Pyrrhic Victories and Pandemics: The European Conquest of the Caribbean

 Pyrrhic Victories and Pandemics:

Yellow Fever, Malaria, and European Conquest in the Caribbean

J.M. Rogers 

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          In historical studies concerning Atlantic history, the focus on yellow fever and malaria's influence over transatlantic policy in the Caribbean is often neglected. Rather than dwelling on the seemingly mundane topic of disease-based mortality, the focus of these works often centers on the international arms race that the discovery of the New World produced or the atrocities that European imperialists committed in the name of colonization. Amidst such grand spectacles of human interaction, however, a subtler and yet equally important factor of West Indies development exists. Spanning across four centuries, from 1492-1888, documentation of repeated epidemics reveals how local diseases affected the lives of those who lived in the Caribbean and the Europeans who visited the tropical region in hopes of securing wealth and land. Records of illness exist within Columbus' diary entries, and he suffered from sickness on his third and final voyage, which may have contributed to his relatively early death at 55. More substantial and consistent illness records were produced during the 17th century when the British began seeking ownership of the highly valued islands in the Caribbean. As the British Empire expanded its vision of trade dominance in the New World tropics, the Spanish found themselves directly in their crosshairs. Having established a vast sugar plantation regime throughout the Tropics and South America and inroads to gold and silver deposits in the Andes and the region of Panama that enabled trade with Asia, the Spanish empire held a coveted position that provided substantial wealth and strategic dominance in the region. However, as British, Spanish, and eventually French records of the period reveal, this treasure trove held darker secrets, secrets that would eventually claim the lives of countless thousands of European soldiers, sailors, trade merchants, indents, and colonists. As the transatlantic power struggle intensified, Cartagena, Havana, Cuba, and Chagres would come to represent a veritable hell on earth for the uninitiated, their corpses accumulating in the humid summer weather.

        The presence of yellow fever (or "yellow jack," as it was colloquially called) in the Caribbean was already the subject of trepidation among Spanish and British sailors in 1655 when Sir Oliver Cromwell's vision of tropical expansion was first put into action (10). One can imagine an equally ambitious General, albeit of more diminutive stature, marching before his countless hordes of A. Aegypti soldiers, delivering insectoid speeches in preparation for this incoming force. As the British soon realized, the Spanish were not the most fearsome enemy in the 17th century Caribbean, but rather the climatic shift from May-October, which brought on heat, rain, and teeming masses of bloodsucking mosquitoes (9). Despite not understanding the mechanism by which diseases like yellow fever and vivax/falciparum were transmitted, there was little speculation about the effect the seasonal shifts had on the success of military campaigns. However, rather than taking the deaths of their densely-manned amphibious expeditions seriously, which often saw mortality rates ranging between 53-90 percent of the non-immune, the Brits committed themselves to a war of attrition with the Spanish and their invisible allies (137). In the wake of tens of thousands of deaths to illness, the empires simply poured more men into the region.

        After the fateful voyages of Cathcart, Wentworth, and Vernon in 1741-1742, in which early successes in Portobelo and Chagres were reversed by stunning losses of life to el vomito in Cartagena and Cuba, the Brits still seemed incapable of grasping the depth of despair that military and trade voyages were experiencing during the Caribbean's rainy months. In contrast, the Spanish were not only aware of the outcomes that seasonal influxes of yellow fever and immigrants created; they framed their entire defensive strategy upon it (11). Noticing that locally born individuals gained immunity to yellow fever, as well as the presence of pre-existing immunities to yellow fever and immune-resistance to malaria among West African slaves, the Spanish sought to harness the devastating power of the diseases in what amounts to little less than germ warfare (4). The installment of dense fortifications at crucial choke points throughout the Caribbean, most notably in Havana and Cartagena, allowed Spain to stall British forces in prolonged sieges, providing the necessary six-week window for the pestilential spread of yellow jack and malaria among non-immune Europeans (11). The British leadership's lack of concern for its men's mortality is a genuinely unsettling reality of this period of territorial conflict, as headstrong British commanders effectively allowed themselves to be baited into a series of Cadmean victories (16).

        The statistical figures of those killed by disease reveal just how deadly these brief skirmishes were in the American tropics. Back home, in Europe, the War of Austrian Succession (1740-1748) saw about eight percent of the military force die from disease and war-related wounds (16). In contrast, Cathcart's expedition to Cartagena saw 90 percent of its European military force killed by the disease. During Edward Vernon's campaigns, approximately 22,000 out of 29,000 men were killed, with 21,000 dying due to disease alone (16). It is hard to comprehend the British strategy in the tropics. Despite knowing the dangers of attempting land sieges outside of the Caribbean's dry season (October to May), the British repeatedly found themselves in summer-time sieges, whose success depended on having a seemingly endless supply of artillery and human resources. This war of attrition eventually led to the British seizure of Portobelo, Cartagena, Chagres, and finally Havana (in 1771), but there was little joy to be had in such victories. Despite securing around 3,000,000 pounds in Spanish booty, the anemic campaigns' toll on the British psyche was deeply etched. After the sack of Havana, the Brits traded it back to the Spanish for land rights to Florida (26). In the years following the Caribbean's conquest, British power was diminished, as evidenced by their inability to quell Pontiac's Rebellion or the revolt of their colonies in North America during the American Revolution (27). The fallout of yellow fever and malaria pandemics throughout the 18th century would shape North America's future more than any other factor.

        Linking together the horrific spread of yellow fever and malaria with the outcome of Europe's conquest of the New World provides an illuminating framework for the political and military decisions made between 1685-1888. Rather than being wars of heroism and national pride, the skirmishes between Spain and Britain were graphic displays of a vulgar disregard for human life. The tens-of-thousands Europeans that died in the attempt to settle this hazardous region greatly diminished the military power of all parties involved, thus creating a power vacuum that would eventually become the United States of America, among other independent nations. The fact that West African slaves had immunity to yellow fever, and resistance to malaria, also provides an impetus for the importation of so many people from this region in particular. This view coincides with Philip Curtin's "The Rise and Fall of the Plantation Complex," which details, among other things, the rise of sugar plantations and the increased distribution of African slaves throughout the American tropics. As with Curtin, historians like McNeill and Rosenberg expose the reader to the broader array of world events that served as catalysts for the expeditions into the New World, most notably those related to challenges presented by forces outside of human control. It is critical to understand that transatlantic enterprises were rarely created by implementing intricately planned sieges or political know-how. Instead, their creation frequently stemmed from ad-hoc reactions to demands of the moment. As with Jamestown and Bermuda, and later the West Indies, it was unintended and unplanned for side-effects of dynamic ecological and interpersonal interactions that generated many of history's most storied outcomes.

Bibliography

McNeill, J R. Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean 1620-1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

McNeill, J R. "Yellow Jack and Geopolitics: Environment, Epidemics, and Struggles for Empire in the American Tropics, 1650-1825." OAH History, April 2004. 9-13

Curtin, Phillip D. The rise and fall of the Plantation Complex. New York: Cambridge University Press

Rosenberg, Charles E. The Cholera Years. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987.