Download PDF | (Brill's Series in the History of the Environment, 7) Rafal B Reichert - Wood, Trade, and Spanish Naval Power (C.1740-1795)-Brill (2024).
277 Pages
Introduction
The dynastic change in Spain in 1700 brought about a series of political, economic, military, and cultural changes. The new Bourbon dynasty, represented by King Philip V (1700–1746), set about restoring and strengthening the Spanish Empire against its main rival, Great Britain. Key to this ambitious project was the modernisation of the navy, which in the words of John Lynch: “had not even a good place to boil a cauldron of pitch”.1 This lamentable state of the Spanish navy was the consequence of the neglect of the shipbuilding industry during the reign of the last Habsburg, Charles II (1665–1700), and also the result of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1713) during which the last of the king’s ships were immobilised. For this reason, the mission of reviving Spanish naval power began as early as 1714. The creation of the Ministry of the Royal Navy and the West Indies, and later of the intendancies, maritime departments, and royal shipyards in Guarnizo, El Ferrol, Cádiz-La Carraca, Cartagena de Levante, and Havana laid the foundations for the development of modern shipbuilding in Spain.
Among the various figures who contributed to this process, the most outstanding are José Patiño, intendant and later minister of the Royal Navy, and Antonio de Gaztañeta, a sailor and shipbuilder who drew up the regulations for the king’s shipbuilding system in the “Spanish style”.2 These efforts by the king, his naval officers, and the royal treasury led to the revival of naval power, and by the eve of the War of Jenkins’ Ear (1739–1748) the Spanish fleet comprised 29 ships-of-the-line, 11 frigates, six paquebotes, four bombards, two galleons, two azogues, two galeotas, two sloops, and one pingüe.3 This policy of naval reinforcement continued between 1743 and 1795 under the Marquis of Ensenada (1743–1754), Julián de Arriaga (1754–1776), Pedro González de Castejón (1776–1783), and Antonio Valdés (1783–1795), José Patiño’s successors in the Ministry of the Royal Navy. Owing to this successful strategy, by the 1790s the Spanish Navy was the second most powerful navy in Europe, after the British Royal Navy. Several factors contributed to this: financial stability; the skilful management of the intendants and officers of the Marina Real and the maritime departments; the implementation of technological innovations; and, finally, a functional raw material supply system. Jan Glete,4 followed by Iván Valdez Bubnov5 and Rafael Torres Sánchez,6 pointed out that this policy was grounded in the broader military strategy pursued by the Spanish and French crowns, whereby the Bourbons’ combined fleets7 could muster as many ships-of-the-line and frigates as the British navy.8
This status was reached after the end of the War of Jenkins’ Ear (1748), and in the period between 1770 and 1789, the naval forces of Spain and France outstripped the Royal Navy in terms of warships. Thus, in the second half of the 18th century, the Bourbon navies became the mainstay of the colonial order, contributing to the naval balance against the powerful British navy. However, it is also clear that, despite having a similar or smaller number of ships, supremacy in combat was on the British side, because their crews and officers were better trained. This is why the Franco-Hispanic fleets meet with more defeats than victories in the second half of the 18th century. British policies to strengthen the Royal Navy during this period triggered the intensification of naval production in Spain and was also reflected in the introduction of technological innovations in shipbuilding. In the second half of the 18th century, the shipbuilding industry produced vessels based on three systems: the “English style”, introduced by Jorge Juan and the British constructors hired by the Bourbon Crown (1750–1765); the “French style”, implemented in the royal shipyards by the shipbuilder François Gautier (1765–1782); and the “mixed or perfected style”, led by the naval constructors José Romero de Landa and Julián Martín de Retamosa, who in their designs combined features of the earlier systems, for example using rigging in the English style to increase the speed of ships.9
The analysis of Bourbon Spain’s naval policy in the second half of the 18th century clearly shows that the most valuable raw material for the ambitious plans to modernise the Marina Real was wood. For this reason, the main subject of this book is timber sourcing, with special attention to the exploitation of forests outside the Iberian Peninsula, including foreign states in the southern Baltic region and in the Spanish colonies, for instance the viceroyalty of New Spain. This book describes the different ways in which wood supply operated, depending on local geographical factors, political situation, available personnel and funds, and the broader context of naval affairs involving the Spanish state, its allies, and its enemies.
That is why the research presented in this book starts with two important questions: (1) how did Spain keep up with the increasing demand for timber as its naval power surged in the second half of the 18th century? and (2) what were the strategies deployed by the Bourbon monarchy to exploit and capture forest resources outside the Iberian Peninsula? In order to answer these two questions, it is necessary to revise the Spanish Crown maritime policies and the development of its naval power, which was the key factor in the protection of, and trade with, its overseas colonies in America. Before, however, it is worth recalling that, in early modern Europe, ships became the main medium of colonial expansion, and their production essential for the economic and military stability of crowns, states, and nations. European demand for wood gradually began to grow from the 1640s, and became acute during the 18th century, mostly as a result of naval competition between England/Great Britain, France, Spain, Holland, and Portugal. The resulting overexploitation of woodland led to the deforestation of many regions in these countries,10 forcing naval powers to reconnoitre other European markets for timber and other sources, from the hinterlands of the Baltic, Adriatic, and Black Sea regions to America and Asia.11 No raw material – apart from precious metal – was as highly coveted by European naval powers as timber.
In the Early Modern Age, this forest resource became the main tool for expansionist and colonialist policies, allowing European naval powers to develop their economy, trade, and military power. For this reason, greater emphasis needs to be put on wood as a strategic resource that led to technological progress in shipbuilding and the modernisation of the navies of England/Great Britain, Spain, France, Holland, and, to a lesser extent, Portugal, Sweden, and Denmark. This is not only from the political – military perspective but, as the Spanish case illustrates, also in terms of knowledge about forest resources in Iberian Peninsula and the American colonies. Thanks to the explorations and surveys undertaken by the Spanish army and naval officers,12 the rational harvesting of wood – to ensure the navy’s ability to self-supply – became a target in itself, and the crown implemented more stringent monitoring systems to maintain the sourcing of this strategic raw material under strict control of the state.13 From the 16th century onwards, the colonial expansion of the European crowns in Africa, America, and Asia allowed the exploration of forests on these continents. This event opened up the opportunity to exploit new tree species other than those traditionally used for centuries in European shipbuilding, which were more suitable for sailing in warmer seas. The trees commonly used in the European shipbuilding industry were pine, oak, beech, spruce, black poplar, and elm. Depending on their physical characteristics (weight, strength, durability, density, elasticity), these European species were used to manufacture different ship parts. For example, pines were mainly used for masting and, to a lesser extent, for planking; beech for oars and rudders; black poplar and elm for planks, ribbons, and turn pieces; oak and melis pine for beams; and pedunculate oak for the structural parts of ships, such as keels, frames, elbows, and rods.14 The knowledge about the properties of tropical wood allowed the progress of European shipbuilding, which began to increasingly use American and Asian species, such as mahogany, sabicú, cedar, cypress, and also teak, ebony, guijo, betis, banaba: woods that performed better in warm waters than European timber, as well as being more resistant to naval shipworm or turu.15 For this reason, their service life was longer than those of vessels built with European wood.
Once this critical issue was well understood, the navies of Spain, France, England/Britain, Portugal, and Holland began taking advantage of their colonies to exploit the durable tropical woods for the construction and repair of their ships overseas and in their European shipyard.16 Spain became aware of the importance of timber early, after the Carrera de Indias, which began systematically in 1543, triggered a constant demand for merchant ships to channel trade with the colonies and armed galleons to protect the vital routes along which precious metals and other commodities circulated.17 In 1562, Philip II and the councils of the Indies and State took measures to begin naval production on a mass scale to create the armadas needed to protect the vast Spanish Empire. This required the reorganisation of forest management by royal officials and massive tree-planting campaigns. In 1574, Philip II appointed Cristóbal de Barros y Peralta first Superintendent of Hills and Forests. The promotion and protection of woodland in northern Spain can be regarded as the first expression of sustainable forestry policies, which was not grounded on conservationist ideas, but on a strategy to guarantee a constant source of raw materials to build and repair ships.18 Interestingly, the same notions guided Spanish public policies until the 1830s, when orders to preserve and manage forests (e.g. Ordenanzas Generales de Montes, 1833) were published on the initiative of Minister Javier de Burgos. Importantly, his orders imposed strict restrictions on logging as an urgent measure to stop soil erosion and flooding, which were exacerbated by the lack of forested areas. For the first time in Spanish history, these ordinances reflected a change in the reasoning behind forestry policies: from preservation with a view on naval construction to the protection of woodland for conservationist purposes.19
Back to the Early Modern Age, it is worth recalling that, between 1574 and the early 19th century, Spanish monarchs and officials triggered several policies to impose control over the exploitation of forest resources in Spain and the colonies. Examples of these official regulations, which focused on the use of common woodland – exploitation regimes, fines and punishments for non-compliance, and the impact of agriculture and stock-breeding – can be found in the Catalonian Ordinacions Forestals, written in 1627 by Miguel de los Santos de San Pedro. These rules tried to impose severe limitations on logging, while reinforcing the presence of the navy commissars tasked with selecting the most suitable trees for naval construction.20 Another example is Toribio Pérez de Bustamante’s Instrucción forestal (1656), with which Philip IV tried to centralise forest management not only in Spain but in his whole empire. The document established a new basic rule for the preservation of woodland: the prohibition to fell trees within two leagues of the coastline and navigable rivers, which were put under royal protection. The Instrucción also ordered local authorities to disseminate the document’s contents in the areas in which these forests were. Interestingly, churches were singled out as ideal points to disseminate the order. The Instrucción also included practical information, concerning felling periods, tree planting, and punishments for those that violated the ban on logging in royal, communal, and private woodland.21 It is interesting that the Spanish Habsburgs also included their American colonies in this legislation. Unsurprisingly, the first ordinance to protect American woodland was passed in Cuba, by order of Philip II in 1559.
This regulation prohibited any logging, two leagues inland on the banks of the Chorrera River and also within ten leagues leeward and windward of Havana, without the governor’s permission. Anyone caught with an axe or a machete in the forests was sentenced to forced labour at the fortification works. Although this first order does not mention the navy’s needs, the following do, because throughout the 17th century the Spanish Crown prioritised shipbuilding in Cuba, notably in Havana. Especially important among all the royal orders concerning the navy’s wood resources was the one issued by Philip III on 26 March 1607, ordering the Cuban governor, Pedro de Valdés, to send 50 pieces and 100 boards of mahogany to the Casa de Contratación, Seville, for its qualities as shipbuilding material to be assessed. Also important was the order issued on 2 March 1620, authorising anyone arriving in Havana with the intention of building ships to fell trees anywhere in Cuba, and that issued on 2 March 1623, with which Philip IV addressed the petition of Cuba’s governor, Francisco de Venegas, to limit this permit to the constructors of naos only, because vecinos of Havana, especially ranchers, were expanding their land at the expense of woodland that was valuable for naval construction.22 During the rule of the Spanish Bourbons, one of the most important decisions was to publish the Ordenanza de 1748, which imposed norms for the exploitation of woodland in the Iberian Peninsula under the supervision of superintendents from the navy departments of El Ferrol, Cádiz-La Carraca, and Cartagena.
The main promoter of this document was the Marquis of Ensenada, Minister of the Royal Navy and the Indies, who granted navy officers sweeping powers to manage public and private woodland in the Iberian Peninsula, prioritising the Navy’s needs and shipbuilding in the royal shipyards. They were bestowed with the authority to decide the fate of all woodland, and, in their surveys, they earmarked the best trees for the Spanish Navy, forcing private landowners to use inferior quality timber for their own needs. Intendants also had precedence to buy timber, sometimes paying below-market prices. Similarly, Navy officers had the authority to send supervisors to oversee planting operations.23 These policies, however, did not yield the expected results, sparking conflict between state officials and forest owners,24 and ultimately forcing the Ministry of the Royal Navy and Indies to seek other sources of timber outside the Iberian Peninsula through the asiento system.25 The analysis of these and other official documents,26 issued during the Early Modern Age, clearly illustrate that policies to protect woodland in Spain were guided by the wish to ensure the supply of timber for the king’s ships. This policy of sustainable use of forest resources pursued by Bourbon Spain was in line with mercantilist ideas put forward in the first half of the 18th century by two Spanish politicians inspired by the philosophy of the Enlightenment, Jerónimo de Uztáriz and José del Campillo y Cossío, who highlighted the huge potential of American forests as the main source of timber for the Spanish royal shipyards. Uztáriz saw great advantage in the durability and resistance of American timber, which he expressed as follows: In the islands and mainland of America, where his majesty has many exquisite kinds of wood and an abundance of pitch and tar for the construction of ships ... with the considerable benefit that if the [ships] made in Europe resist for 12 to 15 years, [those in America] are preserved for more than 30 years since they are made there with the cedar, harder oak, and other woods of superior strength and resistance.27 Campillo y Cossío also demonstrated the advantages of American wood, saying that: Campeche wood, cedar, mahogany and other beautiful woods, masts for ships, planks, pitch ... that now come to us from the Baltic, we will have from our Indies; and also the furniture, tools, instruments for work ... we can take them [from Spain] there and sell them cheaper [in America].
His idea clearly shows that Spain should replace the timber provision from the Baltic and also from other European regions because the use of American timbers would offer a double benefit. First, the money invested in the purchase of timber production in the colonies would remain in Spanish commercial circuits. Second, timber extraction would be supervised by the royal and colonial authorities and would guarantee quality control of the wooden parts produced for ships. Uztáriz and Campillo y Cossío’s ideological approach was materialised during logging operations in Oaxaca and Cuba, which were carried out under the patronage of the Crown, and the concession of asientos to merchants and influential Creole residents from New Spain, Louisiana, and Cuba during the second half of the 18th century (see Chapter 4). During this period, especially after the Treaty of Paris (1763), which brought an end to the Seven Years’ War, in which Spain was defeated by the British, strenuous efforts were made to reinforce the Spanish Navy, which after the time of Ensenada had entered a period of stagnation. The first major change was technological, with the substitution of the “French style” of shipbuilding for the “British system”, which had been followed in the 1750s and the early 1760s. In 1772, Francisco Gautier issued a report entitled Observaciones sobre el estado de los montes de España, nota del consumo de la madera de construcción, que, en cada año, se considera necesaria en los departamentos de Ferrol, Cartagena y Cádiz; y proyecto para aprovisionar estos arsenales de maderas de América,29 in which he described the state of Spanish woodlands and made audacious proposals to use American timber in naval construction in the Iberian Peninsula. Gautier emphasised that “Cádiz uses American wood which is brought at great cost but with little profit, not because it lacks in quality, but because of the carelessness with which it is dispatched [to Spain], where it arrives badly cut, badly arranged, and poorly sorted”.30
These words somewhat concealed his real intentions, which were to base the Navy’s timber supplies mostly on the exploitation of colonial forests; he points out that there was already a flow of tozas31 between Havana and other naval departments, but that this was insufficient and was limited to specific ship parts of sabicú, mahogany, and cedar. In any case, Gautier’s project began initiatives by the Navy and viceregal authorities in the colonies to exploit American forests. In the 1770s and 1780s, various woodland surveys were launched by royal officials to inspect potential timber sources, establishing species and volumes, from the Greater Caribbean and Louisiana to Veracruz, Oaxaca, Yucatán, Darién, the Magdalena River, Cumaná, and the Orinoco. Not all of these crystallised in felling asientos, but others met with greater success. As such, Louisiana and Chimalapas became sources of pine masting used in Havana; Coatzacoalcos, Tlacotalpan, Alvarado, Laguna de Términos, Cartagena de Indias, the Magdalena River, and Cumaná supplied shaped pieces and boards in cedar and mahogany, most of which were shipped to the Iberian Peninsula. Gautier’s idea to tap into the enormous resources of American forests made sense, as the shipbuilder wished to keep Spanish woodland as a strategic reserve for naval construction.
However, the project was hampered by difficulties in hauling shaped pieces timber to Spain and could only become a complement to the supplies obtained in the Iberian Peninsula and other European regions. In the second half of the 18th century, the main supply routes for the Spanish Navy linked with the Baltic and the Northern seas, where timber was obtained from private merchants,32 mostly foreigners and representatives of trade houses from the Netherlands, England, France, and Scandinavia, which frequently had branches in Spain. These businesspeople were connected with Spanish traders and their political allies in Madrid and the main Spanish harbours (Bilbao, San Sebastián, Santander, Cádiz, Seville, Malaga, Cartagena, and Barcelona). The reason behind this model was the shortcomings of the Spanish merchant navy, which from the 17th century was gradually replaced by cheaper foreign freight options – depending on geopolitical conditions, English/British, Dutch, French, and, to a lesser extent, Scandinavians and Hamburgers. In the Mediterranean, the second major source of wood (Romanian, Balkan, and Italian), most contracts were signed with Italian merchants,33 who virtually monopolised timber supplies for the Spanish navy in the 18th century in the region, as illustrated by the contracts signed with asentistas Joseph Marcerano, Baltazar Castellini, and Carlos María Marraci.34 However, the most important source of wood during this period lay in the north, especially the Baltic, where Spain had to compete with other countries that traditionally sourced their timber there, that is, the British, Dutch, and French. Interestingly, with the help of a vast network of Spanish and foreign merchants and the diplomatic support of consuls, plenipotentiary ministers, and ambassadors, Bourbon Spain managed to gain, and keep, a foothold in the Baltic timber market in the period spanning the 1760s to the 1790s.
This activity peaked in the run-up to the American War of Independence (1775– 1783), which Spain joined in 1779, and in the second half of the 1780s. Especially interesting are the attempts to nationalise wood asientos instead of working with foreign merchants. The contracts awarded to Miguel Soto and his representative Felipe Chone in the 1770s were the first step, followed in 1782 by the creation of the Banco de San Carlos to centralise naval supplies and finances. The Soto-Chone asiento yielded some positive results, but the monopolistic position awarded to the national bank was a fiasco, and traditional policies to find foreign merchants with solid Baltic networks, such as the Swedish Gahn, had to be resumed.35 It must be emphasised that the policies implemented by the Spanish Navy in the second half of the 18th century clearly show that Mahan’s thesis36 is – at least for this period – incorrect, because, as also shown by other recent research, Bourbon Spain had enough human capital, skilled royal officials, cash, natural resources in Spain and America, commercial networks, and diplomatic leverage to manage wood supplies in different northern and southern European markets, which led the Spanish armed forces to their greatest success in the 18th century, victory over Great Britain in the American War of Independence.
This would have been impossible without the modernisation and development of the Navy, which in the 1780s became the second most powerful in the world, after the British37. As noted, the main aim of this book – which presents the results of research undertaken over ten years – was to contribute to our understanding of timber supplies for the Spanish Navy, especially from the southern Baltic and the viceroyalty of New Spain, for which little previous research has been undertaken. Although things have improved in recent years, significant gaps in our knowledge concerning these two regions still exist.38 As such, a comprehensive comparison of these important regions for timber supply through the lens of the Spanish Royal Navy’s development strategy was still lacking. Systematic work at Spanish, Mexican, Cuban, and Polish archives has shed light on trade relations, forest surveys, problems with transport, and use in naval construction of timber from the southern Baltic and New Spain, regions that presented very different geographical – economic – political – social contexts. However, owing to the determination of Spanish royal officials, Spain could ultimately meet its main target, which was to guarantee that its shipyards enjoyed a constant supply of timber from outside the Iberian Peninsula. For this reason, this book cannot be easily slotted into a single field, such as environmental history39 or maritime history.40 Instead, it must be seen as a multifaceted attempt to cut across disciplinary boundaries,41 to understand Spanish timber supply policies as a process that merged the environmental, economic, naval, political, geographic, military, and social histories of these two important regions (the southern Baltic and the viceroyalty of New Spain), their forested hinterlands, and harbours like Memel, Königsberg, Gdańsk/ Danzig, Szczecin/Stettin, Veracruz, Campeche, and Havana.
In the 18th century, these places were intimately linked with the Spanish naval departments of El Ferrol, Cádiz-La Carraca, and Cartagena through trade contracts and the timber used to modernise the Royal Navy with the sponsorship of the state. The timber trade that mobilised transport networks in North America, the Caribbean, Spain, northern Europe, and the Baltic clearly illustrates the economic dimension of early globalisation, as it brought remote geographical regions to interact closely.42 It must be emphasised that a local product such as European and American timber became, in this process, a global commodity. The use of this wood in European shipbuilding contributed to colonisation and early globalisation because the ships built in the royal shipyards were later used to protect navigation routes across the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans. Often, these ships, built with timber from Spain, the Baltic, New Spain, and other places, were used to haul silver and other American products (gold, sugar, tobacco, cochineal, and indigo) to Spain, and also took part in offensive and defensive naval operations in time of war. As noted, the book approaches Spanish timber supply policies from different points of view. For this reason, the monograph is divided into two parts and comprises four chapters. The first part (Chapters 1 and 2), analyses timber extraction and wood trade and transport from the southern Baltic to Spain.
The second part (Chapters 3 and 4) presents the Spanish Crown’s efforts to organise an efficient system to identify and harvest American timber from several provinces in the viceroyalty of New Spain, like Veracruz, Oaxaca, Campeche, Cuba, Louisiana, and other forested regions in the Caribbean. Chapter 1, entitled “Spanish Navy Wood Supplies from the Southern Baltic and Riga”, begins by presenting the policies devised by the Marquis of Ensenada, one of the most powerful ministers during the reigns of Philip V and Ferdinand VI, who faced the challenge of modernising the Spanish state with administrative, fiscal, military, and naval reforms. As Minister of the Navy and Indies, between 1743 and 1754 he continued the project to develop and renovate the Marina Real begun by José Patiño y Rosales in 1717. He created a network of consuls and spies to gather information about foreign armies, navies, and military industries. During his time in office, the Navy adopted the known system of asientos, which guaranteed public contracts with foreign entrepreneurs associated with the Spanish commercial sector. The first major contracts were signed in the 1750s to ensure the supply of timber and other raw materials, such as hemp and linen, for the naval departments of El Ferrol, Cádiz-La Carraca, and Cartagena. The chapter analyses the contracts proposed by different commercial houses – mostly Dutch, Irish, and Swedish – from 1750 to 1790.
These contractors gave the Spanish Crown access to the Baltic markets, specifically the harbours between Szczecin/Stettin and Riga, which were able to supply excellent pine or fir masting, and pine – oak planks and beams. The chapter also examines attempts by Baltic merchants, for instance, Mathy and Schultz, from Gdańsk/Danzig, to compete with these businessmen, who held a virtual monopoly over timber exported to Spain. Chapter 2 examines the hinterlands of three major regions in Prussia and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which were connected by sea through navigable rivers. The first section addresses the trade in wood from Silesia and Kłodzko, which were floated down the Oder River to Szczecin/Stettin. This section also analyses the timber market at this harbour, to which wood was delivered from the jurisdiction of Pomerania. The second section of the chapter examines the flow of timber down the Vistula to Gdańsk/Danzig, a Hanseatic commercial hub in Poland and an important harbour for trade in cereal, wood, hemp, and other Baltic products.
This section also includes information about the earliest legislation passed in the kingdoms of Prussia and Poland to protect the royal forests in Silesia, Kłodzko, and Kozienice. The last-but-one section analyses the forest economy of the influential magnate family of the Radziwiłłs and the commercial networks involved in the commercialisation of timber and other products in Riga, Memel, and Königsberg.43 Finally, Chapter 2 examines Felipe Chone’s trip to evaluate the timber floated down the Oder River to Szczecin/Stettin, as well as the Spanish Ambassador in the Kingdom of Poland, Count of Aranda’s description of the Vistula timber trade, after taking a voyage downriver to Gdańsk/Danzig. Chapter 3, “The Survey of New Spain’s Woodlands”, takes the research focus to the other side of the Atlantic, where, beginning in the 1760s, the Ministry of the Navy carried out several inspections of forests in the vast Spanish American empire in order to identify places where wood could be extracted. From the early 18th century onwards, royal projects had begun using timber from the region of Veracruz, in the viceroyalty of New Spain, which is traversed by several major rivers, including the Alvarado and the Coatzacoalcos. This region was rich in tropical forests with good cedar, mahogany, and sabicú, while the mountains of Sierra Madre Oriental were covered in pine forests. The chapter analyses the strategies adopted by the Ministry of the Navy and the viceregal authorities to expedite the harvesting of wood for naval construction in Havana and Spain. Not all these inspections, undertaken by military and naval officers, resulted in wood-sourcing, but all of them yielded excellent geographical knowledge of the forested areas in the provinces of Veracruz and Oaxaca.
The last section of the chapter examines timber-extracting projects in other regions of the viceroyalty, like the Usumacinta River, the Laguna de Términos, and the province of Huejutla. Chapter 4 studies the results of wood logging in New Spain (provinces of Oaxaca, Veracruz, Tabasco, and Yucatán) but also in other regions of the Spanish Empire like Louisiana and the Caribbean, in the General Captaincy of Cuba and the Viceroyalty of New Granada. In New Spain – the region on which the main focus of this book lies – several asientos were signed with the support of the royal treasure. In the period 1784–1787, these contracts were granted to members of the military – commercial elite of Veracruz, who pledged to supply the Marina Real with tozas of mahogany and cedar and also prepared parts for ships-of-the-line and frigates.
This project lasted only four years, not for lack of money or wood, but because of the constant problems with the transport of the timber from the river mouths to the shipyards in Cuba and Spain. The section on Louisiana examines pine-logging contracts with merchants from New Orleans to bring masting and planks to Havana. Finally, asientos granted in the Caribbean, specifically in the regions of Cumaná, the Magdalena River, and Cartagena de Indias, as well as the illegal felling and contraband of wood in Cuba’s south-eastern forests are also analysed.
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