LITMIR.BIZ

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a lively business was carried on with contraband goods. The danger to legitimate commerce in and with the West Indies became so great that the Cuban authorities were forced towards the end of Governor Guazo's administration to adopt strenuous methods in dealing with such offenders. D. Benito Manzano, Andrez Gonzales and other mariners and soldiers of experience and known valor were sent out against them and made important seizures in this service. The governor was authorized to organize cuadrillos (patrols) of custom officers and equip custom house cutters that watched for and descended upon all vessels found without proper clearance papers or that had failed to register their cargoes in conformity to the laws of the island. The smugglers were tried and condemned to suffer various penalties, ranging from loss of property, hard labor and imprisonment, to death.

      Governor Guazo's reorganization of the military forces gave proof of his extraordinary foresight and his executive power. He formed a battalion of infantry composed of seven companies of one hundred men and besides two other companies, one of artillery, the other of light cavalry, which was later changed to mounted dragoons. Two more companies of seventy men each were added some years later by order of the king. For the lodgment of these troops Governor Guazo ordered built the rastrille (gateway of a palisade), which became later part of the fortress and the quarters that run along the southern part.

      Governor Guazo was a man of action and enterprise, besides being endowed with no little military genius. Never once during his administration did he lapse into that passive attitude which was in a large degree responsible for the slow pace at which the Spanish colonies progressed. One of his first aims was to inflict an exemplary punishment upon the outlaws of the seas that rendered insecure the coasts of the Spanish island colonies, and interfered seriously with commerce in the Gulf of Mexico. The militia of Havana had on previous occasions, when called into service on the sea, proved its mettle and displayed so much bravery and perseverance in the pursuit of its tasks that he had unlimited confidence in its ability to do the work he planned. He conferred with the governor of Florida, and they agreed upon concerted action against the English colony of St. George in the Carolinas. He made it known that he intended to dislodge the pirates on the island of the Bahamas called New Providence and for some time settled by the British. For that purpose he fitted out fourteen light vessels, ten bilanders (small one-mast ships, one of them of fourteen pieces), two brigantines (two-masted vessels with square sails) and other smaller ships with munitions and sufficient stores. Then he gathered a force of one thousand volunteers, one hundred veteran soldiers and a few of the prominent residents of the city to whom he entrusted the command of some of the ships. As head of the expedition he named D. Alfonso Carrascesa, a dependable official, and as his assistant D. Esteban Severino de Berrea, a native of Havana and the oldest captain of the white militia.

      The story of this enterprise as related by Guiteras gives a somewhat different version of the struggles between the French and the Spaniards for the possession of Pensacola as that contained in the preceding chapter. According to Guiteras the armada organized in Havana and placed under command of Carrascesa sailed on the fourth of July, 1719. But it had barely left the harbor, when it sighted two French warships. They were coming from Pensacola, which the French had just captured, and had on board as prisoners the governor and the whole garrison. Carrascesa did not for a moment lose his calm assurance at this unexpected intermezzo. He stopped the French when they turned to flee, and they were in turn captured. With the rescued Spaniards from Pensacola he returned to Havana, considering this easy victory of happy augury for the expedition upon which he had set out. But Governor Guazo persuaded him that the reconquest of Pensacola was of paramount importance. Carrascesa yielded to Guazo's arguments and the entreaties of the governor of Florida's stronghold and started upon his new task. He succeeded in recovering Pensacola and reinstalling the Spanish governor with his garrison. Of the ultimate defeat of the expedition Guiteras has nothing to say.

      Carrascesa, too, was a man of untiring activity and did not rest upon the laurels of his victory over the French. He made several expeditions to the ports of Masacra, Mobile and other places, laying waste rice fields and sugar plantations. He captured a number of transports carrying army provisions, and also took many negroes that had been brought over by the company carrying on slave trade, prisoners. So encouraged was he by his successes, that he planned another attack upon Masacra, which was defended by four batteries mounted on the coast and had a garrison of about two thousand Frenchmen and Canadians. But he realized that his forces were numerically far inferior and he desisted from carrying out this enterprise. He contented himself with turning his attention to the improvement of the fortifications of Pensacola and built a fort at the point of Siguenza for the defense of the canal. While engaged upon this work he was surprised by the arrival of a French squadron under the command of the Count de Champmeslin. There were six vessels in all well equipped with artillery far superior in quality to that of the Spaniards. A fierce and stubborn combat ensued, in which the volunteers from Havana distinguished themselves by their valor, but the French admiral succeeded in forcing the passage of Siguenza and compelled Carrascesa to surrender. Pensacola fell for the second time into the hands of the French, who, however, gave credit to the Cubans for unusual bravery and declared that, had it not been for their inferior numbers, and the inferior equipment of their ships and their troops, they never would have been defeated. This is the story of the fights for Pensacola as related by the Spanish historian Guiteras.

      Governor Guazo's administration covered one of the most important periods in the history of Cuba. One of his last acts was the proclamation in Havana in March, 1724, of the ascension of King Luis I. to the throne of Spain, his father, King Philip V., having abdicated. But King Luis died on the thirty-first of August and King Philip V. resumed the scepter. In the following month Governor Guazo retired from office and on the twenty-ninth of September was succeeded by the Brigadier D. Dionisio Martinez de la Vega. One of the first acts of Governor Martinez was to raise the garrison to the number of two hundred and fifty men. By decree of the court he also superintended the construction of the arsenal which was to contribute much to the improvement of the rather poorly equipped fleet. In order effectively to pursue his predecessor's policy of prosecuting the smuggler bands, the number of which was alarmingly multiplying on and about the island, Governor Martinez suggested to the Minister of the Treasury the erection of a shipbuilding plant to turn out vessels especially designed for that purpose. He obtained the consent of the Minister and within a short time the plan was realized.

      This dockyard for the construction of ships primarily intended for revenue service, was at first erected between the fort of la Fuerza and la Contaduria (office of the accountant or auditor of the exchequer), because that location offered great facilities to lower the vessels directly from the rocks to the sea. But as soon as the superiority of the ships built in Havana over those produced in Spain became manifest, owing to the excellent quality of the timber used, it was at once decided to extend the dockyard and it was moved to the extreme southern part of the city where it occupied a space of one-fourth of a league, near the walls with the batements and buttresses, which added much to its solidity and beauty. There within a few years were built all kinds of ships, from revenue cutters to warships intended to strengthen the Armada. In time the plant turned out large numbers of vessels. According to Valdes there were built between the years 1724 and 1796 forty-nine ships, twenty-two frigates, seven paquebots, nine brigantines, fourteen schooners, four ganguiles (barges used in the coasting-trade, lighters) and four pontones (pontoons or mud-scows, flat bottomed boats, furnished with pulleys and implements to clean harbors); in all one hundred and nine vessels.

      This shipyard and the fortifications which were being steadily improved were found of invaluable service in the year 1726, when a break between Spain and England occurred and a British fleet appeared in the Antilles. So alarmed was King Philip V. by the news of the danger of British invasion which threatened Cuba, that he immediately ordered D. Gregorio Guazo, who had in the meantime been entrusted with the superior military government of the Antilles and Central America, to adopt measures of safety. Guazo accordingly sent the squadron of D. Antonio Gastaneta with a force of one thousand men to assist in the defense of Cuba. The historians Alcazar and Blanchet report that D. Guazo himself accompanied the squadron, fell sick upon his arrival in Havana and died the same month. But Valdes records that he died on the thirteenth of August of that year in his native town of Ossuna. However, D. Juan de Andrea Marshall of Villahemosa seems to have been appointed his successor.

      The

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