Indigenous Carib (Kalinago) Anti-colonial Resistance (1490s)

Timeline

1. 1493Guadeloupe · GuadeloupeIn September 1493 Columbus began his second voyage with 17 ships and about 1,200 men, arriving in November at islands including Dominica, Marie-Galante, and Guadeloupe. At Guadeloupe the Spanish found several villages and women and children held by the local people, who sought refuge with the Spanish; Columbus on this basis classified the local people as "Caribs."
2. 1493Santa Cruz Island (Santa Cruz) · Virgin IslandsThe fleet encountered a canoe near Santa Cruz (today's U.S. Virgin Islands) carrying several local men and women. When the Spanish tried to capture them they were met with arrow fire, and at least one Spaniard was seriously wounded and died. After the exchange the Spanish captured or killed those aboard—one of the earliest well-documented incidents of indigenous Carib armed resistance.
3. 1494–1500Waters of the Lesser Antilles · Lesser AntillesContact in the 1490s led Spain to label the inhabitants of the Windward Islands collectively as warlike "Caribs/cannibals," providing a pretext for subsequent slaving expeditions (a 1503 royal decree authorized the slave trade in "Caribs"). Indigenous peoples of the Lesser Antilles continued resisting with canoes, poisoned arrows, and raiding tactics, preventing Spain from establishing a firm colony in the 1490s and the following decades; the 1525 colonization attempt at Guadeloupe also failed.