Islands of the Caribbean - Antigua and Barbuda

Modern Antigua & Barbuda (Lesser Antilles)
AD 1954 - Present Day
Incorporating Heads of State (1954-2022), British Colony (1954-1967), Associated State (1967-1981), & Independent Constitutional Monarchy (1981-On)

The 'Independent Constitutional Monarchy' of Antigua and Barbuda, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, consists of two major islands and a few smaller ones, one of which is the usually-uninhabited Redonda. The islands sit in the central part of the Leeward Islands, part of the Lesser Antilles chain between the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea.

Barbuda is to the north of Antigua, while both lie to the east of the Dutch-owned islands of Saba and Sint Eustatius and the independent St Kitts & Nevis, to the south-east of the French-owned island of St-Barthélemy, to the west of the Atlantic Ocean itself, to the north of the French-owned island of Guadeloupe, and to the north-east of the British-owned island of Montserrat.

The first inhabitants of Antigua were Ciboney who settled around 2400 BC. Tens of sites around the island contain their beautifully-crafted shell and stone tools. After the Ciboney had moved on, the Arawak settled around AD 1232. They were chiefly an agricultural people, and most left in time to be replaced around 1500 by the more aggressive Caribs who settled all the islands of the Caribbean.

The first Europeans to see the island were Christopher Columbus and his crew, on behalf of what was on the verge of becoming a Spanish empire. Without landing there, he saw Antigua on his second voyage to the West Indies in 1493, naming it Santa Maria la Antigua after a saint of Seville. Despite the formation of various local Spanish Colonies, those and other Europeans generally avoided settling the island due to the fierce resistance being offered by the Caribs and because there seemed to be little fresh water there.

Antigua did gain settlers in the end, in 1632 when English colonisers arrived from St Kitts. It officially became an English colony in 1667, by which time the native inhabitants were virtually extinct thanks to various diseases being spread by the Europeans. King Charles II gave the island of Barbuda to Christopher Codrington in 1680, and four years later Codrington established the first sugarcane plantation there. Sugarcane cultivation exploded over the next fifty years, with plantations being powered by African slaves, with most current Antiguans being their descendants.

By the end of the eighteen century not only was Antigua a valuable colony for its sugarcane, it was also of strategic importance along major sailing routes. Captain Horatio Nelson, head of the British Squadron of the Leeward Islands, landed at English Harbour in 1784 to construct Nelson's Dockyard.

The Hanoverian Navigation Act required British colonists to use only British-registered ships. Nelson's determination to enforce it affected the not-insignificant trade of the colonists with the newly-independent United States and earned him the enmity of the local population. He was required to remain on board his uncomfortable ship, while the future King William IV, who was serving under him, was housed luxuriously in Clarence House.

The British empire abolished slavery in 1834, but allowed a four-year apprenticeship before full emancipation. Antigua became the only Caribbean colony to immediately institute emancipation, and the event is still celebrated as a major holiday. Emancipation, however, did not mean real freedom. Most former slaves remained dependent upon plantation owners, and this condition existed until 1939. So while emancipation improved the colony's economy, the main labour force did not share in the prosperity. Gradually, the demand for sugarcane shrank, and soon the island was losing its prosperity.

Queen Victoria's United Kingdom incorporated the island of Redonda (the 'Kingdom of Redonda') into Antigua's administrative purview in 1872. Various pretenders to this day continue to claim a pretence 'throne' for the island. One year before that event, Britain had created the 'Federal Colony of the Winward Islands', with Antigua as a constituent member. This was reorganised as the 'Territory of the Winward Islands' in 1956 and was dissolved in 1960.

A 'Federation of the West Indies' was also formed to include all of the British West Indian islands in the hope that the federation would become an independent state. When Jamaica withdrew in 1962, though, the federation collapsed.

A royal commission recommended the establishment of a labour movement to improve poor employment conditions. As a result, in the 1940s, Vere Cornwall Bird, head of the Antigua Labour Party, led the rise of a labour movement which itself instigated the movement for independence. Bird led Antigua's government for almost all of the 1960s and right through into the 1980s, becoming the country's first prime minister in 1981 and serving in that position until 1994. His son, Lester, succeeded him as prime minister.

Antigua became an internally self-governing 'Associated State' with the United Kingdom in 1967. On 1 November 1981 it and Barbuda, historically a dependency of Antigua, became independent in the form of a constitutional monarchy. Sir Wilfred E Jacobs, Antigua's governor between 1967-1981, became the first governor-general of Antigua and Barbuda.

The country is a parliamentary democracy whose head of state is the monarch of the United Kingdom, represented by a governor-general. A two-house parliament consists of a senate and a 'House of Representatives'. The country is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, with a population of 68,000 as of 2014. Its people have a Creole culture, the result of the blending of descendants of African slaves, Portuguese servants, and English settlers. Temperatures are even, between the mid-twenties to low thirties Celsius, humidity is low, and the islands are the sunniest of the Leeward Islands. Tourism in the past few decades has greatly improved the country's economy.

The full list of islands which make up the Lesser Antilles chain includes Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Redonda, St Kitts & Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad & Tobago.

The Americas

Caribbean Islands

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