British Capture of Guadeloupe
Britain took Guadeloupe from France in 1759 and argued for four years about whether to keep it or Canada. The expedition was part of Pitt's global strategy of using naval superiority to take French colonies while subsidising Prussia to occupy the French army in Europe. A force arrived in January, bombarded Basse-Terre into ruins, and then discovered that taking a town on a Caribbean island is not the same as holding the island; the campaign took three months of marching through cane fields and mountains, and disease killed far more of the attackers than the fighting. The planters surrendered in May on terms that guaranteed their property, their religion and their laws, and were delighted. Guadeloupe under French rule had been short of enslaved labour because the French navy could not protect its shipping, and British occupation opened the island to British slavers, who landed some 18,000 people in four years, and to the North American provision trade. Sugar exports rose sharply. That is why the argument at the peace was serious. Guadeloupe's sugar was worth more in cash terms than the entire fur trade of Canada, the West Indian planting interest in Parliament lobbied hard to keep the island and get rid of a competitor, and Voltaire's line about a few acres of snow was a common opinion in both countries. Britain kept Canada and returned Guadeloupe in 1763, on strategic rather than commercial reasoning. The island is a French department today. The debate is the clearest case on record of an empire choosing land over money. Sugar islands were the most profitable colonies anyone had, and Britain took a continent instead, and lost the most valuable part of it within twenty years.
- Year: 1759 CE
- Category: Military
