke had attacked the English vessels to leeward of his ships as they struggled to clear the land, he would have caught them at a disadvantage, but instead, he followed his orders and sailed up the channel. The English, however, just managed to get their fleet to the windward of the Spaniards and for nine days hung on to the Armada as it ran before a gusty westerly while pounding away with their long-range guns at the lumbering galleons.

On July 23, the wind dropped and both fleets lay drifting off Portland Bill. The Spaniards attempted a counter-attack with the Neapolitan galleys rowed by hundreds of slaves. Sir Francis Drake took advantage of light wind and swept in upon the main body, forcing them to give way "until they flocked together like sheep".

During the following night, the English launched ships full of dynamite to drift in the direction of the enemy, then set them alight, abandoning them as quickly as possible. Massive explosions shook the very air. The Spanish captains cut the cables that held their ships at anchor and made for the open sea. There were many collisions in the dark.

Over the following several hours, both winds and tide worked against them. Finally, the Spanish turned to face their pursuers. A long and desperate fight raged for eight hours. Ships lashed together as men fought it out hand to hand, sword to sword, musket to musket. Breaking free, their main van sailed northward with one thought in mind: home. This time, the westerly winds helped although they were wrecks. Then a shift came. They were forced to make for Ireland for fresh water - they had already cast their horses and mules overboard.

The English had not lost a single ship. A handful of men had given their lives. The Spaniards had lost half their fleet. The British struck a gold medal upon which was inscribed: "God blew and they were scattered". This victory over Spain was the shining achievement of the Elizabethan age. England had emerged as a first class sea power. She had resisted the might of the greatest empire since Roman times.

This, in fact, was a turning point in the history of the world. There were still many battles to fight against Spain, France and later against Germany, and many tribes and nations to conquer and overthrow to make the British Empire. But in the final analysis, it was England that won the wars. 

The Caribs fear the Horses

In the year of our Lord 1533, the Spanish establishment on the island, named for the Trinity, discovered by the Grand Admiral forty-five years ago, was comprised of just one pueblo at a place described by the naturals as Mucurapo.

It was a fortified camp and consisted of thirty-one houses with kitchens, stables, smithy and storehouses.

Before the attack in September of that year, it was protected by a singly stockade, but now a double wall was constructed of heavy balks of timber, filled between with earth. This wall was 180 paces each way, pierced with loop holes and flanked by bastions mounted with cannons from the ships. The strength of the last Indian attack had clearly left and indelible impression upon the Spaniards. Antonio de Herrera in his 'Historia General de Las Indias 1730' cited a report by Antonio Sedeño to His Most Catholic Majesty's Audencia at Madrid:

"Thus we waited on watch until four o'clock in the early morning of September 13th, 1533, as dawn was breaking upon the pueblo and before the guards were relieved or the rounds made, a great number of Indians, all clothed, swept down upon us, with loud cries contrary to their usual mode of attack.

They at once surrounded the pueblo on all sides and launched the attack with great courage and persistence as though they had been Turks, and in half-an-hour about 15—20 of our men had been wounded.

So many were the arrows that they covered the ground. As the horses were stabled in the middle of the pueblo, the Indians were not able to get at them through the defenses, but by shooting arrows high up they managed to wound five out of the eight before steps were taken to cover them. These horses were the principal reserve and would be urgently required later, as we felt certain that without them we should all be killed. We all agreed that if these horses were lost, that day or soon after, it would be necessary to abandon the Island with the loss of everything.

We then sent out the horses to resist and break up this furious attack. As soon as the first horseman was seen, the Indians began to shout loudly, 'Horses, Horses, Horses,' and to turn and fly. As the other horsemen followed and wounded and killed the Indians, they broke completely and fled to the hills, leaving on the battlefield many bows, arrows, shields and war clubs.  We killed about 30 Indians and captured three alive, from whom we learnt that many tribes had united to make this assault. They had agreed to take arms to kill the Spaniards and drive them out of the Island. If this attempt were not successful they had agreed to return again in eight days in still greater numbers to make the Island free of us.

This was sure to happen sooner or later and our men were depressed at this news, for the punishment inflicted by the horsemen was not sufficiently great. We searched the battlefield and collected our wounded, about 20 or more. Amongst these was the Teniente of Paria who had been one of the horsemen; his horse had been killed by two arrows tipped with poison, so that it died raving mad."

The tribal people generally referred to as Caribs were terrified of horses. The Spaniards with iron helmets and breast plates were recognisable as men, but horses, it would appear, touched some nerve, some primal fear. The second battle of Mucurapo lasted about an hour and  half, involved some 3,000 Caribs. It commenced in the pre-dawn hours. The warriors had moved silently across the Savannah and through the high forest of giant silk cotton trees. This attack was in response to one launched upon an Indian village by the Spaniards some months before when at the one in the morning they had fallen upon a sleeping village. The Indians had engaged in a desperate defense and refused to yield. The Spaniards set fire to the huts so as to bring out the men, the women and the children, and by the fierce light of their blazing homes, this bitter and unequal fight continued to the end.

Event he women and children submitted voluntarily to the flames rather than surrender. Many warriors died, a handful fled into the northern mountains. Of the Spaniards, ten had died "raving in madness' from the wounds of poisoned arrows. The Caribs took the fort by surprise and penetrated the stockade of the Spanish camp and were engaged in hand to hand fighting (K.S. Wise). It was only the timely action by the horsemen which saved the day for Spain.

It was now evident that the Carib people had gathered in strength and were not afraid to die for their Iere. Antonio Sedeño knew that the margin by which he and his men had survived was very narrow. Fourteen Spaniards had been killed, and only 30 men remained. All the horses had been wounded. There was great dissent in the camp at Mucurapo. Antonio de Herrera declared that this conquest of Trinidad was doomed to failure and that he intended to leave for the main land.

That night, the rations almost done, they received food from the cacique Maruana, leader of the south of the island. the Caribs, as well received fresh reinforcements and a large quantity of poisonous arrows. From the fort, their encampments could be seen dotting the forested areas of what is now Woodbrook and St. James. The campfires in the fort were piled high with logs and blazed brightly as the sun settled into the Dragon's Mouth, turning gold to red with the intensity of primeval volcanoes. Starving sentinels scanned the forest for a sign that could signal attack from the Caribs. The night grew inordinately still.

Sedeño had received news that no assistance nor supplies could be expected in Trinidad. Many men had deserted, preferring to risk the crossing to the main in rotting and unsafe pirogues than to face the poisoned arrows of the Caribs. Dissatisfaction and discouragement enhanced by the absence of adequate supplies of food had grown since March 1534 the rest of his men mutinied against Sedeño and demanded to be led away from Trinidad where only death and destruction awaited them. That night, he was arrested by his own men and removed to the mainland. The second battle of Mucurapo had been won by the Caribs.

(from "Chronicles of the Carib Wars", K.S. Wise)

Amerindian Names

Place names are points of memory in the fabric of West Indian lifestyle. Let us look at some of the names that come from the period long before the arrival of Columbus in the Caribbean Sea, from the years when Trinidad was settled only by the Amerindian people. The world being ‘brand new’ in those days, things received their names for the first time - some of them have survived.
The tribal people gave names to the rivers and plains, the mountains and capes. Some of these names are to be found in Venezuela as well, such as Tacarigua, which has a parallel in the Lago Tacarigua, or Cumana, which is found in two places on Trinidad’s North coast and also on the mainland. There is a Caroni river on this island and a mighty Caroni running through the jungles on the neighbouring continent. Other pre-Columbian names are Arouca and Caura, where the Capuchins had missions in the 17th century.
People spoke Spanish exclusively in these hamlets until quite recently. Siparia was the site of another mission, where tobacco was cultivated. Arima and Naparima, Toco and Tunapuna, Chaguanas and Chaguaramas, Piarco and Oropouche - all these are Amerindian names which survived. Port of Spain was once called Conquerabia, a name which disappeared early.
Corosal, Maraval and many other names ending in -al are very interesting, because in most cases the -al is the Spanish collective suffix, sometimes stuck onto an old Amerindian root. For example, a place rich in the palmtree called “corozo” by the Amerindians became “Corozal”. In Cocal, the name refers to an abundance of coconut trees. The story is that a ship was wrecked on this part of the east coast of Trinidad. Its cargo of nuts were washed ashore and took root. Maraval is described as a large track of land below Anapo. It was covered with maro trees.
This marriage of Spanish and Amerindian also happened in the other islands. Pouisal in Montserrat got its name from the abundance of poui trees, as did Morichal in the same island and in Trinidad as well, which refers to the moriche palms that grew there.
The Spanish settlers who came in the wake of Christopher Columbus named their estates after the distant places now left behind: El Socorro, Barataria, Aranjuez, El Dorado. When they marveled at the beauty of their new homes, they called the Vistabella and Buenos Ayres.
There is magic and beauty in these place names. They contain, like time capsules, messages from another age, when our country was still roamed by its original inhabitants.
They contain, like time capsules, messages from another age, when our country was young.

From the African languages, other words have survived like "zami" fi (meaning "friends"), and "susu", which we use when we become "partners", each contributing so much a week to a savings club. When gardeners went into their fields, they owuld take with them a calabash full of water, known long ago as a "paki", unsing te Ashanti work "apakyi". In parts of West Africa, it is the custom to name a child by the day of the week on which it was born, for example "cudjoe" is the the Ashanti word for Monday, "quashie" for Sunday, "quaco" for Wednesday, "cuffie" for Friday and so on.


In our search for African words that have survived, we have to turn to our floklore. Here we find fascinating evidence of African survivals: anansi, the central charater of many folk tales, is in fact the spider god of the Akan-Ashanti people. In Accra, Lagos and the northern regions of Nigeria, where the land falls away into a vast ocean of tawny-coloured sand, people know all about this Anasi, the spiderman who is weak but who overcomes the strong by guile in a way that the Greek hero Odysseus overcame the cyclop.
Nansi stories brough delight, but as a boy gowing up in belmont in the 1940s and 1950s, these were jumbies living in the "big canal", in Olton Road and at the corner of Reform Lane and Hermitage Road - a dangerous place after 9 o'clock!
Throughout the Caribbean, out the Caribbean region, chance word used in conversation, a game played at evening time, a song chanted to still a restless child, the names given to food and plants, link us with distant times and with men and women long dead. Cudjoe, Quashie, Paki, Zami, Senseh: words like these whisper of the past, revealing our history to us - but only to those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.

Centennial Impulses

 The emergence of a national society evolved in cycles of centuries.

“The turn of the century” is a phrase pregnant with a sense of the auspicious, the momentous. For Trinidad and Tobago, the turn of the 18th century and the turn of the 19th century did in fact mark turning points in the overall development of the two islands.

In the case of Trinidad, the end of the 1790s, 1797 to be exact, marked the close of 300 years of Spain’s dominion over this island. 300 years of studied neglect, in fact. Various points of view have been put forward as to why Trinidad ‘de Barlovento’, “to the windward”, was not developed by Spain. Some sources say that it was because the original inhabitants, the Caribs, were man-eaters. This is true, as it was commonly put about by the Caribs themselves that Spaniards tasted much better than the English or the Dutch. Other sources say that these warrior tribes were in the process of conquering the island at the same time when the first Europeans arrived. One of the results of this conquest of Trinidad by the Caribs was their eating of the Aruac men and the marrying of the Aruac women. The equally conquering Spaniards, however, didn’t plan to either eat nor marry any Amerindians, but to enslave the whole lot. Different strokes for different folks!

Another reason for Spain’s neglect of Trinidad may have been the island’s proximity to the Orinoco delta. This river system, one of the world’s largest, could take ships right into the upper reaches of the South American continent, to the Guyanas, to Venezuela, Columbia, almost to the Andes themselves. If Trinidad had been developed, with a busy port, infrastructure for ships, provisions and labour, the island might have become a stepping stone, a base camp, from which all sorts of expeditions up the Orinoco could have been launched. The Spanish Crown had good interest in avoiding that. History had taught them that the rumour of a “Golden Civilisation” on the level of Peru and Mexico existed upstream of the Orinoco. It had already brought English conquistadors like Sir Walter Raleigh in the 1590s to Trinidad. In search of the fabled El Dorado, he had burnt the port of Trinidad, which is where Port of Spain is today, taken the island’s capital, San Jose de Oruna, released the governor’s prisoners, the island’s principle caciques, taken the governor captive and sailed up the Orinoco in search of the gold of El Dorado. And all that Raleigh was acting on was a rumour! The fact that he ‘lost his head’ (literally) a couple of years later perhaps makes the point about acting on rumours...

For whatever reason, the island of Trinidad remained uncultivated and basically uncolonised. It was not, however, entirely neglected. Early on, it was discovered that rich beds of pearl-bearing oysters lay just offshore all along the Western coast, from the Naparimas in the south to Chaguaramas in the north. This was, in fact, our first “industry’ - pearl fishing. So many tribal people died in this work of diving for pearls that the Gulf of Paria was called by the Spaniards the Gulf of Tears. Capuchin missionaries came from Aragon in Spain to convert the natives who had not died as the result of European contact, or who had not been captured and sold into slavery. These, the remainder, they “pacified” by robbing them of their culture.

Tobago during this period was having a very different sort of experience. Quite contrary to Trinidad, Tobago was being settled and also hotly contested. The United Provinces, now the Netherlands, was seeking to break away from Spanish rule. One of their ways of doing this was to establish for themselves a viable economy. Tobago became an object of opportunity for the Dutch. By the early 1600s, they were on the island, cutting the forest, importing slaves from Africa, and building windmills - cutting edge economical reasoning and technology at the time!

But the Dutch were not alone. The Courlanders, one of Europe’s mini states, not much bigger than Tobago, had been given the Caribbean island by James of England. (Not that it was his to give in the first place.) The Courlanders were settling around Courland Bay, and the Dutch on the other side of the island, around what is now Scarborough. For a while, they were unaware of each other’s presence, but upon discovery, they promptly had it out.

Tobago was much fought over by European leading nations of the day during the centuries that followed. The Dutch, the French, the English delivered an appearing never-ending round of conquest and settlement.

Tobago acquired institutions that were out of the ordinary in other colonies of the time. A House of Assembly, for example, occupied by the white planter interest, was already in existence in Tobago, while Port of Spain had nothing much going on.

Tobago was laid out in parishes. By the mid-1780s, towns were planned and a forest reserve created. For a tropical island in that period that was quite advanced. It is interesting to note that just as Trinidad was coming out of its long 300-year Spanish slumber with the conquest of the island by the British in 1797, Tobago was just about to enter a twilight that was to last almost a century and a half.

With Trinidad, the 1780s on through the 1800s saw the most rapid development that could be imagined. This was the result of the French colonisation of this Spanish island. History has asked the question why after some 300 years of virtual abandonment did Spain suddenly allow a French creole from Grenada by the name of de St. Laurent create a population here? It has been put forward that because the Kings of Spain were now of French descent, they were more keen on the development of their territories. It has also been said that the Spanish government needed to develop the island because the British or some other European power might seize it and in so doing gain a foothold on the continent.

Be that as it may. The facts are that the French came to Trinidad in 1783, brought thousands of slaves and opened up the island and created an agricultural economy which was to last until independence. But more than that, they established a cultural frontier. The French “colons”, both of European extraction and the more locally assembled variety, set the tone for how Trinidad’s dominant cultural forms in music, festivals and song (calypso) were to take form.

The century from the 1800s to the 1900s was a French century in Trinidad, despite the fact that the island was a British colony. Perhaps with exception of the Indian immigrants of the second half of the 19th century, Frenchness touched everyone's life, black and white alike. After 1845, the coming of the East Indians, however, was of great significance. By virtue of their separate rural and agricultural lifestyle, they retained their religious, cultural and social moiré, without impacting on the overall body politic for perhaps the first century of their immigration. The Indianness of Trinidad can only be compared in the Caribbean with that of Guyana.

Without doubt, the century between 1800 and 1900 saw the foundation for Trinidadianness put into place, comprising several ethnicities and economies. Sugar, cocoa and oil have helped to make this place so unique amongst emerging nations.

From 1900 to 2000, Trinidad has developed significantly, building on and benefitting tremendously from the institutions that were established by the British colonial system: the judiciary, the police service, educational, health and infrastructural amenities.

In keeping with the various economies, Trinidad has undergone a remarkable degree of industrialisation. Similar to other emerging industrial nations in the first decades of the 20th century, local labour had to struggle hard to maintain its dignity vis-à-vis the colonial power. The same accounts for voter franchise and the distinctive freedom of speech, expression and behaviour that is so much our own.

Looking back over the close to 220 years since the Cedula of Population presents the student of history with an amazing landscape. Class, race, skin colour, caste, gender: all were combined to produce immensely complex and fascinating patterns of human relationships. Notwithstanding the relatively healthy state of the country’s economy at any point in time, its success was really only ever due to its people and the evolution of a national society.

Trinidad in the World View Part One

The Immortal 45

Our huge neighbour to the west, whose mountains we see on rainwashed days, a paler blue than the sky, is to too many Trinidadians an unknown entity. ‘Down the main’, to Venezuela, seems a far and distant journey.

Just over two hundred years ago, however, this island of ours was a province of that great country, whose history, sometimes dramatically linked with our own, has had an effect on world politics itself.

During the 1800s, just after Trinidad’s Spanish governor Chacon capitulated to the British, the Spanish and Portuguese possessions on the South American continent were divided into five gigantic areas of rule:

a) the vice royalty of New Spain, taking in modern Mexico and Central America, to which Trinidad belonged as an island province;

b) the vice royalty of New Spain, taking in modern Mexico and Central America, to which Trinidad belonged as an island province;

c) the vice royalty of Peru in the west;

the vice royalty of Peru in the west;

d) the vice royalty of La Plata in the south east and

the vice royalty of La Plata in the south east;

e) the Portuguese possession of Brazil.

These vast administrative areas were only very lightly imposed upon settlements and small cities in a vast land mass, covered by the largest forested area on the globe. They were isolated, lonely and sometimes abandoned; some were surrounded by snow-capped mountain ranges. Some of the largest river systems in the world created vast deltas, swamps bigger than the whole of England. The continent contained stone age people, some only recently discovered, as well as advanced civilisations who had mastered precessional astronomy.

The immensity of distances at a time when footpower, horsepower and sail were the only way to travel, can just barely be imagined. Also almost impossible to imagine was the immensity of the loot that was removed by the Spanish and Portuguese, the riches in gold, silver and precious stones that were taken away to Europe. But most awesome of all was the complete destruction of unknown civilisations and the complete subjugation of peoples, once their ruling elite had been destroyed.

With the conquest of the ancient cultures over and done with, there was at the very top a small ruling elite sent from Europe, headed up by a viceroy, his court, and a Spanish bureaucracy. The local ruling class was comprised of the colonial-born Spanish creoles. There were large local populations, Amerindian peoples, now christianised more or less, certainly downtrodden, a large slave population and a growing community of mixed people.

Apart from grievances against Spanish rule, this population was subjected to outside influences that contributed to revolution and overthrow of Spain’s colonial empire. The intellectual base for revolution had been put into place in the 18th century. The European Enlightenment affected the New World as well. The French Revolution (1789), its natural result, was much discussed by the wealthy, European-educated Spanish creoles and upper class mestizo families. The viceroys were perhaps a little more isolated in the old, elaborately decorated palaces of Caracas and Bogota. The French Revolution and the subsequent wars truly revealed the extent of the decline of Spain, a former power which had established a worldwide empire.

With the capture of Trinidad by the British in 1797 and following destruction of the Spanish fleet eight years later at Trafalgar, the Spanish creoles knew for sure that Spain could not contain their revolution movement. The catalyst for revolution in the South Americas was Napoleon Bonaparte. He deposed the Spanish Bourbon king and installed his brother Joseph on the throne of Spain. Uprisings in Spain occured; the French emissiaries who came with the news of the change of dynasty were rejected in Caracas. At first, the colonies rallied around the Bourbon monarchy and against the French ursurpers.

Once such a degree of independent action had taken place, it was now only a matter of who was going to take over the revolution. A man named Francisco de Miranda emerged, who had been born in Caracas in 1750. As a young man, he had been educated in Europe, and had taken in his dose of classical education and the Enlightenment. He had been closely connected to the secret societies which were very popular at the time. When he was incarcerated by the revolutionaries in Paris, he was able to take a library into prison. Miranda had previously commanded an army on the Rhine. He was a friend of the Russian poet Pushkin and an acquaintance of Prince Potemkin of Russia, and sometimes a lover of Catherina the Great.

He attempted revolution in 1806 in the South Americas from Washington, no doubt aided and abetted by the freshly hatched revolutions there. It failed. He immediately tried again. By that time, there were several juntas, comprising military strongmen and fiery speakers, whipping up support on all levels.

In Venezuela, the leadership of the junta was taken up by the most significant man of the time in Latin America, Simon Bolivar. Like Francisco de Miranda, Bolivar had been born in Caracas, he in 1783. Like Miranda, he had travelled in Europe, came from a wealthy patrician family, and felt keenly for his country. Liberty, egalitarianism, a profound sense of fraternity dominated Bolivar’s thoughts.

In 1810, Bolivar was in England, and so too was Miranda. They returned together. General Miranda assumed control of the forces. The country by that time had been somewhat pacified and the revolutionary forces faltered. There were counter revolutions; today, the turmoil in the country is hard to understand from the distance in time. In July 1812, Miranda capitulated to the Spanish powers. He was sized by Bolivar’s supporters, and later died in Spain.

Simon Bolivar found refuge in Haiti, where in Port-au-Prince he was supported by Toussaint L’Ouverture. Under Tousaint, the blacks had revolted in terrible wars of retribution. Toussaint’s revolution was already being challenged by the Emperor Bonaparte.

Roume de Saint Laurent, Trinidad’s coloniser, married Miriam Rochard, his coloured, Tobago-born sweetheart in the presence of Toussaint, with Tousaint’s brother as his witness. These were all men of the time.

Bolivar retuned to fight another day. He went to Cartagena, then to Bogota, and maintained the insurgency against the royalists.

Santiago Mereño came from a wealthy family who owned properties on the island of Margarita. He too was an educated young man, fired by revolutionary zeal. He was married to the daughter of Geraldine Carriage, also known as Sir Gerald Fitzpatrick Carry,the owner of Chacachacare.

In British-held Trinidad there were several revolutionary movements, some supported by Lt. Col. Picton. There were secret societies, whose membership contained freethinkers with ideas, framed by the Enlightenment and personal experiences that had been tempered in the revolution. Santiago Mereño’s charismatic personality drew these minds to him. Carry’s island became the training ground for a small force of would-be insurgents, intent on taking a guerilla war into Spanish-held Venezuela in the dry season of 1813. Central to the plot were a wealthy planter named Manuel Valdez, Jean Baptiste Bideau, Jean Besson, two of the Bermudez family, Pial, Armurio, Azure and a few others. They are described as the ‘Immortal 45’.

They sailed across the Grand Boca from Chacachacare in an assortment of craft ranging from pirogues to dinghis, seized the coastal town of Guairia and battled their way into Maturin. The raid of the ‘Immortal 45’ tipped the balance of power. Bolivar was delighted and recommenced the war. This was the second stage of the wars for the liberation of South America.

In 1813, Bolivar crossed the Andes with just a few hundred men. Elements of the ‘Immortal 45’ from Trinidad were also at his side. Bolivar entered Caracas in August of that year and rallied all patriotic people to his cause. Simon Bolivar’s hope that Venezuela would become part of a great confederation of United South American States is still to be realised, in the same way that a Federation of Caribbean States is still to many a hopeful ideal.

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