African Immigration To Puerto Rico - First Africans in Puerto Rico

First Africans in Puerto Rico

When Ponce de León and the Spaniards arrived on the island of "Borinken" (Puerto Rico), they were greeted by the Cacique Agüeybaná, the supreme leader of the peaceful Taíno tribes on the island. Agüeybaná helped to maintain the peace between the Taínos and the Spaniards. According to historian Ricardo Alegria, the first free black man set foot on the island in 1509. He was Juan Garrido, a conquistador who belonged to Juan Ponce de León's entourage. Garrido was born on the West African coast, the son of an African King. In 1508, he joined Juan Ponce de León to explore Puerto Rico and prospect for gold, and in 1511, he fought under Ponce de León to repress the Caribs and the Tainos who had joined forces in Puerto Rico in a great revolt against the Spaniards. Garrido went on to join Hernan Cortes in the Spanish conquest of Mexico. Another free black man who accompanied de León was Pedro Mejías. Mejías married a Taíno woman chief (a cacica) by the name of Yuisa. Yuisa was baptized Luisa (hence the name of the town of Loíza) so that she could marry Mejías.

The peace between the Spaniards and the Taínos was short-lived. The Spaniards took advantage of the Taínos' good faith and enslaved them, forcing them to work in the gold mines and in the construction of forts. Many Taínos died as a result either of the cruel treatment that they had received or of smallpox which became epidemic on the island. Other Taínos committed suicide or left the island after the failed Taíno revolt of 1511.

Friar Bartolomé de las Casas, who had accompanied Ponce de León, was outraged at the treatment by the Spaniards of the Taínos and, in 1512, protested in front of the council of Burgos at the Spanish Courts. He fought for the freedom of the natives and was able to secure their rights. The Spanish colonists, fearing the loss of their labor force, also protested before the courts. They complained that they needed manpower to work in the mines, the fortifications and the thriving sugar industry. As an alternative, Las Casas suggested the importation and use of black slaves. In 1517, the Spanish Crown permitted its subjects to import twelve slaves each, thereby beginning the slave trade in their colonies.

According to historian Luis M. Diaz, the largest contingent of African slaves came from the Gold Coast, Nigeria, and Dahomey, and the region known as the area of Guineas, the Slave Coast. However, the vast majority were Yorubas and Igbos, ethnic groups from Nigeria, and Bantus from the Guineas. The number of slaves in Puerto Rico rose from 1,500 in 1530 to 15,000 by 1555. The slaves were stamped with a hot iron on the forehead, a branding which meant that they were brought to the country legally and prevented their kidnapping.

African slaves were sent to work in the gold mines to replace the lost Taino manpower, or to work in the fields in the island's ginger and sugar industry. They were allowed to live with their families in a bohio (hut) on the master's land, and were given a patch of land where they could plant and grow vegetables and fruits. Blacks had little or no opportunity for advancement and faced discrimination from the Spaniards. Slaves were educated by their masters and soon learned to speak the master's language, educating their own children in the new language. They enriched the "Puerto Rican Spanish" language by adding words of their own. The Spaniards considered the blacks superior to the Taínos, since the Taínos were unwilling to assimilate. The slaves, in contrast, had no choice but to convert to Christianity; they were baptized by the Catholic Church and assumed the surnames of their masters. Many slaves were subject to harsh treatment, at times including rape. The majority of the Conquistadors and farmers who settled the island had arrived without women, and many of them intermarried with the blacks or Tainos. This mixture formed the basis of the early Puerto Rican population.

In 1527, the first major slave rebellion occurred in Puerto Rico as dozen of slaves fought against the colonist in a brief revolt. The few slaves who escaped retreated to the mountains where they resided as maroons with surviving Tainos. By 1873, over twenty slave revolts had been carried out, including some of great political importance such as the Ponce and Vega Baja conspiracies.

By 1570, the gold mines were declared depleted of the precious metal. After gold mining came to an end on the island, the Spanish Crown bypassed Puerto Rico by moving the western shipping routes to the north. The island became primarily a garrison for those ships that would pass on their way to or from richer colonies. The cultivation of crops such as tobacco, cotton, cocoa and ginger became the cornerstone of the economy. The cultivation of these crops required little manpower, such that the families did all the farming themselves, and thus, also unlike the sugar farming, required no slaves. However it was all the opposite with the cultivation of the sugar cane. Sugar plantations supplanted mining as Puerto Rico's main industry and was linked to African slavery. Spain promoted its development by granting loans and tax exemptions to the owners of the plantations. They were also given permits to participate in the African slave trade.

A Spanish edict of 1664 offered freedom and land to African people from non-Spanish colonies, such as Jamaica and St. Dominique (Haiti), who immigrated to Puerto Rico and provided a population base to support the Puerto Rican garrison and its forts. Those freeman who settled the western and southern parts of the island soon adopted the ways and customs of the Spaniards. Some joined the local militia which fought against the British in the many British attempts to invade the island. The escaped slaves and the freedman who emigrated from the West Indies kept their former masters surnames, which were normally either English or French. Even today it is not uncommon for Puerto Ricans of African ancestry to have non-Spanish surnames.