West Indies | Islands, People, History, Maps, & Facts

The history of each island in the West Indies is unique and predates Columbus’ arrival in the Western Hemisphere. However, for over 500 years, some ideas and beliefs have woven the islands together. 

From the encounter of Europeans with the aboriginal culture that had lived there for thousands of years to the growth and development of colonialism, capitalism, and slavery to race, class, creolisation, mercantilism, and finally, to resistance, rebellion, and self-determination, the history of the West Indies is rich with narratives that provide insight into the last five centuries of world history. West Indian history is the story of peoples, cultures, and economic systems colliding, which some argue was a forerunner to today’s globalisation.

Federation of the West Indies History

The West Indies Federation, which existed from January 3rd, 1958, until May 31st, 1962, was a political union for a short period of time between numerous Caribbean islands that were British possessions.

The Federation’s stated goal was to construct a political body that could become independent from Britain as a single state; however, the Federation disintegrated due to internal political strife before that could happen. Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Vincent, Saint Lucia, and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago eventually became sovereign states, with Anguilla, the Cayman Islands, Montserrat, and the Turks and Caicos Islands becoming the British overseas territories.

The West Indies Federation granted British Guiana and British Honduras (Belize) observer status. 

West Indies Island 

The West Indies are two archipelagos located between North and South America in the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The Caribbean archipelago extends from Cuba in the northeast to Trinidad and Tobago in the southwest and includes the Venezuelan islands of Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao. The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands are part of the Lucayan archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, located northeast of Cuba and Hispaniola.

The Caribbean archipelago forms the Caribbean Sea’s eastern border. The Caribbean’s seas also touch the shores of Central and South America and the countries that border them (Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, and Belize).

The West Indies are multiracial, a multicultural, multilingual, and multinational archipelago of islands home to aboriginal, European, African, and Asian ancestry. These cultures have merged to form a West Indian or Caribbean cultural identity.

The Caribbean vs the West Indies

The phrase “West Indies” was coined by Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to the Western Hemisphere. In 1492, he arrived in the Bahamas at San Salvador and visited Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and St. Croix. He thought he’d made it to the East Indies, the islands now known as Indonesia and Malaysia. The islands where he landed were dubbed the West Indies when his error was recognised.

The Caribbean, named after the Kalinago or Carib indigenous people, is another name for the region, but not all countries in the Caribbean Sea are considered part of the West Indies. The Lucayan archipelago and the Caribbean archipelago, comprising the Greater and Lesser Antilles, are traditionally considered part of the West Indies. The Caribbean refers to the entire Caribbean Sea and the coasts surrounding it.

The Greater and Lesser Antilles are two names for the Caribbean archipelago’s islands. Antillia, legendary land west of Europe, was shown on mediaeval maps. The larger islands of Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico make up the Greater Antilles. From the British and US Virgin Islands in the north to Trinidad and Tobago in the south, the Lesser Antilles are made up of smaller islands.

West Indies Map Facts 

1. There are over 700 islands, islets, reefs, and caves in the Caribbean. The islands are separated into several groupings
2. Most Caribbean Island residents are descended from enslaved Africans brought to the islands by European colonial powers to work on sugar plantations. After slavery was abolished, they remained on the islands
3. Parts of all four Pirates of the Caribbean films starring Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley, were shot in the Caribbean
4. The first James Bond film, Dr No, was set in Jamaica
5. Another fascinating fact about the Caribbean is that the Caribbean island of Saba has the world’s tiniest runway, measuring less than 1,300 feet long
6. Jamaica has more churches per square mile (1,600 total) than any other country on the planet, and this record is even listed in the Guinness Book of World Records
7. Barbados was the only foreign country that former President George Washington ever visited. He went there with his brother Lawrence, who had tuberculosis, hoping that a change of scenery might help him. The house where they stayed is still standing, and it has been renovated and is open to the public

Conclusion

Since the seventeenth century, Britain’s quest for administrative convenience in governing her colonial empire has fueled the federal idea. From William Stapleton’s General Assembly of the Leeward Islands in 1674 to Robert Melvill’s Government of Grenada in 1763 to John Pope-Confederation Hennessy’s of the Windward Islands in 1876, Britain has attempted to rationalise the administration of her West Indian possessions throughout the centuries. All of these attempts to impose federalism by imperial decree failed.