The Bahamas in International Intrigue: Lighthouses and Cay Sal Bank

Abstract

By the early 19th century after a series of wars with France, Spain and the United States of America, Britain jealously guarded every inch of her West Indian colonies. The United States of America’s request for cession of strategic plots of land in The Bahamas for lighthouses was considered by Britain with mistrust. Relations between Britain and its former colony had been strained since the War of Independence and the War of 1812. The ideology of the Monroe Doctrine sought to expand United States territory and economic power but Britain did not want that expansion to be into her sovereign territory. Of further concern to Britain was that one of the areas requested, the Cay Sal Bank, of strategic importance to the United States of America, was at the time contentiously claimed by both the British colony of The Bahamas and the Spanish colony of Cuba.