Caribbean Scene

 

Fun Fact:

Before the outbreak of the French and Indian war, the French had traded sugar, molasses, and rum with the British North American colonies. Many American ship men ignored the trade restrictions after the war started and continued as smugglers. Others armed their vessels and went after French merchantmen. Some French shippers did likewise. Both England and France adopted a convoy system to protect the shipping.

Sugar production flourished on the French island of Martinique, and the powerful sugar lobby convinced William Pitt that it should be taken and later used as a bargaining chip to exchange for Minorca in the Mediterranean, which the French had captured. Pitt's friend and sugar magnate assured him that Martinique would be an easy conquest.

Lord Anson, first lord of the Admiralty, resisted Pitt's attempt to divert ships from the channel for the planned conquest. However, George II had caught Pitt's vision of global empire and become one Pitt's strongest supporters, avowing that Martinique must be taken to trade for the return of Minorca. 

I guess you could say: He had a yearning for a Caribbean Scene, George and Pitt were sharing the same dream, and their hearts beat as one, all for love of the rum.

November 12, 1758, and fleet of 73 ships sailed from Portsmouth for the Caribbean, arriving off Barbados in January, 1759, and joining a small squadron under the command of Commodore John Moore, who assumed command of the combined naval force. Major General Thomas Peregrine Hopson commanded the land forces.  Martinique law 125 miles to the northwest.

Hopson chose Fort Royal as his goal and landed troops on Martinique. He soon discovered that his troops would have to hack a road through tropical jungle under the constant threat of French fire along the route. He withdrew his forces. The invasion had lasted a day.

In a second effort, Commodore Moore sent Captain Edward Jekyll commanding the 60 gun ship-of-the-line Rippon to attack the coastal defenses at Saint Pierre. Contrary winds pinned the ship against the coast and Jekyll had to put down longboats to tow the damaged ship from the dangerous crossfire of the French batteries. 

Moore and Hopson re-assessed their situation and the strength of Martinique. They found that the island of Guadalupe, a hundred miles to the north, might be less formidable. January 23, 1759, the commodore sent eight ships to bombard the fort at Basse-Terre on Martinique. During the fierce exchange, a mortar shell fouled the fort's cistern, and the militia garrison instead drank rum all day. Thus relaxed, they simply went home. 

Moore launched bomb ketches against the town--which soon became a firestorm as the bombs ignited the abundant and flammable wooden warehouses of sugar and molasses. After occupying what remained of Bass-Terre, Moore took Fort Louis and the town of Grand-Terre on the opposite side of the island in a similar manner. However, the rest of Guadalupe remained under French control, and soon over a quarter of Hopson's troops took fever and had to be evacuated. Hopson himself fell victim and died. John Barrington assumed command of the land forces and hastened to attack and subdue the rest of the island before the arrival of the French fleet.

Although Governor General Marquis de Beauharnais landed troops from Martinique on Guadalupe, the French planters, tired of the destruction to their livelihoods, refused to support Beauharnais. The governor general had to return to Martinique, and Barrington's terms for their previous surrender had been most generous. 

The Guadalupe sugar producers would soon be providing the Massachusetts rum distillers with nearly half of their molasses requirements.

The above was taken from my notes from Chapter 11 of The French and Indian War by Walter R. Borneman -- and with apologies to Billy Ocean.

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