British Honduras
Belize, 1862–1981. Draft, not yet reviewed
British Honduras was a Crown colony on the east coast of Central America. In 1862, the Settlement of Belize in the Bay of Honduras was declared a British colony called British Honduras, and the Crown's representative was elevated to a lieutenant governor, subordinate to the governor of Jamaica. In 1964 Britain granted British Honduras self-government under a new constitution. On 1 June 1973, British Honduras was officially renamed Belize.
Seat of power: Belize City
Rulers
James Robert Longden
Governor of British Honduras, 1867–1870
In 1867 he became Governor of British Honduras, and in 1870 Governor of Trinidad.
Portrait of James Robert Longden: Book by Arnold Wright; Photographer not stated, Public domain, file
Cornelius Alfred Moloney
Governor of British Honduras, 1891–1897
He was Governor of British Honduras from 1891 to 1897.
Ernest Bickham Sweet-Escott
Governor of British Honduras, 1904–1906
He was a British colonial administrator who was in turn governor of the British Seychelles, British Honduras, British Leeward Islands and British Fiji.
Portrait of Ernest Bickham Sweet-Escott: Bain News Service, publisher, Public domain, file
Wilfred Collet
Governor of British Honduras, 1913–1918
He was a British colonial administrator who was governor of British Honduras and then of British Guiana.
Eyre Hutson
Governor of British Honduras, 1918–1925
He was an English colonial administrator who became Governor of British Honduras and later Governor of Fiji.
Ronald Garvey
Governor of British Honduras, 1949–1952
He was a British Colonial Service administrator who served in the Pacific, the West Indies, and as Lieutenant Governor of the Isle of Man at the end of his career.
John Warburton Paul
Governor of British Honduras, 1966–1972
He was a British colonial administrator and civil servant. He was the Governor of British Honduras from 1966 to 1972.
Culture
- London officially ended slavery in the Bay in 1838. But the Baymen continued to control and command the labour of the free slaves for over a century by denying them access to land, and by ensuring their continued dependency through a system of truck wages.
- During the Caste War of Yucatán, a devastating struggle that halved the population of the area between 1847 and 1855, thousands of refugees fled to British Honduras.
- The Great Depression of the 1930s caused a near-collapse of the colony's economy as British demand for timber plummeted.
- The first election under universal suffrage was held in 1954 and was decisively won by the PUP, beginning a three-decade period in which the PUP dominated the country's politics.
Picture
Belize City was founded as "Belize Town" in 1638 by English lumber harvesters.
Image: Pgbk1987, CC BY 3.0, file
Sources
Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.