The largest, by far, of these islands, Trinidad, belonged in 1793 to Spain, at that time the ally of Great Britain. Its nearness to the South American continent gave it, as a distributing centre, marked commercial advantages, of which the unenterprising Spaniards made little use; but, as the trade winds blow from the north of east, it was not favorably placed for a naval station. The two next in size, and among the most fertile, Guadaloupe and Martinique, were French islands. Being in the centre of the chain and to leeward of none, except the outlying English Barbadoes, they were admirably situated for military control, and the strategic advantage of position was supplemented by the defensive strength of Fort Royal (now Fort de France), the principal harbor of Martinique; which was then, as it is now, by far the most powerful naval position in the eastern Caribbean. Besides them, France owned Santa Lucia, next south of Martinique, and Tobago. The military importance of these islands, combined with a distinct though minor commercial value, and the experience in past wars of the injury done to British commerce by privateering based upon them, made their reduction advisable to Great Britain; to whom belonged most of the other Lesser Antilles as well as the trade of the Caribbean. One of the first acts of the war, before sending a vessel to the Mediterranean or increasing the Channel fleet, was to despatch a squadron of seven sail-of-the-line to the West Indies, where there were at that time, except a few small cruisers, but two fifty-gun ships, one at Jamaica and one to windward—a thousand miles apart. No fact shows more strongly how unprepared Great Britain was for war than the naval destitution of this region, at a time when France had three or four ships-of-the-line continually in her colonies. This British squadron sailed under the command of Admiral Gardner on the 24th of March, 1793; and there was a strong expectation that Martinique and Guadaloupe, which had hoisted the old royal standard of France upon learning the deposition of Louis XVI., would place themselves under British protection. This hope was disappointed, they having already resumed their republican allegiance, and Gardner returned to England in the fall, leaving a part of his squadron behind.
It was then decided to reduce the French islands by force, and on the 26th of November Sir John Jervis, afterwards Earl St. Vincent, sailed with a small force of ships-of-war carrying seven thousand troops destined for this service. Reaching Barbadoes in January, the expedition appeared off Martinique on the 5th of February, 1794, and after a series of successful operations the island capitulated on the 22d of March. A detachment was next sent against Santa Lucia, which was surrendered on the 4th of April. On the 10th of the same month the combined naval and military forces anchored off Guadaloupe, and on the 20th this island, with its off-lying dependencies, Marie-Galante, Desirade and the Saints, also submitted. Tobago having been seized with slight resistance in April, 1793, Great Britain was now in possession of all the hostile Windward Islands, except the petty St. Martin, part of which belonged to France. A considerable detachment of troops was next sent to Mole St. Nicolas to assist the undertaking against Haïti; a reduction of the force in the Windward Islands which led to disastrous consequences, felt throughout the war by the islands and commerce of Great Britain. For on the 3d of June, when the British commanders had departed leaving a garrison in Guadaloupe, there appeared off the coast a division of ships, two being frigates and the others transports, which had left France in April, before the loss of the colonies was known. Landing without opposition, they established themselves firmly and gained possession of half the island before Jervis and Grey could appear. The struggle continued with varying fortunes during the following six months, but the British continually lost ground and wasted with yellow fever. This dire disease told likewise severely on the new French arrivals, but these found a native Creole population of nearly six thousand, the larger part of whom were faithful to the republic; whereas their enemies, out of a total original force of seven thousand, had, besides losses in battle and by disease, been obliged to spare garrisons for the captured islands and a detachment to Haïti. These causes alone would seem sufficient to account for the recapture of the island; but the utmost credit must at the same time be allowed to the French officers concerned, and especially to the commissioner of the Convention, Victor Hugues, who accompanied the expedition. This man, who had at Rochefort filled the rôle of public accuser, which in Paris gained for Fouquier Tinville a hideous immortality, seems to have embodied in himself the best and worst features of the men of the Terror, whose fate he escaped by leaving France betimes. In his report to the Convention he boasted of having put to death twelve hundred royalists in Guadaloupe. This horror partakes doubtless of the evident exaggerations discernible in the French accounts of a military operation which, not so adorned, would have been brilliant enough. Hugues's brutality is unquestionable, but to it he joined the vigor, audacity, and unscrupulous determination to succeed which carried the French armies to victory in all parts. The British were forced to evacuate their last port in Guadaloupe on the 10th of December, 1794.
Upon receiving news of Hugues's success the Directory hastened to send re-enforcements, and on the 6th of January, 1795, a number of ships-of-war and transports reached Guadaloupe and landed troops variously stated at fifteen to twenty-five hundred. Hugues, who had meantime organized a respectable territorial army, used the land and naval forces now at his disposal with great energy. Santa Lucia was retaken on the 19th of June, and insurrection fomented and maintained in Dominica, St. Vincent and Grenada, among the negroes, aborigines and old French inhabitants, to the great distress of the British. National vessels and privateers, having once more a secure base of operations, swarmed throughout the seas and inflicted great losses on the trade. All this disaster, which continued throughout the year, arose from not having quite enough men in Guadaloupe to put Hugues down before he had a foothold; and the British government was now compelled to send a far larger force to repair in part an evil, which a smaller number, at the proper moment, would have wholly prevented.
The disastrous result of the campaign of 1794 in Belgium and Holland, resulting in the conquest of the latter by the French, the overthrow of the House of Orange, and the alliance of Holland with France under a republican government, had both released the British troops employed on the Continent and thrown open the Dutch colonies to British attacks. Sir Ralph Abercromby, who had distinguished himself in the recent operations, was appointed to the command in the eastern Caribbean, and sixteen thousand troops were assigned to the expedition, which was to be convoyed by eight ships-of-the-line under Admiral Christian. They were to have sailed in September for a campaign in the drier and cooler winter months; but the usual difficulty in moving large bodies, particularly of sailing ships, delayed their departure until the 15th of November. Two days later the Channel was swept by a gale of hurricane violence, which caused the loss of many ships and lives, and forced all that survived to return to Portsmouth, a single transport alone reaching the destination at Barbadoes. On the 3d of December a second start was made, but almost equal bad fortune was met. After battling the ocean for seven weeks, Christian and Abercromby returned to England with part of the convoy, the remainder finding their way by driblets to Barbadoes; several, however, were taken by Hugues's cruisers. Abercromby then took passage in a frigate, reaching the island on the 17th of March, 1796; and was followed by the admiral, who arrived on the 21st of April with a fleet of transports. Santa Lucia was at once attacked, and on the 25th of May the French garrison capitulated. On the 11th of June, St. Vincent, and a few days later Grenada, which were in possession rather of insurgents than of enemies, likewise submitted. Prior to the arrival of Admiral Christian, Abercromby had sent a detachment of twelve hundred men against the Dutch colonies on the mainland, Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice, which surrendered without resistance in April and May, and were laid open to British trade.
Great Britain had now resumed tranquil possession of all the eastern islands, except Guadaloupe. The strong organization which this had received from Hugues, and the re-enforcements that had been thrown in, indicated that prolonged operations would be needed to effect its subdual. The sickly rainy season was at hand, during which also hurricanes prevail, so that all reasons combined to postpone the attempt to the healthier months—a decision which was amply justified by the great mortality from yellow fever which ensued among the troops, despite all the immunity from exposure that care and the cessation of campaigning could give. By the time that operations could begin, Spain had declared war against Great Britain; and the prospect of easily seizing her large and far more valuable islands diverted attention from Guadaloupe. The latter continued throughout this and the following war, until 1810, a thorn in the side of British trade. The recapture of Guadaloupe by the French, and the consequent evils, remain a pregnant