Captaincy General of Cuba

Captaincy General of Cuba Provincia de Cuba
1607–1898
Flag Coat of arms
Error creating thumbnail: Captaincies General of Cuba (center) and Puerto Rico (upper right corner), and their respective location in the Caribbean Sea (lower left corner).
Capital	Havana (population 576,935 in 1874)
Common languages	Spanish Indigenous languages
Religion	Catholicism (official)
King
• 1777–1788	Charles III (first)
• 1886–1898	Alfonso XIII (last) (regent: Maria Christina)
Governor and Captain General
• 1763–1765	Ambrosio de Funes Villalpando (first)
• 1887–1898	Ramón Blanco y Erenas (last)
Historical era	Spanish conquest of the Americas Hispanic Monarchy:
• Administrative reorganization	1607
• Treaty of Paris	10 December 1898
Population
• Estimate	2,986,494
Currency	Real, Peso
ISO 3166 code	CU
Preceded by Succeeded by Viceroyalty of New Spain Captaincy General of Santo Domingo United States Military Government in Cuba Colony of Jamaica Spanish Florida Spanish Louisiana
Today part of	Cuba
Autonomous captaincy general dependent on the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo until 1795 and in turn on the Viceroyalty of New Spain until 1821. As a dependency of the Columbian Viceroyalty it was a lieutenancy of government from 1511, a New Spanish governorate of Cuba from 1535, and a governorate and captaincy general from 1577 to 1777.

The Captaincy General of Cuba was a political entity that formed part of the Spanish Empire, established by the Spanish Crown in 1607, during its period of American dominion. It formed part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain until 1821.

Previously, the island and its provinces made up the Governorate of Cuba, which was a dependency of the Captaincy General of Santo Domingo from 1535. It later received greater autonomy from 1764 as a result of the Bourbon reforms carried out in the Viceroyalty of New Spain by the Count of Floridablanca, who steered the foreign policy of Charles III toward strengthening the Spanish position against the United Kingdom, especially in the Caribbean Sea.

The Governorate of Cuba and its successor, the captaincy general of the same name, comprised, in addition to the island of Cuba, Jamaica until 1655, the Province of La Florida from 1567, and Spanish Louisiana from 1763.

From then on, the Cuban administration was dominated by captains general, most of them military men. Some of them saw their performance rewarded by later being elevated to Viceroys of New Spain.

From 1825, the Captain General of Cuba was endowed with broad powers in the branches of Government, Justice and Treasury, in addition to remaining the highest military authority. And from the second half of the 19th century, he was also its Governor General, the viceroyalties on the American mainland having been lost.

History

Background

Diego Velázquez, Lieutenant of the Viceroy Diego Columbus, began the conquest of Cuba in 1511, taking office as the first Governor of the island of Fernandina (Cuba) and remaining in the post until 1524.

Nuestra Señora de la Asunción de Baracoa was founded in 1511, San Salvador de Bayamo in 1513, Santísima Trinidad, Sancti Spíritus and San Cristóbal de La Habana in 1514, and Santa María del Puerto del Príncipe and Santiago de Cuba in 1515.

From the 16th century, the Province of Cuba was under the command of the Governor and captain-at-war of Santiago, dependent on the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo. On 26 July 1553 that Audiencia authorized the Governor to reside in Havana.

In 1567, the Governor of Cuba and Adelantado of La Florida, Admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, definitively subdued the natives and annexed the peninsula of La Florida to the Governorate of Cuba.

In 1579, the office of captain general was added to that of Governor of Cuba when Captain Gabriel de Luján was appointed Governor; he took office in 1581. In matters of government the Governor remained subject to the Viceroy of New Spain; in naval matters he depended on the generals of the fleets stationed in the port; and in judicial matters he depended on the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo.

Division of the island into two governments

By the royal decree of 8 October 1607, King Philip III created the Captaincy General of Cuba and divided the Island of Cuba into two governments: the Western Department, seated in Havana, and the Eastern Department, seated in Santiago de Cuba. The jurisdiction of the Governor of Havana was fixed on the east up to fifty leagues from the city.

[…] and I want and it is my will that whichever of the said two governors has charge of the government of the city of San Cristóbal de La Habana and the said places of its district be and be titled my Governor and Captain General of the island of Cuba and of the said city, as those who have been so for the whole Island have been titled until now […]
And because of the drawbacks that it is considered could result from the contrary, I order that my Governor and captain-at-war of the city of Santiago de Cuba and its district be subordinate, in everything that touches upon and depends on matters of government and war, to my Governor and Captain General of the said Island and city of Havana […]

The towns of Baracoa, Bayamo and Puerto Príncipe—present-day Camagüey—came under the jurisdiction of the Governor of Santiago de Cuba. The towns of San Juan de los Remedios, Sancti Spíritus and Trinidad were not assigned to either government and remained exempt and directly subject to the Governor General. The island was divided by the order: let 80 leagues be measured from Cape San Antonio, and let a line be drawn from north to south.

Oil painting of the port of Havana, 1639

Pedro Valdés took office as Governor and Captain General of Cuba, residing in Havana, and Juan Villaverde y Ozeta as Governor and captain-at-war of Santiago, in the city of the same name. In the branch of war, the Governor of Santiago remained dependent on the Captain General. Each governor had administrative autonomy, dealing directly with the Court of the King. In judicial matters both governments continued under the jurisdiction of the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo.

In 1655, during the Anglo-Spanish War, the British definitively expelled the Spaniards from Jamaica, which was under the direct dependency of the Captaincy General of Santo Domingo; the Spaniards emigrated to Cuba.

In 1756, the Naval Intendancy of Havana was created, which acted as a "Royal Factory" of ships and vessels.

On 6 June 1762, a large British armada appeared, with more than 50 ships and 14,000 men. To take the city, the British had to force the surrender of the Morro Castle, defended by a determined garrison led by the ship-of-the-line captain Luis de Velasco and the Marquis Vicente Gómez. Havana fell after a two-month siege. Within a year the Spaniards restored sovereignty, but many defensive deficiencies had been exposed. The British withdrew from Cuba on 10 February 1763 after the Treaty of Paris and in exchange for the cession of Florida to the Kingdom of Great Britain. In compensation for the loss of Havana, Spain received from France the territory of Louisiana on 3 November 1762.

After the British evacuation, the King of Spain commissioned General Alejandro O'Reilly to carry out a thorough military reorganization in Cuba.

In 1763, construction began on the Fortress of San Carlos de La Cabaña in Havana, the largest of those built by Spain in the New World. Its privileged position made it an impregnable bastion; it is said that the works dragged on so long and at such high cost that Charles III, King of Spain, looked out of the window of his palace with a spyglass so that they could point out to him where that construction was located.

From the Bourbon reforms

From 1764, the governor of Santiago was already a permanent Captain General, and in 1774 the first official census of Cuba was carried out, which yielded a result of 171,670 inhabitants.

On 31 October 1764, the Intendancy of Havana was established, the first intendancy of treasury and war created in Hispanic America. Its first intendant was Miguel de Altarriba, who took office on 8 March 1765.

In 1766, the Intendancy of New Orleans was created in the province of Spanish Louisiana, which depended on the Cuban governorate. Its first intendant was Juan José de Loyola y Mendoza, with the military command in the hands of Antonio de Ulloa, but shortly afterward Loyola y Mendoza assumed it as well.

Evolution of the Captaincy General of Cuba

In 1777, thanks to the intervention of the Minister of the Indies José de Gálvez, the Captaincy General of Cuba, which included the island of the same name and Spanish Louisiana, became independent of that of Santo Domingo, although it would remain dependent for a couple more decades on the Real Audiencia of the same name, and thus it became an autonomous entity within the New Spanish Viceroyalty.

The Spaniards recovered West Florida for the Cuban captaincy general in 1779 and took San Carlos de Penzacola in 1781, both thanks to Bernardo de Gálvez. Spain also recovered East Florida by means of the peace preliminaries agreed upon by Prince William IV of England during his visit to the residence of Captain General Luis de Unzaga y Amézaga in Havana in April 1783, where they exchanged the Bahamas for the Floridas, later ratified by the Treaty of Paris of September 1783; despite this, Luis de Unzaga y Amézaga had to send a battalion from Cuba to recover the city of San Agustín, since its British governor was still resisting.

Between 1784 and 1785, the relations of this Captaincy General with the newly born United States were excellent, since they helped each other, with correspondence at the highest diplomatic level between Luis de Unzaga y Amézaga and the founding fathers of the United States: George Washington, Robert Morris and Patrick Henry, among others.

In 1794, a Royal Consulate of Agriculture and Commerce was created in Havana. In 1795, by the Treaty of Basel, the territory of Santo Domingo was ceded to France.

Beginning of the 19th century

In 1800, the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo was moved to Santa María del Puerto Príncipe—present-day Camagüey—as had been ordered on 22 May 1797, since that island had been ceded to France, although it had previously been installed in Santiago de Cuba from 1799. It remained in Puerto Príncipe until 1808, when it was moved to Havana, later returning to Puerto Príncipe.

In 1812, the Constitution of Cádiz stated:

The Spanish territory comprises […] the island of Cuba with the two Floridas, the Spanish part of the island of Santo Domingo, and the island of Puerto Rico with the others adjacent to these and to the mainland in both seas.

The Spanish Constitution of 1812, promulgated by the Cortes of Cádiz (which served as a parliamentary regency after Ferdinand VII was deposed), declared the territory of the Captaincy General an integral part of the Spanish Monarchy and transformed it into a province with its own elected "provincial deputation" (the provincial deputations of Cuba, Santo Domingo and Puerto Rico being created, and by decree of 23 May 1812 that of Santiago de Cuba was created), a governing board with joint administrative and limited legislative powers. The municipalities also received locally elected cabildos. The provincial deputation and the cabildos functioned while the Constitution was in force from 1812 to 1814 (in 1813 the Intendancy of Puerto Príncipe was created together with the Intendancy of Santiago de Cuba, with jurisdiction over Treasury) and from 1820 to 1823. Finally, the Constitution was abolished by Ferdinand VII.

To secure sovereignty against pro-independence threats (the Conspiracy of the Suns and Rays of Bolívar) and annexationist threats (from Mexico and Colombia), from the royal order of 8 May 1825 Captain General Francisco Dionisio Vives obtained from the King absolute and total powers for the government of the island, and the Permanent Military Commission was created with jurisdiction over political matters. It was communicated that from that moment the Captain General would hold:

the full extent of the powers that the Royal Ordinances grant to the governors of besieged strongholds.

He could also suspend any law he deemed appropriate, reporting to the King for his approval.

The Constitution of 1812 came back into force in 1836 owing to the mutiny of La Granja de San Ildefonso. The new Constitution of 1837 established the principle of specialty for the government of the overseas provinces of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines, reinforcing an autocratic colonial regime, deprived of representation in the Cortes of Spain and suppressing the democratically elected town councils and provincial deputations, the island being governed directly by the Crown through the Captain General. The Constitution of 1845 maintained the same regime, which would last until the war of 1868.

The Reales Audiencias

The Real Audiencia of Havana was created by royal decree of 18 August 1838. The territory of the Real Audiencia of Puerto Príncipe was limited to the Eastern and Central provinces or departments of the Island of Cuba, the latter of which included the governments of Trinidad and Nueva Colonia Fernandina de Jagua. The rest of the territory of the Island of Cuba was assigned to the Real Audiencia of Havana.

That of Puerto Príncipe was abolished in 1853; in 1859 the municipal regime was reformed, and in 1868 it was reestablished as the Real Audiencia of Camagüey with jurisdiction over the Central and Eastern departments of Cuba. On 1 July 1871 the Real Audiencia of Santiago de Cuba was established; it was abolished shortly afterward and recreated on 28 November 1898.

A Spanish frigate towing a British ship to Havana. Oil painting, circa 1770.

A great socioeconomic transformation took place in the Captaincy General of Cuba during the 18th century. The island went from being a defensive key of the Caribbean that was sustained by the Mexican situado and some agricultural and livestock production, to a flourishing colony exporting sugar, tobacco and coffee. Cuba could not prosper before the 1760s due to Spanish trade regulations. Spain had installed a monopoly in the Caribbean and its primary objective was to protect it. The islands were not allowed to trade with any foreign ship. As soon as Spain opened Cuba's ports to foreign ships, a great sugar boom began, lasting until the 1880s.

In 1852, Captain General José Gutiérrez de la Concha referred to one of the most serious problems for the sociopolitical stability of the Island of Cuba: the formation of the españolista party, with interests that did not always coincide with those of the metropolis. He summed up the distrust he felt toward this power group in the following terms:

All the consideration that even the exaggeration of national sentiment in good Spaniards deserves must disappear when dealing with those who seek to speculate for their own benefit with that sentiment, for these, and bad public officials, do as much or more harm to Spain than those who openly conspire against the Government, because against the latter there are the laws and force, which cannot always be applied to those who in that manner disguise their evil passions. It would therefore be a grave error for whoever governed in Cuba not to resort, in given cases and in difficult circumstances, to the extraordinary powers with which the governor captain general is and must always be invested.

The Spanish Constitution of 1869 established that:

Art. 108. The Cortes shall reform the system of government of the overseas provinces once the deputies of Cuba or Puerto Rico have taken their seats, in order to extend to them, with the modifications deemed necessary, the rights set forth in the Constitution.

The outbreak of the war of independence in October 1868 prevented the election of Cuban deputies, so the constitutional regime was not applied on the island.

Postage stamp of 1881 with the effigy of King Alfonso XII

On 30 June 1876, King Alfonso XII promulgated the Constitution that was to govern until November 1897; it again provided for the government of the island by special laws. In 1879, Cuban deputies were once again admitted to the Cortes of Spain. Between 1880 and 1886 slavery was abolished in Cuba.

Thus revolts followed one after another during the second half of the 19th century, supported by ideologues of the stature of José Martí, which General Martínez Campos, sent especially from the metropolis, suppressed and sealed in the Peace of Zanjón (1878). By 1897 the Captaincy General was separated from the Government and Cuba was given a bicameral parliament. This system lasted only a few months, since shortly afterward the Spanish–American War would break out in 1898 with disastrous consequences for Spain: the loss of its Overseas provinces.

On 25 November 1897, the Autonomous Constitution for the islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico was promulgated:

The Government of each of the Islands shall consist of an Insular Parliament, divided into two Chambers, and of a Governor General, representative of the Metropolis, who shall exercise the supreme Authority in its name.

Ecclesiastical organization

Main article: Spanish Catholic dioceses of the Indies

In 1518, the Diocese of Asunción de Baracoa (or Cuba) was erected, suffragan of the Archdiocese of Seville. It was moved to Santiago de Cuba in 1522.

On 5 December 1520, Pope Leo X erected the Diocese of Santiago de la Florida (or Tierra Florida), but it did not survive.

By means of the bull Super universæ orbis ecclesiæ of Paul III of 12 February 1546, the Archdiocese of Santo Domingo was erected, with the Diocese of Santiago de Cuba assigned to it as one of its suffragans.

On 10 September 1787, the Diocese of San Cristóbal de La Habana, Louisiana and the Floridas was erected, separated from that of Santiago de Cuba, both remaining suffragans of the Archbishopric of Santo Domingo.

On 25 April 1793, the Diocese of Louisiana and the Two Floridas was erected as a suffragan of Santo Domingo.

As a result of the Peace of Basel, the Archdiocese of Santo Domingo disappeared in 1795, and consequently in 1803 the Archdiocese of Santiago de Cuba was erected, its suffragans becoming the Diocese of San Cristóbal de La Habana, that of San Juan de Puerto Rico, and the Diocese of La Luisiana and the two Floridas.

See also

• Colonial governors of Cuba

Bibliography

• José Gregorio Cayuela Fernández and Ángel Bahamonde Magro, Hacer las Américas. Las elites coloniales españolas en el siglo XIX. Alianza Editorial, 1992. ISBN 84-206-4231-2.
• José Gregorio Cayuela Fernández, Bahía de Ultramar. España y Cuba en el siglo XIX. El control de las relaciones coloniales. Siglo XXI Editorial, 1992. ISBN 84-323-0788-2.