Saint Kitts and Nevis are islands in the Leeward chain that are only two miles apart. The portraits of British King George V show him in an explorative mood, so why not learn a little of the colonies founding. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe. take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
These issue of stamps show the King in various adventurous poses beside his official profile. This is perhaps in keeping with the colony being founded by a Society of Adventurers acting with a Royal patent. Most would not have thought of George V as an adventurer. Philatelists knew different. The King had put together one of the world’s great stamp collections. To do that requires more than a little adventure.
Todays stamp is issue A3, a half penny stamp issued by the Crown Colony of Saint Kitts and Nevis in 1920. The two islands now have separate stamp issues. This was a thirteen stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth $6.00 used.
Before Europeans found the islands, there were three groups of Indians that had occupied the volcanic islands. Not much of known about the first group called Sibony because they left behind no relics of having been there. The Taino people followed about 800 AD but were believed to be fewer in number. Lastly the islands were conquered by the Caribe Indians, who were quite warlike, and perhaps because so, were again fewer in number. Christopher Columbus was the first European to spot the islands on his second voyage and later Sir Francis Drake visited. One early British explorer that did well financially from his visit was Bartholomew Gilbert. He did not try to set up an outpost but rather collected samples of exotic plant life and their seeds that he then traded back in Britain. He had done the same thing on Cape Cod in the USA.
In 1620 three British gentlemen received a patent from King James I to colonize the Leeward Islands. They formed a Society of Adventurers and arrived on Saint Kitts with 15 settlers in 1623. They found Caribe Chief Tegremante agreeable to selling some land. Tegremante already had a steady business offering refuge to Frenchmen needing a place to hide. The first years tobacco and vegetable crop was mostly wiped out by a hurricane that September but the colony survived. In 1625 a heavily armed French warship arrived and both the Society of Adventurers colony and the Caribe came to terms with the French presence. They were heavily armed. When Cardinal Richelieu heard of the success, he formed a French company to exploit Saint Kitts and bought 60 slaves in Senegal for it.
Chief Tegremante decided in 1826 there were too many Europeans and slaves on his islands and began quietly bringing in extra Caribe warriors to raid the French and British settlements. A native woman named Barbe warned the Society of Adventurers what was about to happen. The settlement then invited the Caibe for a large party where the liqour flowed freely. Then overnight they themselves raided Chief Tegremante’s camp when they were not in a position to know what hit them. Most of the high chiefs including Tigremante were killed.
The next day the thousands of Caribe warriors were angry but in disarray. At a place now called Bloody Point there was a large battle. 2000 Caribe and two hundred settlers died. Several more settlers were left insane from injuries sustained. The Caribe had been dipping their arrows in a poison from the machineel tree. It was decided jointly with the French to remove the remaining Caribe to Dominica. Barbe was allowed to stay. This is portrayed today as a genocide among those steeped in sore loserism.
The Society of Adventurers merged into the Royal African Company in 1664. The French company also merged into a larger one in 1665. After that relations between the French and British settlements on Saint Kitts deteriorated. In 1666 at the battle of Sandy Point the French were defeated and the British had the islands to themselves. The new company management was more about profit than adventure and the main cash crop moved from tobacco to more slave labor intensive sugar cane. The planters became rich, and Saint Kitts was the richest colony per capita in the British Empire at the time of the American Revolution. That number of course requires you to not count the many slaves and count the Jewish planters of Spanish heritage as British.
Well my drink is empty. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting