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The English Conquest of Jamaica Oliver Cromwell’s Bid for Empire
Carla Gardina Pestana
Cambridge, MA: The Balknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2017 Hardcover. Ix+362 p. ISBN 978-0674737310. $35
Reviewed by Christopher N. Fritsch Mountain View College, Dallas (Texas)
Professor Carla Pestana provides an excellent examination of the lowpoint and highpoint of Oliver Cromwell’s Protectorate—the failure and the success of the Western Design. Like other Atlantic studies, Pestana’s book covers a great deal of ground. Her focus is the English Empire under Oliver Cromwell and her analysis of Cromwell’s design is well presented and thoroughly researched. From government publications, personal accounts and correspondence, Pestana utilised materials from both England and Spain. Thus, hers is a very complete presentation of Cromwell’s Western Design. Pestana’s account begins with England at a crossroads during the Interregnum. Under Elizabeth, James I, and Charles I, England colonised North America through chartered companies and personal colonial charters. Colonisation came at a high cost, and establishing colonists in Virginia was a difficult and dangerous process. Bad water, lack of food, sanitation problems, and Native Americans, all contributed to a high death rate and difficulty in establishing a permanent colony. Colonies north of Virginia often fared no better. Individuals and chartered companies were unequal to the task of establishing, constructing, and resupplying plantation ventures. Two decades after the founding of Massachusetts Bay, Cromwell and his government changed the course of English imperial development. For nearly fifty years, the government in England limited their involvement in Atlantic colonisation and imperial establishment. With the end of the monarchy, Cromwell brought a new approach to empire. He transformed the English state into an active participant in imperial development. Under Cromwell, the English government became directly involved in the organisation and development of empire. The wars of the 1640s, which led to the Interregnum, consolidated the Three Kingdoms into one. The conquest of Ireland and Scotland reinforced Cromwell’s belief in his ability as military organiser and commander. Cromwell’s initial foray into imperial development was the successful conquest of England’s neighbours. As Pestana notes, these victories over Ireland and Scotland, not only brought Cromwell to political power, but also, increased England’s military might and worked as a model for colonial expansion. Until Cromwell’s ascendancy, colonists in North America led relatively independent lives. Often trading with the Spanish or Dutch, English colonists lived beyond the reach and interests of London to a point. Foreign ships often arrived in English colonial ports to carry on trade; these opportunities ended with the imposition of the Navigation Acts. This immediately changed the relationship between London and the colonies, as the colonists became incorporated into Cromwell’s imperial consolidation through the Acts. With the consolidation of the Isles and the implementation of imperial policy to control better and eventually incorporate colonies, Cromwell began to look for new opportunities to augment the English empire. The next imperial initiative was the conquest of Spanish America. Cromwell, like many other Englishmen, believed Spain was in decline, and poised to be overrun. He thought that Spanish colonies could be conquered easily and that the residents would embrace the opportunity to remove the Spanish and assist the English. For Cromwell, the decision to attack Spanish America was elementary. Spain moved to eliminate the incursions of other European nations. Capturing ships and imprisoning crews, Spain imposed their own imperial control in the New World. Cromwell understood the implications of these policies: men murdered, forced into hard labour, and perhaps the greatest injustice, the imposition of Roman Catholicism upon English Protestants [9]. Still, Cromwell and many of his fellow Englishmen believed that Spain and her empire had run her course. Spanish power was waning, and, after the consolidation of the Isles, England’s power was ascending. Cromwell believed that England stood on the verge of bringing Spain to her knees and constructing a greater English empire in its wake. Cromwell’s thinking reflected England’s view of the world. The English believed that Spain had neither the interest or ability to protect its American empire. By 1650, England settled other parts of the Americas; colonies along the Chesapeake, in New England, and a foothold in the Caribbean, Bermuda and Barbados, represented the development of colonies along the western Atlantic. Spain was unable to counter this threat and maintain its position of dominance in the New World. Also, Spain faced the demise of its continental power. Revolutions in Portugal and the Netherlands led to the independence of both and signaled the decline of Spain’s European power [7]. England’s decision to attack was predicated upon these events and perceptions. The question for Cromwell and his colleagues was where to attack. After prolonged discussion, a conversation with John Hawkes tipped the decision. Hawkes lived on a number of islands in the Caribbean. Living in Barbados and then joining an expedition to Santa Cruz Island and eventually finding his way to Hispaniola, Hawkes relayed his understanding of island fortifications, defenders, and their potential. Cromwell and the Commissioners, who were overseeing the plan, found Hawkes reliable and his information decisive—decisive enough to move their military-imperial interests toward Hispaniola. Planning a joint land and sea venture was the difficult part. Acquiring the necessary ships, sailors, soldiers, food, and equipment became the first key objective. Cromwell and his Commissioners believed that England’s Caribbean colonies would supplement certain deficiencies after the expedition departed. Cromwell’s commanders carried the ‘looming authority of the state along with the will to exercise that authority’ in the colonies. From the moment the expedition arrived, the relationship between resident colonists and the fleet grew strained. The destruction of crops, the housing of men, their draw on local food and water supplies, all drained local resources. The expedition injured local residents all the more as it enforced the Navigation Acts and encouraged men to join the expedition. Increasingly, the relationship between Admiral William Penn and the fleet and the residents of Barbados deteriorated. At the top of the list of complaints was the acceptance of indentured servants into the force. Owners believed that the expedition absorbed numerous servants, as soldiers and sailors, with their contracts unfulfilled. They further disbelieved Penn’s desire to search and find these men and return them to their owners. For their losses and the disruption of trade with the Dutch, colonists believed that the nonenforcement of the Navigation Acts would compensate residents fairly. Expedition leaders disregarded most, if not all the complaints, as they believed that most of the residents were opposed to Cromwell’s government. After more debate on taking prizes and acquiring plunder, the fleet finally caught sight of Hispaniola on 12 April. Misjudgments plagued the venture from the start. Miscalculations on where to land, length of marching, and the lack of food, water, and familiarity with the heat, humidity and environment made the operation unsuccessful. Pestana notes that illness from the lack of food and water or the quality of food and water caused more deaths than actual military engagements. The failure to take the island shook members of the expedition to the core, as they searched for explanations and questioned England’s power [89]. For Englishmen of the period, this questioning eventually turned to religious and theological explanations. Cromwell, like many of his countrymen, believed that God wanted Spanish America destroyed; others believed this was God’s pronouncement on the Protectorate. Like contemporaries, Pestana targets two major decisions for the failure of the expedition. First, she believes that the decision to shift the landing to a different location forced the soldiers to march longer. This change created the ‘hunger, dehydration, ill health, and consequent demoralisation’ within the ranks of both officers and soldiers. Secondly, she sees the sheer size of the force as a problem. Although the large number of soldiers, sailors and ships presented an impressive display, the ability to equip and feed such a force became considerably more difficult. She believes that the logistics of coordinating such a force caused its own downfall and England’s failure to complete the mission. The loss of Hispaniola did not end the expedition’s aspiration to achieve some military-imperial goal. Their attention now turned to Jamaica. Here again, Pestana’s analysis shows more English deficiencies than military brilliance. Once on shore, the English delayed in entering Santiago de la Vega. This mistake allowed Jamaica’s residents time to escape and secure themselves from the invasion and eventually force the English to begin treaty negotiations. Nearly six months after the fleet left England, the Commissioners and leaders of the Western Design returned with little to show for their efforts. What was once a vision of the destruction of Spanish America and a reconstructed Caribbean was, in reality, a small foothold on Jamaica. The English came to plant, not to pirate. They held to the belief that once ‘rid of the lazy Spanish, controlled by the industrious English, Jamaica would be transformed’ [139]. Transformed not as another sugar colony but with an abundance of diverse agricultural products. As Pestana sets out to show, this goal was difficult to achieve. Between the continued Spanish presence and the development of independent Afro-Jamaican communities, the island hardly existed as an English-run colony. The transition from military outpost to colonial settler communities and production was a difficult one. The attempts to encourage soldiers to farm land and produce their own food never created any substantial returns. Thus, the colony was in continual need of food. Continuing issues over food, water, and disease plagued the English for a number of years. Although English commentators noted the potential for Jamaican products, especially the developing interest in cocoa, these problems did not foster a great deal of interest in migration to the island. For Pestana, these problems drew immediate comparisons to sustainability issues in Virginia. Residents on Jamaica had to learn to adjust to the environment for survival. In the end, the English conquest of the island took the better part of a decade to accomplish. What began under Cromwell finally saw its completion under Charles II. The cost of the undertaking was extraordinarily high in lives and financial expenditures. Reading the work closely, there was, however, a return on these investments. The imposition of the Navigation Acts early in the arrival of the fleet to Barbados and the eventual control of Jamaica laid a foundation for the development of an English empire. Cromwell’s expenditures in the development of an English navy and his moves to remove the Spanish, although mostly unsuccessful, and the elimination of the Dutch and French as trade competitors brought not only a new empire to the horizon but also a new interventionist state—a state that both Charles II and James II would endorse. Finally, as much as Pestana presents this process, one can be struck by the continual perceptions of the world by the English. Cromwell, assured in his convictions that God wanted the conquest to happen, believed that Spain would fall due to its own political and religious problems and attachments. He fundamentally believed that African slaves and the local indigenous populations would see the English as liberators and therefore, rally to the English cause of Spanish destruction. These were perceptions that were rooted in the English perception of the world. Cromwell and many of his countrymen saw their intellectual worlds crushed when the fleet was defeated in Hispaniola and they couched this defeat, as their ancestors understood the defeat of the Armada, in religious, Godly terms. Understanding this intellectual context is one of the greatest strengths of the work and places Cromwell’s empire as foundational to the future of a British empire.
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