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Arrival of the Spanish
In early August of 1492, three ships under the command of Christopher
Columbus departed from Spain on a journey that, Columbus hoped, would
take them to the
Orient
. The lands of the East had goods that Europeans cov-
eted, such as spices and silks. But reaching these faraway trade centers
required a dangerous overland journey across Asia or a long sea voyage
south around the western coast of Africa and then northeast across the Indian
Ocean. Columbus hoped to find an easier, more direct route by sailing west
across the Atlantic Ocean.
On the morning of October 12, 1492, more than a month after they had
last set foot on dry land, Columbus and several of his top officers waded
ashore on a small island that they assumed to be near Japan. In reality, the
island was in the Bahamas. Columbus named the island San Salvador,
claimed it for Spain, and declared the island’s native inhabitants to be sub-
jects of the Spanish king and queen. It was about 500 years since the
Lucayans had first settled in the Bahamas.
After deciding that the Bahamas contained little of value, the Spaniards
removed many of the native Lucayans to work in the gold mines of
Hispaniola, a large Caribbean island Columbus had found during his 1492
expedition. (Hispaniola is the site of the present-day nations of Haiti and the
Dominican Republic.) Within 25 years, the peaceful Lucayans had virtually
disappeared, having fallen victim to European diseases to which they had no
immunity, overwork, mass executions, and general mistreatment at the
hands of the Spanish.
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