West Indies 1763–1830

By 1763, after the Seven Years’ War, Britain had damaged the economic base of the sugar producing colonies in the Spanish and French West Indies. Britain had successfully captured the French and Spanish sugar plantation islands, apart from French Santa Domingo (Saint Dominigue). After the 1763 Paris Treaty, the British returned Guadeloupe and St Lucia to the French in exchange for Canada. The French ceded Dominica, St Vincent and Grenada to Great Britain. Spain ceded Florida to the British. Britain was frustrated that she had been given West Indian islands that were mountainous and less suitable for sugar production although, when France and Spain lost Santa Domingo (on Haiti) to a slave revolt in 1791–1804, Britain owned the most profitable sugar colonies, in Jamaica and Barbados. Spain ceded Trinidad to Britain in 1802, but retained sugar-rich Cuba until the end of the 19th century; in Central America its territories were lost to independence by 1830–31.