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A Scotsman in Cuba, 1811-1812

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

Raymond A. Mohl*
Affiliation:
Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, Florida

Extract

Traditionally, historians of the Americas have found essential primary source material in the published diaries, journals, and travel accounts of European visitors and tourists. The pungent nineteenth-century commentaries of Alexis de Tocqueville and Lord Bryce are rarely omitted from general accounts of American history. The extensive writings of Alexander von Humboldt, partially scientific in nature and covering his travels during the first decade after 1800, similarly add to the perspectives of Latin American historians. When taken in conjunction with other sources, and when used carefully, the penetrating insights and strong impressions of such travelers can help reconstruct the past in a more detailed, often more colorful, way.

Type
Documents
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1972

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References

1 The few studies of Cuban history available in English include an older work, Johnson, Willis Fletcher, The History of Cuba (5 vols., New York,1920)Google Scholar; the classic study by Ortiz, Fernando, Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco and Sugar (New York, 1947)Google Scholar; and a few more recent books: Foner, Philip S., A History of Cuba and Its Relations with the United States (2 vols., New York, 1962–1963)Google Scholar; MacGaffey, Wyatt and Barnett, Clifford R., Cuba: Its People, Its Society, Its Culture (New Haven, 1962)Google Scholar; Fagg, John E., Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic (EnglewoodCliffs, N. J., 1965)Google Scholar; and Freeman Smith, Robert, ed., Background to Revolution: The Development of Modern Cuba(New York, 1966)Google Scholar; Thomas, Hugh, Cuba: The Pursuit of Freedom (NewYork, 1971).Google Scholar Bibliography may be found in Griffin, A. P. C., List of Books Relating to Cuba [in the Library of Congress] (Washington, 1898)Google Scholar; de Morales, Lilia Castro , Impresos relativos a Cuba editados en los Estados Unidos de Norteamérica (Havana, 1956)Google Scholar; and Smith, , ed.,Background to Revolution, pp. 215219.Google Scholar For a published travel account nearly contemporaneous with that of Dunlop, see Humboldt, Alexander, The Island of Cuba, trans, by Thrasher, J. S. (New York, 1856).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 See Wallace, David H., ed., “‘From the Windows of the Mail Coach’: A Scotsman Looks at New York Statein 1811,” New-York Historical Society Quarterly, 40 (July 1956), 264296 Google Scholar; Mohl, Raymond A., ed., “‘The Grand Fabric of Republicanism’: A Scotsman Describes South Carolina,1810–1811,” South Carolina Historical Magazine, 71 (July 1970), 170188 Google Scholar; and Mohl, RaymondA., ed., “A Scotsman Visits Georgia in 1811.” “A Newly Discovered Travel Account,” Georgia Historical Quarterly, 55 (Summer 1971), 259274.Google Scholar

3 Tope: a parapet, or ramparts built upon the walls of the city. For a description, see Johnson, , History of Cuba, 2, 102.Google Scholar

4 Alexander von Humboldt similarly remarked upon the unsanitary nature of Havana. See Humboldt, , Island of Cuba, pp. 106107.Google Scholar

5 Faste: great pomp, display, or ostentation.

6 The idle amusements of Havana are similarly described in Johnson, , History of Cuba, 2, 233235.Google Scholar

7 On the theater and promenades, see ibid., II, 131–133, 238–242, and Humboldt, , Island of Cuba, p. 107.Google Scholar Later travelers were also impressed by the paseo and its volantes. See, for example, Trollope, Anthony, The West Indies and the Spanish Main (reprint of 1860 ed., London, 1968), pp. 141144.Google Scholar

8 There is virtually no information readily available on these early British settlers in Cuba. Platt, D. C. M., “British Agricultural Colonization in Latin America,” Inter-American Economic Affairs, 18 (Winter 1964), 338, 19 (Summer 1965), 23–42 treats only Brazil and Argentina.Google Scholar ippy, J. Fred R, British Investments in Latin America, 1822-1949 (Minneapolis, 1959)Google Scholar does not deal with this kind of investment and emphasizes a later period. An interesting article on immigration to Cuba discusses plans to encourage white immigration, but gives no information on English settlers. Corbitt, Duvon C., “Immigration in Cuba,” Hispanic American Historical Review, 22 (1942),280308.Google Scholar It is conceivable that some of these Englishmen had been Loyalists who fled East Florida after the American Revolution. Wilbur H. Siebert, in analyzing British dispersal from Florida, indicates that although most Loyalists returned to the United States or went to England, Canada,or the Bahamas, some stayed with the Spanish or went “to other Foreign Parts.”See Siebert, Wilbur H., Loyalists in East Florida, 1774 to 1785(2 vols., Deland, Fia., 1929), I,208210.Google Scholar

9 On coffee cultivation in Cuba, sec Humboldt, , Island of Cuba, pp. 281284 Google Scholar and Johnson, , History of Cuba, 5, 197202.Google Scholar

10 On Cuban mining, see ibid., pp.104–125.

11 Slavery in Cuba is treated in an older work, Aimes, Hubert H. S.,The History of Slavery in Cuba, 1511 to 1868 (reprint of 1907 ed., New York, 1967) and in three more recent studiesGoogle Scholar: Knight, Franklin W., Slave Society in Cuba during the Nineteenth Cntury (Madison, Wise, 1970)Google Scholar; Klein, Herbert S., Slavery in the Americas: A Comparative Study of Virginia and Cuba (Chicago, 1967),Google Scholar and Foner, , History of Cuba, 1, 4652.Google Scholar On the use of bloodhounds in the United States, see Covington, James W., “ Cuban Bloodhounds and the Seminoles,” Florida Historical Quarterly, 30 (October 1954), 111119.Google Scholar

12 “Additional information on the militia iscontained in KleinN, Herbian M., “The Colored Militia of Cuba, 1568-1868,” Caribbean Studies, 6 (July 1966), 17–27.Google Scholar

13 On tobacco cultivation, see Humboldt, , Island of Cuba, pp. 284290.Google Scholar On the tobacco monopoly, see Foner, , History of Cuba, 1, 3839 Google Scholar and Pierson , William W., “ Francisco de Arango y Parreño,” Hispanic American Historical Review, 16 (November 1936), 473474. The monopoly was abolished in 1817.Google Scholar