History of the United States Virgin Islands
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The United States Virgin Islands, often abbreviated USVI, is a group of islands and cays in the Caribbean to the east of Puerto Rico. Consisting of four larger islands (Saint Croix, Saint John, Saint Thomas, and Water Island) plus fifty smaller islets and cays, it covers approximately 133 square miles. Like many of its Caribbean neighbors, its history includes native Amerindian cultures, European exploration and exploitation, and slavery.
Overview
Early inhabitants of the Virgin Islands included the Ciboney, Arawak and Carib ethnic groups.
The first documented Europeans to visit the islands arrived with Christopher Columbus. The islands were occupied by several nations over the next century, including England, Holland, France, and Denmark. In 1733, the Danish West India Company purchased Saint Croix from the French and brought together Saint Thomas, Saint Croix, and Saint John as the Danish West Indies.
Danish trading posts were set up on the islands, trading in sugar, slaves and other goods. Sugar cane cultivation was a major economic acftivity for many years, with slaves used as one of the labor sources. However, following increasing humanitarian awareness, laws againts slavery and a slave rebellion in 1848, the governor Peter von Scholten officially freed the last slaves the same year.
The islands were purchased from the Danish by the United States in 1917.
Early history
The Ciboneys
Although not much is known about the Ciboney people who inhabited the islands during the Stone Age, archaeological evidence seems to indicate that they were hunter-gatherers. They made tools of stone and flint but left few other artifacts behind.
The Arawaks
Experts at canoe building and seamanship, the Arawaks migrated from the Amazon River Valley and Orinoco regions of Venezuela and Brazil, settling on the islands near coasts and rivers. These peaceful people excelled at fishing and farming. They grew cotton, tobacco, maize, yuca, and guava as well as a variety of other fruits and vegetables.
The Arawaks developed intricate social and cultural lives. For recreation, they held organized sporting events. They also valued artistic endeavors, such as cave painting and rock carving, some of which have survived to the present. Religion played a large role in their daily lives, and through ceremonial rituals they asked their gods for advice to help them through troubled times. Their civilization flourished for several hundred years until the Caribs invaded.
The Caribs
While the Caribs came from the same area as the Arawaks and may have been distantly related, they did not share the Arawaks' friendly nature. Not only were they fierce warriors, they supposedly feasted on their adversaries. Their bloodthirsty reputation spawned the English word cannibal, derived from the name the Spanish gave them, Caribal.
Whether or not they actually ate their victims, the Caribs did destroy numerous Arawak villages, murdering as many as they could. By the mid-15th century, the Caribs had slashed the Arawak population from several million to a few thousand. But even the Caribs were no match for the gold-hungry Europeans who were about to descend.
Colonization
Blown off course during his 1493-1496 voyage, Christopher Columbus landed on Saint Croix, then continued his explorations on Saint Thomas and Saint John. He gave the islands their original Spanish names (Santa Cruz, San Tomas, and San Juan), focusing on religious themes. The collection of tiny islets, cays, and rocks dotting the sea around them reminded Columbus of Saint Ursula and her 11,000 virgin martyrs, inspiring the name Las Once Mil Virgenes.
The first encounter Columbus had with the Caribs quickly erupted into a battle. When Columbus and his crew decided to move on to other islands, they kidnapped six Arawaks to guide them. Although Columbus left without founding a colony, many more battles between the Spanish and Caribs followed over the next century.
Other European explorers finished the job the Spanish had begun. They tried to convert the Caribs and Arawaks to Catholicism, which largely failed. They also enslaved the native populations to work on plantations. With tobacco having already been cultivated on the islands, it made a good cash crop. Later on, coffee, sugar, and cotton also were grown.
The Danish Virgin Islands period
Diseases, coupled with murder and slavery, took a large toll on both the Arawaks and the Caribs. Several groups of Arawaks committed mass suicide rather than submit to foreign rule.[citation needed] By the late 17th century, the Arawaks had been completely exterminated and few Caribs remained.[citation needed]
With only a small population on the islands, there was a great demand for labor. The trans-atlantic slave trade to the islands began in 1673. The difficult conditions and inhumane treatment slaves were subjected to bred discontent. Moravian Brethren misssionaries from Herrnhut, Saxony, arrived in St. Thomas in December, 1732. Objects of great distrust from the slave holders, they lived with the slaves and won their confidence. In 1733, a long drought followed by a devastating hurricane pushed slaves in St. John to the breaking point. Members of the Akwamu tribe from modern Ghana staged a massive rebellion, seizing control of the island for six months. The Danish, who controlled the island at that point, enlisted the help of French authorities from Martinique to regain control (see St. John Slave Revolt).
Another slave revolt in 1848 was more successful in the long run. The governor at the time, Peter von Scholten, faced with thousands of enslaved Africans with burning torches threatening to burn down the town of Frederiksted, freed the slaves even though it was against the wishes of Danish Crown.[citation needed][dubious – discuss] He would later be jailed in Denmark by the Danish Crown for this action.[citation needed]
The 20th century
Before World War I, the United States wanted to buy the islands due to fear that if Denmark were conquered by Germany, Germany would attempt to take over Denmark's overseas dependencies. In 1917, a treaty was concluded in which the United States purchased the islands for $25,000,000. After the United States bought what is now known as the United States Virgin Islands from the Danish, the islands became an unincorporated U.S. territory. Most Residents were granted U.S. citizenship in 1927, and an act of 1932 provided that all natives of the Virgin Islands who on the date of the act were residing in the continental United States or any of its insular possessions or territories were U.S. citizens. The islands remained under the direct control of the U.S. government until 1968, when Virgin Islanders were first allowed to elect their own Governor (previously, governors had been appointed first by the navy, then by the interior department). In 1972, Virgin Islanders elected their first non voting delegate to congress.
See also
External links
- "Scholten and the emancipation of Danish Slaves in the Danish West Indies"
- Virgin Islands Humanities Council
- St. John Historical Society
References
- "History of the United States Virgin Islands". History of the United States Virgin Islands. Retrieved September 24.
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