Читать книгу Santo Domingo: A Country with a Future - Otto Schoenrich - Страница 31

Decline of the colony.—English attacks on Santo Domingo City.—Settlement of Tortuga by freebooters.—French settlements in western Santo Domingo.—Border wars.—Cession of western coast to France.—Return of prosperity.—Effect of French revolution.—Negro uprising in French Santo Domingo.—Rise of Toussaint l'Ouverture. —Cession of Spanish Santo Domingo to France.—Evacuation by Spain.

Within forty years after its discovery Santo Domingo had passed the zenith of its glory. The vast and wealthy countries discovered and conquered on the mainland of America absorbed the attention of colonists and of the government, and Santo Domingo quickly sank to a position of economic and political insignificance. So little importance was given the island by chroniclers during the ensuing two hundred and fifty years and so few are the records remaining, that not even the names of all the governors and the periods of their rule can be accurately determined. The colony barely existed, the monotony of its life was interrupted only by occasional attacks or menaces of attacks by pirates or other foes.

Every effort was made to prevent decay. Decrees were issued forbidding emigration or the recruiting of troops for expeditions of discovery, but they were evaded. Thus Louis Columbus, the grandson of the Discoverer and one of the most influential men of the colony, fitted out an expedition against Veragua. African slaves continued to be imported to take the place of the exterminated Indians, but as their importation was expensive the mines were abandoned and the number of sugar estates declined. For the greater part of the period from 1533 to 1556 the government was in the hands of an energetic man, Licentiate Alonso de Fuenmayor, Bishop of Santo Domingo and La Vega, and later first Archbishop of Santo Domingo. He pushed to a conclusion the work on the cathedral and other religious edifices then building, repaired the edifices belonging to the state and constructed the walls and bastions which still surround the city. He was able to ward off the attacks of corsairs, who multiplied in West Indian waters to such an extent that in 1561 the Spanish Government forbade vessels to travel to and from the new world except under convoy.

In 1564 the cities of Santiago de los Caballeros and Concepcion de la Vega were completely destroyed by an earthquake and the few remaining inhabitants reestablished the towns at short distances from the original sites. The entire intercourse of the colony with Spain was reduced to two or three caravels a year and the revenues sank so low that the salaries of state officials were paid and continued to be paid for over two hundred years, from the treasury of Mexico.

The year 1586 was marked by the capture of Santo Domingo City by the noted English navigator, Sir Francis Drake, during the celebrated cruise on which he took the strongest towns on the Spanish main. On the morning of January 11, 1586, the inhabitants of Santo Domingo City were thrown into consternation at seeing eighteen foreign vessels in the roadstead, in a line which stretched from Torrecilla Point to the slaughterhouse. To the joy of the people the fleet set sail for the west, but their joy was short lived, for the next morning messengers arrived with the news that the enemy had landed at the mouth of the Jaina River and was marching on the city. Preparations were made for defense, but terror gained the upper hand and soon the civil and religious authorities, the monks and nuns and the entire population were fleeing in confusion on foot, in carts and in canoes, leaving their belongings behind. Some one hundred and fifty men remained to dispute the passage of Lieutenant-General Carliell who appeared at the head of a thousand men. They were quickly dispersed by the invaders who entered the gates with little loss and proceeded to the plaza where they encamped. For twenty-five days Drake held the deserted city, carrying on negotiations meanwhile for its ransom. When these flagged he ordered the gradual destruction of the town and every morning for eleven days a number of buildings were burned and demolished, a work of some difficulty on account of the solidity of the houses. Not quite one-third of the city was so destroyed when the residents paid a ransom of 25,000 ducats, about $30,000, for the remainder. Drake thereupon embarked, carrying with him the bronze cannon of the fort and whatever of value he found in the churches and private houses. He also ordered the hanging of several friars, held by him as prisoners, in retaliation for the murder of a negro boy whom he had sent with a flag of truce.

Seventy years later Santo Domingo was again attacked by English forces, this time with the object of making a permanent landing. Oliver Cromwell after declaring war against Spain sent a fleet to the West Indies under the command of Admiral William Penn, having on board an army of 9000 men. The fleet appeared off Santo Domingo City on May 14, 1655, and a landing was effected in two bodies, the advance guard under Col. Buller going ashore at the mouth of the Jaina River while the main body under General Venables disembarked at Najayo, much further down the coast. Buller met with strong resistance at Fort San Geronimo and was forced to retire to Venables' intrenchments. The united English forces made several attempts to march on the capital, but fell into ambuscades and sustained heavy losses. Despairing of success, the fleet and army left the island on June 3 and proceeded to Jamaica, which they captured.

The rovers of the sea and the restrictive trade regulations imposed by the Spanish government, which limited trade with the new world to the single port of Seville in Spain, made development of the island's commerce impossible. The trade restrictions had the effect of encouraging a brisk contraband traffic with Dutch vessels on the north coast, to stop which the Spanish government adopted the incredible expedient of shutting up every port except Santo Domingo City and ordering the destruction of the north coast towns. Puerto Plata, Monte Cristi and two villages on the coast of what is now Haiti were thus destroyed in 1606 and the inhabitants transferred to towns almost in the center of the island, where they were far removed from temptation to smuggle. The measure temporarily stopped contraband trade on the north coast, but destroyed all legitimate trade in that region, transformed the coast into a desert and furnished an opportunity for the settlement of the buccaneers in the northwest.

The English, French and Dutch, in resisting Spain's claim to sole trading rights in the new world, authorized the fitting out of privateers that often degenerated into pirates. The bays and inlets of the coast of Santo Domingo became favorite resorts for such ships. The depot of the corsairs on the island of St. Christopher having been destroyed by the Spaniards in 1630, a number of refugees sought shelter on the island of Tortuga, on the northwest coast of Haiti. Some of them began to cultivate the soil, others took to hunting wild cattle on the mainland of Haiti, while others indulged in piracy. Tortuga soon became the busy headquarters of reckless freebooters of all nations, who here fitted out daring expeditions and returned to waste their gains in wild carousals. In 1638 the Spanish governor of Santo Domingo made a descent on the island and destroyed the settlement, but most of the buccaneers were absent at the time and the only result of the raid was to cause them to organize under the captaincy of an Englishman named Willis. French national pride asserted itself, however, and with the assistance of a French force from St. Christopher, the English inhabitants of Tortuga, who were in a minority, were persuaded to leave for Jamaica, and Tortuga thenceforth continued under French governors.

In 1648 the Spaniards of Santo Domingo made another fruitless attempt to expel the buccaneers; but in 1653 the Spanish governor, the Count of Peñalva, collected a force which caught the island unawares and was strong enough to overawe the inhabitants, who were permitted to leave, though abandoning all their property. The Spaniards left a garrison but the persistent Frenchmen returned and drove it out. In 1664 the French West India Company took possession, established a garrison, and appointed as governor an energetic man, D'Ogeron, under whom the country rapidly advanced in prosperity and commerce. With the idea of encouraging permanent settlement, D'Ogeron had women brought over from the slums of Paris and portioned out as wives to the rude colonists.

The rapidly increasing population caused settlements to be made on the Haitian mainland, and the city of Port-de-Paix was founded on a beautiful bay opposite Tortuga. The city flourished to such an extent and the advantages of settlement on the mainland were so superior that the settlers of Tortuga gradually left the smaller island and settled along the Haitian coast. Within twenty years Tortuga was practically deserted and it so continues to this day.

A better class of people now arrived from France. Families were brought in from Anjou and Brittany, and the French settlements continued to spread all the way down the western coast of the island, the French settlement at Samana being withdrawn. Slaves were imported from Africa, and in 1678 a rising took place among them, which was easily put down. In 1684 the French government formally sent out commissioners to provide for the regular government of the colony, and churches and courts of justice were established.

The Spanish inhabitants of Santo Domingo meanwhile made attack after attack on the French, but the Spanish colony was in such reduced straits that no extended efforts were possible. Where the French were repulsed the Spaniards were too few numerically to hold the territory and it was soon reoccupied. Angered at the repeated aggressions, D'Ogeron sent out an expedition under Delisle in 1673, which landed at Puerto Plata and marched inland to Santiago. The inhabitants fled to La Vega and only avoided the burning of their city by paying a ransom of 25,000 pesos, whereupon Delisle returned to the French colony. D'Ogeron at this time proposed to the French government the conquest of the entire island for France, and would probably have attempted to carry out this plan, had not his death occurred shortly after.

Cordial relations existing between France and Spain in 1685, tentative boundary agreements were made between the French and Spanish authorities, but each side accused the other of violations and the strife continued as before. When in 1689, war broke out between Spain and France, the French governor organized an expedition to invade the Spanish section. He reached Santiago where some of his men died after consuming meat and wine found in the deserted houses. Believing them poisoned, he ordered the torch to be applied to the city and retired after seeing it reduced to ashes. Admiral Perez Caro, the Spanish governor, thereupon made preparations for a telling blow on the French. The colony's militia and regular troops sent by the viceroy of Mexico invaded the French section and on January 21, 1692, administered a crushing defeat on the opposing force in the plain of La Limonade, killing the French governor and his principal officers. The victorious army marched through the French settlements, desolating the fields and putting all prisoners to the sword. At the same time a new settlement the French had made at Samana was exterminated.

The new French governor found the affairs of his colony in very bad condition; but with the assistance of refugees from other islands he sent an expedition to Jamaica, from where over 3,000 slaves together with stores of indigo and other property were carried off. In retaliation the English and Spanish fleets combined and with 4,000 men aboard set sail from Manzanillo Bay in 1695, and sacked and burned Cape Français and Port-de-Paix, the English carrying off all the men they took prisoners and the Spaniards the women and children. Hostilities were ended in 1697 by the peace of Ryswick by which Spain recovered territory conquered from her by the French and ceded the western part of the island of Santo Domingo to France. The occupation of the western coast by France, so long resented as an intrusion, was thus formally recognized.

The French colony immediately entered upon an era of prosperity which soon made it the richest country of the West Indies. Great plantations of tobacco, indigo, cacao, coffee and sugar were established. The country came to be known as the paradise of the West Indies and the wealth of the planters became proverbial. The grave defect was that this prosperity was built on the false foundation of slavery. In 1754 the population numbered 14,000 whites, 4000 free mulattoes and 172,000 negroes.

The Spanish colony on the other hand sank lower than ever. Practically abandoned by the mother country, there was no commerce beyond a little contraband and only the most indispensable agriculture, the inhabitants devoting themselves almost entirely to cattle raising. The ports were the haunts of pirates, and a number of Dominicans also became corsairs. By the year 1730 the entire country held but 6000 inhabitants, of whom about 500 lived in the ruined capital and the remaining urban population was disseminated among the vestiges of Cotui, Santiago, Azua, Banica, Monte Plata, Bayaguana, La Vega, Higuey and Seibo. Such was the poverty prevailing that a majority of the people went in rags; and the arrival of the ship from Mexico, which brought the salaries of the civil officials and the military, was hailed with the joyful ringing of church bells.

To how great an extent this depression was due to trade restrictions is evident from the circumstance that when in 1740 several ports were opened to foreign commerce there was an immediate change for the better. Agriculture expanded, exports and imports increased, money circulated, the cost of the necessaries of life fell, the population rapidly increased and many new towns sprang up. According to an ecclesiastical census the population had in 1785 advanced to 152,640 inhabitants. Of these only 30,000 were slaves, owing to the Spanish laws which made it easy for a slave to purchase his freedom. Many of the freemen were negroes or mulattoes.

In 1751 the colony was visited by a severe hurricane, which caused the Ozama to leave its banks, and by a destructive earthquake which overthrew the cities of Azua and Seibo and did much damage to the church buildings of Santo Domingo. Azua and Seibo were reestablished on their present sites. Another earthquake in 1770 destroyed several towns in the French part of the island.

From the beginning of the century the boundary between the French and Spanish colonies of Santo Domingo had been a source of constant friction and bickerings. A preliminary agreement had been made in 1730, but in 1776 a permanent treaty was drafted, it was ratified at Aranjuez in 1777, and the boundary was marked with stone monuments.

When the French revolution broke out in 1789 both the Spanish and French colonies of Santo Domingo were enjoying a high degree of prosperity. In the French colony there were about 30,000 whites, and the haughty white planters were wont to indulge in every form of luxury and sybaritic pleasure; the negro slaves, whose number had grown to almost half a million, were subjected to the most barbarous ill-treatment; and a class of about 30,000 ambitious free mulattoes had arisen, many of whom where cultured and wealthy, but who were all rigidly excluded from participation in public affairs. It was evident that but a spark was needed to produce what might turn out to be a general conflagration.

The spark came in the formation of the National Assembly in France and its declaration of the rights of man. The mulattoes at once petitioned the National Assembly for civil and political rights, which were in 1790 equivocally denied and in 1791 finally granted them. The whites resisted the government decrees and uprisings began. The first of these was a revolt of the mulattoes under Ogé, which was quickly suppressed. Ogé fled to Spanish Santo Domingo, but was surrendered by the Spaniards on condition that his life be spared, a promise that was not kept for he was publicly broken on the wheel. Jean François, another mulatto, then raised an insurrection of the negroes in the north, marching on Cape Français, burning and murdering, with the body of a white infant carried on a spear-head at the head of his troops. His forces were defeated by the whites, who commenced an indiscriminate slaughter of their victims. The negroes thereupon rose in every direction and the paradise of the West Indies became a hell. The great plantation houses were burned, the wide estates desolated, white women were ravished and murdered and white men put to death with horrible tortures, while the liberated slaves indulged in orgies at which the beverage was rum mixed with human blood. It was a fearful day of reckoning.

In 1793, France went to war with England and Spain. The Spanish authorities of Santo Domingo made overtures to negro leaders of whom a number entered the Spanish army as officers of high rank, among them Toussaint, an intelligent ex-slave who later assumed the surname of l'Ouverture and who showed remarkable military and administrative qualities. The French government sent commissioners to the colony, whose tactless handling of a difficult situation fanned the flames of civil war. The English attacked the colony, captured Port-au-Prince, and enlisted the aid of the revolted slaves in overrunning the surrounding country. When they besieged Port-de-Paix the French commander sent secret emissaries to Spanish Santo Domingo and induced Toussaint to desert from the Spanish ranks and with his negro followers help to drive out the English. Killing the Spanish soldiers he found in his way, Toussaint went to fight the English, with such success that in 1797 he was made general-in-chief of all the French troops. The English, decimated by disease, were obliged to leave in 1798 and sign a treaty of peace with Toussaint by which the island was recognized as an independent and neutral state during their war with France. The operations in Santo Domingo are said to have cost the English $100,000,000 in money and 45,000 lives.

In the meanwhile border fights were going on in Spanish Santo Domingo between Toussaint's troops and forces collected from the various Spanish possessions on the Caribbean Sea. They continued until 1795, when by the treaty of Basle peace was declared between France and Spain and the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo was—to the dismay of its inhabitants—ceded to France, the whole island thus passing under French control. Toward the end of that year part of the Spanish troops and members of religious orders embarked and an emigration of the better families began, many taking their slaves with them. The Spaniards also exhumed what they supposed to be the remains of Columbus in the cathedral of Santo Domingo and carried them to Havana. One of the terms of the treaty was that the colony should formally be delivered when French troops were sent to occupy it, but as the French were at this time kept busy in the western portion, the Spanish governor and authorities continued to administer the country for several years. Little by little troops and civil officials were withdrawn and in 1799 the royal audiencia or high court was transferred to Puerto Principe, in Cuba, most of the lawyers of the colony leaving at the same time with their families.