British Period
Spanish rule over the island, which nominally began in 1498, ended when the final Spanish Royal Governor, Don José Maria Chacón surrendered the island to a British fleet of 18 warships under the command of Sir Ralph Abercromby on 18 February 1797.
Read more about this topic: History Of Trinidad And Tobago
Famous quotes containing the words british and/or period:
“I ... would rather be in dependance on Great Britain, properly limited, than on any nation upon earth, or than on no nation. But I am one of those too who rather than submit to the right of legislating for us assumed by the British parliament, and which late experience has shewn they will so cruelly exercise, would lend my hand to sink the whole island in the ocean.”
—Thomas Jefferson (17431826)
“Words convey the mental treasures of one period to the generations that follow; and laden with this, their precious freight, they sail safely across gulfs of time in which empires have suffered shipwreck and the languages of common life have sunk into oblivion.”
—Anonymous. Quoted in Richard Chevenix Trench, On the Study of Words, lecture 1 (1858)