It would be easy for the reflective historian to engage in many
interesting and pertinent observations concerning the time in which
Captain Francisco Carreno became governor of Cuba. It was the year 1577.
That was the year in which the sixth religious war in France began, a
struggle which made inevitable the still greater religious wars which
followed, in which not merely two factions in France but the two great
powers of Spain and England were the chief belligerents. That was the
year, too, in which Sir Francis Drake began his voyage around the world,
which was perhaps the most momentous since that of Columbus in 1492,
since it led directly to the strife between Spain and England in
America, the English conquest of Cuba, the foundation of the English
colonies in North America, and the subsequent development of the United
States; all having the most direct and important bearing upon the
fortunes of Cuba.
Albeit he was a native of that city of Cadiz in the harbor of which
Drake performed one of his most daring and most famous feats, Carreno
probably entered upon his governorship with no premonitions of what was
in store. While Drake was furrowing the strange expanses of the South
Sea, it was French privateers that chiefly troubled the Spanish Main and
menaced the ports of Cuba. Their favorite cruising ground was in the
waters between Cuba and Jamaica, and between Cuba and Hispaniola, and
their menace to Cuba was chiefly to the ports between Cape Maysi and
Cape Cruz, and in the Gulf of Guacanabo. The chief sufferers, as also
the chief gainers from contraband trade, were Santiago, Manzanillo, and
the settlements at the mouth of the Guantanamo River. The people of
those places were never sure whether an approaching French vessel was
bent on contraband trade or war and plunder; and indeed the Frenchman
himself sometimes left that question to be answered after he had landed
and viewed the place. He then decided which would be the more
profitable, to trade with the people or to plunder them. At times, too,
it must be confessed, the Spaniards were in similar uncertainty whether
to receive the French as traders or to slay them--if they could--as
enemies.
Carreno was the first governor of Cuba to die in office, his death
occurring on April 27, 1579. His administration thus lasted only two
years; but they were years filled with hard work on his part and with
much progress for the island. The sugar industry which had been founded
in the preceding administration prospered and expanded, and caused a
considerable increase in slave-holding. Negro slaves were the favorite
workmen on the plantations and at the mills, and a large number of them
was needed at each establishment. The increase in the number of slaves
caused, however, some anxiety lest there should be servile
insurrections, such as had occurred on the Isthmus of Panama, in Mexico
and elsewhere; so that in 1579 the government refused to permit any more
to be imported, even though they were wanted by the governor himself. It
is recorded that his personal request for a thousand negroes to work at
copper mining was refused by the King, or by the Council for the Indies.
Anxiety was caused, also, by the increasing number of free negroes, and
of slaves who were practically free. Most of the entirely free negroes
had been slaves but had bought their freedom from their masters for
cash. This was not particularly difficult, since the market value of the
best negro slaves at that time was only from fifty to sixty pesos. Those
practically free were slaves who were permitted by their owners to live
where they pleased and work as they pleased, on condition of paying
their masters certain royalties every week or month. In Carreno's time
there were hundreds of negroes of these classes in and about Havana, and
probably still more of them in the eastern end of the island. The
anxiety concerning them arose from two causes. One was, the fear that
they might incite the slaves to insurrection, placing themselves at the
head of the movement; a fear which was not at that time realized. The
other was, the fear that they would build up objectionable communities.
Thus in Havana they occupied a quarter of the town by themselves, in
which their wooden cabins were huddled closely together; the sanitary
conditions were bad; and the danger of fire which might imperil the
whole town was obviously imminent. There was in Carreno's time a
movement to procure their deportation to Florida or elsewhere, and to
forbid the residence of free negroes in Cuba; but it did not become
effective.
It is agreeable to remember that in spite of the obviously objectionable
nature of the institution of slavery, and in spite of the fears and
anxieties which have been mentioned, negro slavery in Cuba in those
early days was not marked with the distressing features which it has
elsewhere borne. It was probably more humane than it was two and a half
centuries later in the United States. The slaves were seldom sold by one
master to another, and never in circumstances which separated husband
and wife, or parents and young children. Severe physical punishments
were prohibited. Their masters were compelled to feed them well, and to
provide them with decent and comfortable clothes. There was no personal
or social prejudice against them, but they were permitted to attend
church and to frequent all public places on equal terms with the
Spaniards. Ordinarily they were not permitted to carry weapons; but
those who occupation seemed to make it desirable for them to be armed,
such as cattle-rangers, and messengers travelling from one part of the
island to another, were permitted to bear arms just as white men would
have done. Moreover, the free negroes were called upon equally with the
whites to serve as sentinels on the water fronts of cities, and were of
course provided with arms. There are no authentic records of
intermarriage between Spaniards and negroes, yet neither is there any
proof that it did not occasionally occur. We have already seen that
amalgamation with the Indians was not unknown, and in other Spanish
colonies of those and later days there were some fusions with African
blood.
What is chiefly to be remembered, however, is that negroes, although
enslaved, were regarded in Cuba as human beings, with immortal souls, no
less than their masters, and that they were invariably so treated. There
was no pretence that they were of an intrinsically inferior race, or
that they were suffering from the primaeval curse of Canaan or of Ham.
And when they gained their freedom and became educated, they were
treated socially and politically according to their merits, without
regard for the color of their skin.
In the most literal sense, the administration of Carreno was marked with
constructive statesmanship. As a statesman this Governor set about
enlarging and improving Havana and other cities, and providing them with
public and private buildings commensurate with the needs of an
increasing population. He laid out enough of the streets of Havana to
establish for all time the plan of that city. He encouraged the building
of houses, or at any rate discouraged the holding of town sites
unimproved, by making distributions of lots to all who wished them, on
condition that the owners would promptly build. If they did not build
within six months, their titles were forfeited. Another important reform
effected by him was the substitution of adobe or other masonry for wood
as building material. By the end of his administration fully half of the
houses in Havana had walls of masonry, and a considerable number had
also tiled roofs.
It was Carreno, too, who began the building of the first custom house in
Cuba, at Havana. The king had ordered Montalvo to undertake this
enterprise, but he appears to have taken no steps whatever in that
direction, not even selecting a site. Carreno essayed the task with
characteristic energy. He selected an appropriate site, at the water
front and close to the principal wharf, where an excellent rock
foundation was to be found, and there he planned to erect a building of
solid masonry, seventy feet long and two stories high. The royal
government approved the plans, and the work was promptly entered upon.
Finally, it was impossible that the new governor should not be seriously
concerned with La Fuerza. Carreno found that long-delayed edifice
practically finished, according to the old plans; its though condition
was, as hitherto suggested, decidedly unsatisfactory. He began by
insisting upon clearing away all buildings of any kind close to the
fort. This had been ordered nearly a score of years before but had never
been done. The purpose was, of course, to strengthen the fort by leaving
no shelter near its walls which might harbor or facilitate the approach
of a hostile force. Then he insisted upon building an additional story
on La Fuerza. This he declared was necessary, for barracks for the
garrison, and for a storage place for gunpowder, the fort proper being
flooded more than half the time. Doubtless these needs were real, and
Carreno intended to meet them with the new story. Yet it seems also to
have been his plan thus to secure for himself living quarters more
pleasant than the house which had been assigned to him for that purpose.
There was much opposition to his plans for enlarging La Fuerza, but he
persisted in them, and they were nearly completed at the time of his
death.
During the administration of Governor Carreno the question of the
distribution, proprietorship and use of land became of much social and
economic importance in Cuba. The population of the Island was still
small, and yet because of the immense size of the tracts which many
settlers had appropriated for cattle ranges nearly all the accessible
and available area had been taken up. In the eastern part of the Island
there was practically no unclaimed land left excepting that in the
mountains and some almost impenetrable swamps, and already many
controversies and not a few forcible conflicts had arisen over rival
claims. Thus far no private ownership of land was authorized outside of
building sites in the towns and cities. Cattle ranges and farms were
held under indefinite leases from the Crown, subject to forfeit if the
land were permitted to remain unoccupied and unused for the space of
three years. These grants were made by the municipal government in the
name of the Crown. At first the tracts thus taken were of unlimited
extent and indeed their boundaries were defined in only the vaguest
possible manner. The result naturally was that innumerable and
interminable conflicts arose over overlapping claims.
To correct such evils and to provide for a more equitable distribution
of land in future, Alfonso Caceres, who had been sent to investigate the
administration of Governor Menendez, was charged with a complete
revision of the land system of the Island and with the prescribing of
new rules and regulations for subsequent grants and titles. In entering
upon that work he found some settlers holding enormous tracts which they
had never attempted to utilize. Of these he summarily voided the titles
and assigned the land to others. Such areas were quickly taken up by new
comers, in smaller and definitely bounded tracts, so that by the time of
Governor Carreno practically the only unoccupied lands of considerable
extent and practical value were to be found in the extreme west end of
the Island.
Around Havana and some other large municipalities there were reserved
unassigned zones of from fifteen to twenty miles in width which were
kept practically as public game preserves. No grants of cattle ranges
were made in them. But they were infested by many stray cattle and hogs
which had escaped from the ranges beyond and were there running at large
in practically a wild state, and these were regarded as fair game for
hunters from the cities. It was, however, insisted that anyone killing
such stray animals must bring their hides to market with the ears
attached, so as to prove that they were indeed wild strays, since then
their ears would be unbranded while all the animals on the ranges had
their ears branded with their owner's marks.
The Government wisely desired to encourage agriculture, even at the
expense of stock raising, the latter occupation having been expanded
disproportionately to the former. It was accordingly provided that
grants of land for farming purposes might be made within this hunting
zone, and also that such grants might be made of land already
apportioned for cattle ranges, the owners of the ranges thus invaded
being indemnified by other grants of land elsewhere. By this means a
varied agricultural industry was gradually developed to the great
advantage of the Island, though for many years cattle raising remained
the chief industry. During Carreno's administration more than 20,000
hides were exported yearly, and in the great demand for leather at that
time this trade was exceedingly profitable. Of course a large amount of
meat was also produced, but the difficulty of preserving it in the warm
climate of Cuba caused much of it to go to waste, so that yearly
thousands of heads of cattle were slaughtered for their hides alone,
their carcasses being left to the dogs and buzzards.
The sudden death of Carreno caused some curious complications in the
Government of the Island. As he had been appointed for a definite term
of four years, and as that term was scarcely half expired, no successor
had yet been chosen for him. In this emergency the Supreme Court of
Hispaniola appointed a temporary governor to discharge the functions of
the office until the Crown should make a permanent appointment. The
choice of the court fell upon a lawyer, Gaspar de Torres. Even he was
not appointed until several months after the death of Carreno, and in
fact not until after the King had selected a permanent Governor to
succeed Carreno. However, as the permanent Governor would not take
office until the expiration of the term for which Carreno had been
appointed it was necessary for the temporary Governor to fill the
vacancy. Torres was appointed in October, 1579, but did not actually
assume office until the first of January, 1580. Little is known of his
antecedents, but he appears to have been an unworthy member of the legal
profession. He was possessed of an itching palm. As a result his brief
administration was filled with scandals and with controversies and
conflicts, practically all arising from his pecuniary greed and from the
unscrupulous means which he employed for satisfying it.
He came into conflict with the powerful and numerous Rojas family, and
particularly with the most conspicuous member, Juan Bautista Rojas, the
Royal Treasurer. This latter official declared that Torres was the worst
Governor Cuba had ever had, and that he misappropriated more funds than
all his predecessors put together. Apparently as Torres had been
appointed merely to fill out Carreno's unexpired term, he determined to
make hay while the sun shone. He took office in January, 1580. Eight
months later a judicial investigation into his administration was
ordered, as a result of which he was very quickly convicted of
misappropriation of funds and was ordered to refund several thousand
ducats which had been improperly collected and retained by him. Instead
of refunding, however, he absconded, leaving his bondsman to make good
his liabilities.