60GETTY IMAGESHistoric citiesAn image of Havana from the first
half of the 19th century shows its
bustling harbour and shipyards- but can’t convey the smell and
dirt of its unpaved streets
Havana
Early 19th century
Cosmopolitan port of elegant
promenades, well-informed
residents and enslaved workersHavana, the hub of the Spanish empire
in the western hemisphere, was built
around a great harbour. Here, treasure
fleets assembled before returning to
Europe bearing the spoils of the New
World. Following a brief occupation by
Britain during the Seven Years’ War
(1756–63), the city opened up to wider
trade, the vast shipyards bustled with
activity, immigration soared and massive
fortifications were built.
In 1800, Prussian polymath Alex-
ander von Humboldt visited Cuba. His
account of its economy and society incor-
porated detailed statistics prepared by the
Spanish colonial government to explore
the island’s potential for development –work that saw him dubbed “the second
discoverer of Cuba”. He described the
activity of Havana’s busy harbour and
shipyards, the solid cathedral and Gov-
ernor’s House, the elegant promenades
and the country houses of the wealthier
inhabitants, their contents often ordered
from pattern-books and delivered from
the United States.
The city’s residents were outward-
looking and well-informed of current
affairs in Europe and the wider world.
A noted naturalist, Humboldt lauded
the majesty of the city’s royal palm trees,
soaring some 25 metres high. But he was
not blind to the darker side of the city:
he was disturbed by the smell and dirt of
its unpaved streets, which sometimes left
the visitor wading through knee-deep
mud, though he observed that some bore
the traces of a failed experiment to pave
them with mahogany tree-trunks. “The
many carriages or volantes, which are the
characteristic carriages of this city, and
the drays laden with boxes of sugar, theirdrivers rudely elbowing the passer-by,
made walking in the streets both vexa-
tious and humiliating,” he wrote.
The object of Humboldt’s strongest
disapproval, though, was slavery, which
he condemned as “possibly the greatest
evil ever to have afflicted humanity” (his
book was initially banned in Cuba). The
numbers of slaves arriving from Africa
soared in the later 18th and early 19th
century, and Humboldt distinguished
between the lot of the urban slave and
the growing numbers on the many new
sugar plantations; he also noted a great
rise in the importation of female slaves.
He saw, too, that Cuban law and custom
made it relatively simple for a slave to buy
or be granted freedom, so that there was
a large free black population. Even so,
fears persisted in Cuba of a black revolt
against the colonial system, as in the
French colony of Saint-Domingue (now
Haiti) in 1791. In Cuba, brief rebellions
in 1810 and 1812, led by free black peo-
ple, were violently quashed.ИЗП
ОДГОТОВИЛАГРSpanish colonial government to explore РSpanish colonial government to explore
the island’s potential for development –Р
the island’s potential for development –Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore УУПП
Spanish colonial government to explore Spanish colonial government to explore АА"What'sNews"the island’s potential for development –
News"the island’s potential for development –VK.COM/WSNWS60
VK.COM/WSNWS60the island’s potential for development –VK.COM/WSNWSthe island’s potential for development –