History
Saint Martin was split in a Dutch and a French part in 1648. The Dutch part became a single Dutch colony in 1818 as Sint Eustatius and Dependencies when France returned its possessions after the Napoleonic Wars. This colony was merged with the colonies Curaçao and Dependencies (the ABC islands) and Suriname with a capital in Paramaribo. When this merge was partly reversed in 1845, the Dutch part of the SSS islands became part of Curaçao and Dependencies with Willemstad (Curaçao) as capital. This colony became the country Netherlands Antilles in 1952. The Dutch part of the SSS islands initially formed until 1983 the single "island area" (Dutch: eilandgebied, the main administrative division of the country, governed by an Island council) the Leeward islands (Dutch: de Bovenwindse eilanden).
Read more about this topic: SSS Islands
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