1 gen 1797 anni - Brief expulsion of Irish from PR

Descrizione:

On February 17, 1797, the governor of Puerto Rico, Brigadier General Ramón de Castro, received the news that England had invaded the island of Trinidad. Believing that Puerto Rico would be the next English target of invasion, he decided to put the local militia on alert and to prepare the island's forts against any military action.

After the Spanish victory in San Juan against Great Britain in what is known as the Battle of San Juan of 1797, Governor de Castro became suspicious of all English-speaking European foreigners, mistakenly believing that they supported the anti-Spanish military campaigns of the British and ordered some of the local residents and foreigners, especially those of English and Irish descent, to be placed under surveillance. Many were given eight days to leave the island and those who did not leave were imprisoned.[15]

The people in Puerto Rico, among them Treasury official Felipe Antonio Mejía, were so outraged by de Castro's actions that they sent special envoys to Spain on behalf of the Irish immigrant and merchant community on the island. They made their views known to the Spanish Crown to whom they condemned the governor's measures as legally unjustified and economically counter-productive, promoting their strongly held conviction to the Crown that the Irish immigrants had already proven their allegiance to the Spanish colonial government and were invaluable economic and trade partners that expanded Puerto Rico's trade horizons with Spain and the Western Hemisphere colonies. Eventually, the temporarily-banned Irish and their families returned to the island, including the O'Dalys, Dorans, Kiernans, Quinlans, O'Ferran, Butler, Killeleigh and Skerrets, among many others.

In 1823, Robert and Josiah Archibald, Irish brothers, imported and introduced to Puerto Rico the island's first steam-operated mill which they successfully used in their already profitable Ponce sugar plantation. By so doing, they further highlighted the economic importance of the Irish immigrant community in Puerto Rico.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_immigration_to_Puerto_Rico

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