Slavery
Local inhabitants were exploited as forced labors in gold and copper mine.
Spain imported a large number of slaves from Africa. Statistics: - Over the next 300 years, almost one million West Africans were taken to Cuba. - By the 17th century, Africans formed almost 50 per cent of Cuba’s population. - From 1821–31 alone, it is estimated that 600,000 slaves were imported. - The vast majority of slaves (possibly as high as 85 per cent) arrived in the 19th century.
Impact
Slaves worked on the sugar and tobacco plantations that, from the 17th century, had come to replace cattle ranching as Cuba’s main economic activity.
Slavery had an important impact on Cuba’s developing society, culture and economy.
Rebellions
In 1532, there was a rebellion in a gold mine. in 1538, blacks and native Cubans joined together against the white landowners. As became increasingly evident after 1800, the experience of slavery eventually resulted in black Cubans forming the bulk of the military forces that successfully fought to end Spanish control of Cuba.
Economy
Initially, the main source of wealth was growing of tabacco+cattle ranching+sugar plantation.
Landowners aimed to increase their wealth by adopting more modern methods. More imported slave to expand sugar plantation.
-> During the second half of the 18th century, the number of slave ships arriving in Cuba rose from six to 200 a year. The number of sugar plantations in Cuba increased fivefold, and the amount of land for sugar production doubled between the 1770s and the 1790s.
By 1800, sugar was Cuba’s biggest single export. The wealth this generated soon turned Cuba into Spain’s most valuable colony.
[[../sections/1 Origin and rise of independence movements|1 Origin and rise of independence movements]]
La Escalera Rebellion, 1843–4
It was a joint rebellion of slaves and ‘free people of colour’, and some of their leaders believed they would have Britain’s support.
aim: This rebellion was essentially one of blacks and mulattos wanting to end slavery and achieve equal rights, rather than a clear struggle for Cuban independence.
The rebellion spread quickly across western Cuba. One of the uprisings, in November 1843, took place in Matanzas province — and was led by a black female slave known as ==‘La Negra Carlota’==.
Cuba’s captain-general, ==Leopoldo O’Donnell==, and the ==Comision Militar== quickly suppressed from January to March 1844 the rebellion.
Outcome: The Cuban authorities then exiled all free blacks not born in Cuba — as O’Donnell assumed they had stirred up the black slaves.
Significance: This rebellion was the most significant one between Aponte’s 1812 rebellion, and the First War of Independence that began in 1868.
The first and second war of Independance invlove many slaves in fighting, especially in the second war
The Second War of Independence, 1895-8
main leaders: ==Jose Marti== and ==Maximo Gomez==
Early actions
1st April, 1895, José Martí and Máximo Gómez, landed with a small band of revolutionaries on the southern coast of Cuba. At the same time, ==Antonio Maceo== — and his brother, José — landed with a small force on the north coast of Oriente province, to support the February uprising.
19 May, Martí was killed in a Spanish ambush. - -> Gómez and Maceo organised a revolutionary government meeting the need for military leaders to have more independence: - In September 1895, rebel leaders formed a constituent assembly which then approved a constitution. - Gómez and Maceo were able to get this to include a clause that made it clear that the civilian authorities could only intervene in military operations if ‘absolutely necessary’ to achieve important political ends. - The constituent assembly then chose Salvador Cisneros Betancourt, a wealthy aristocrat who had fought in the First Independence War as president; - while Tomás Estrada Palma (the last president of the Republic in 1878) was appointed as the foreign representative of the ‘Republic in Arms’. - Gómez was then appointed as commander-in-chief, with Maceo as second in command.
The rebellion spread rapidly during 1895. By the end of the year, Gómez and Maceo commanded a force of more than 30,000 rebels — 80 per cent of them were black, and were referred to by white Spanish troops as the mambises. (==Former slave support==).
initial appointment: Gómez’s promotion of lower-middle-class and black individuals to officer roles based on military skill