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NEVIS
Nevis is an island in the Caribbean,
whose name is derived from an original Spanish name given by
Christopher Columbus. With Saint Kitts it constitutes the nation of
Saint Kitts and Nevis. Indeed during the last Ice age the sea level
was 200 feet lower and St. Kitts and Nevis were one island with
Saint Eustatius (also known as Statia) and Saba.
History
The most famous Nevis resident was Alexander Hamilton, a famed
statesman and founding father of the United States. Another famous
association is the wedding of Admiral Nelson, who married a Nevisian
heiress on the island in the 18th century.
Nevis, due to sugar
production, was once a dominant source of wealth for Great Britain, so much
that the exports from West Indian islands like Nevis were worth more than
all of those from the 13 colonies of North America at the time of the
American Revolution. The great wealth of the West Indies led to wars between
Spain, Britain, and France, and the formation of the United States can be
said to be a partial byproduct of these wars whose strategic trade aims
often ignored North America.
The original Arawak and Carib inhabitants of the island called it Oualie,
meaning "land of beautiful water". Christopher Columbus visited the island
on his second voyage on 11th November 1493. He renamed it Santa María de las
Nieves, mistaking the cloud cap atop Mt. Nevis for snow. This name has also
been linked to a contemporary miraculous summer snow storm in Spain. Nevis
was part of the Spanish claim to own all the Caribbean islands which they
pursued from 1493 until 1671. Nevertheless it continued to be a popular
stop-over point for English and Dutch ships on their way to the North
American continent.
Captain Bartholomew Gilbert of Plymouth visited the island in 1603, spending
two weeks to cut twenty tons of lignum vitae wood. Gilbert sailed on to
Virginia to seek out survivors of the Roanoke settlement in what is now
Virginia. He was killed in a skirmish with the local Native Americans.
Captain John Smith visited Nevis also on his way to Virginia in 1607. This
was the voyage which founded the Jamestown Settlement, the first permanent
English settlement in the New World.
In 1620 Captain Anthony Chester visited the island in the 'Margaret and John'
and were attacked by two Spanish war ships at Nevis.
On August 30, 1620, James I of England asserted sovereignty over Nevis by
giving a Royal Patent for colonisation to the Earl of Carlisle. However
actual European settlement did not happen until 1628 when Anthony Hilton
moved from nearby Saint Kitts following a murder plot against him. He was
accompanied by 80 other settlers soon to be boosted by a further 100
settlers from London who had originally hoped to settle Barbuda. Hilton
became the first Governor of Nevis.
Nevis was united with St. Kitts and Anguilla in 1882, and they became an
associated state with full internal autonomy in 1967, though Anguilla
seceded in 1971. Together Saint Kitts and Nevis became independent in 1983.
On 10 August 1998, a referendum on Nevis to separate from St. Kitts had 2427
votes in favour and 1498 against, falling short of the two-thirds majority
needed.
Geography
Mount Nevis (3,232 feet) is the remnant of an ancient stratovolcano, as is
Mt. Liamuiga on the sister island of St. Kitts. Nevis has a population of
nearly 10,000, and maintains one of the highest literacy rates in the
Western Hemisphere, at approximately 98%. The capital is Charlestown.
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