Inhabiting Isla Nena- Imperial Dramas, Gendered Geographical Imaginings and Vieques, Puerto Rico.

7/25/2019 Inhabiting Isla Nena- Imperial Dramas, Gendered Geographical Imaginings and Vieques, Puerto Rico.

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CENTROJOURN L

Vo lum e XX

Num ber i

SPBiNC 2008

INHABITING ISLA NENA

IMPERIAL DRAMAS

GENDERED GEOGRAPHICAL

IMAGININGS AND

VIEQUES PUERTO RICO

M A R I E

CRUZ SOTO

ABSTRACT

This essay examines how Vieques bas been

geographically imagined as Isla Nena through the

struggles of communities to inhabit and of empires to

claim the island. The study traces such struggles from

the i6th to the 21st century in order to historicize Isla

Nena as the gendered ajid infantUized representation

of an island-community negotiating complex colonial

relationships with different metropolises. The study

further portrays through the /ongwe ureframework

how thisisland-com m unityhasforcenturies been caught


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LA ISLA MADRE LA ISLA ENCINTA

RO MP I EN EL MA R SU DOLOR;

LA ISLA M AD RE ABR I SU E NTRAA

Y LA ISLA NENA NACI:

VIEQUES...

(Luis Llorns Torres , La Isla Nena )

VI QU S

a 2i-by-4-mile island, has been a millenary steppingstone for Caribbean

human crossings. In the midst of the crossings different cultures have attem pted

to establish themselves in the small island. Forging a community in the heart of

this West Indian island-arc, however, has been for the would-be settlers an equally

millenary process . For varied reasons in different contexts the act of establishing a

stable community in this remote speck of the Caribbean has met with resistance

on the part of powerful historical actors like the Spanish and the U.S. empires.

These empires have, through invasions, diplomatic argum ents and even massacres,

made evident that colonial fringes like Vieques can simultaneously be caught in the

center of imperial dramas. While Vieques was never perm anently situated in the

center of the global schemes of these em pires, the island was nonetheless an integral

part of their imperial designs. Vieques surfaced to prom inence at different con texts,

posing both challenges and opportun ities to metropolises. Spain s early ith-centu ry

crusade against Caribs, for example, was redefmed through Vieques. The 17th to 19th

century rivalry between Spain and G reat Britain for the co ntrol of the Caribbean

was manifested in Vieques. Even the U nited S tates ig6os pan-Am erican campaign

was rethough t through Vieques. Thus, Vieques represents a space where imperial

dramas have been acted ou t. Th e term imperial dramas refers to the schemes,

challenges and p rojects of empires. Vieques, in turn, was caught in the center of

imperial dramas because what happened in the island m anifested and, maybe more

importan tly, affected the global narratives these em pires were weaving.

The struggle of populations to exercise control over the island has made difficult

the formulation of local imaginings capable of negotiating a collective identity.

Yet the challenges have inspired and been woven into the most sacred narratives

surrounding Viequense identity and community. The inhabitants of Vieques have

engaged the struggle through histories that tie their people to the island. Over a

time span lasting two centuries they have geographically imagined an enclosed space

inscribed with local meaning Jessand Massey 1995: 134). Such urgent imaginings of

the island as a private and dom estic Viequense unit have been articulated through


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archival and ethnograph ic research as well as by my own 5iZ J

identity. While the history encompassed in the following pages will inevitably

silence different voices, it broadly engages the stor ies of

users,

following Michel

de Certea u, that through tactics like walking and other everyday practices creatively

wove spaces claimed by different empires (C erteau 1988). I hope, accordingly,

to provide the reader with the long struggle of peoples to claim a place of the ir

own. The right to inhabit Vieques, after all, has been fought for on a daily basis

over the past 500 years.

on eption

Th e bir th of Isla Nena was a long and anguish-ridden one. According to recent

archeological studies there are traces of human presence in Vieques dating as far

back as 150 B.C.3 Yet th e traces are scarce and the presences of different pre -

Colum bian cultures have been confiated in Viequense collective m emory under the

term Carib . This last indigenous group, if it indeed existed as a separate cultural

group from the Tainos, has survived in the archives ofth eir Spanish victimizers.

The survival of narratives detailing Carib combativeness and resistance against

the Spanish colonial regime makes possible a fragmentary recon struction of wha t

could have been the conception of Isla Nena during the 16th-century Carib-Spanish

encounter in Bieke.

Back in the early i6 th century, Spanish chron icles and maps made reference to a

small island sou theast of P uerto Rico known by its aboriginal inhab itants as Bieke.

Translated as Small Island, Bieke was thou ght to be the hideou t, or maybe lair,

of the Carib Indians that waged war against the Puerto Rican Tainos. Yet if the

indigenous groups were mutually hostile, the Spanish Empire apparently catalyzed an

indigenous union against the common European enemy. According to the historians

Juan Bautista Muoz (1745-1799) and Fray Iigo AbbadyLasierra (1745-1813),

after 5 the Caribs allied with the Tainos for the purpose of attacking Spanish

settlem ents in the P ue rto Rican main island. Th en, in 1514, Bautista and Abbad

concurred , the Viequense caciques Cazimes and his broth er Jaureyvo led a Carib

expedition into the no rtheastern town of

Loiza.

Cazimes was killed du ring one o

the raids, and w ithout their leader, che Caribs retired. Jaureyvo, nonetheless,

returned a few days later to avenge his brother's d eath. Thi s time the Caribs

overtook the Spanish settlers, who could not prevent the cap ture of settlers (Brau

1981:

234-5). Th e G overnor of Pue rto Rico C ristbal de M endoza, having received

news of the attacks, pursued the raiders back to Bieke. In the ensuing battle

Jaureyvo , along with many othe r C aribs, was killed. The rest were taken prisoners in

order to later be used as laborers among Spanish settlers of the Puerto Rican main

island. Bieke was left for deserted (Abbad 1959: 58-60; Tapia1945: 118-9).

Th e accounts of Juan Bautista Mu oz and Fray Iigo Abbad

y

Easierra differ in

various details. Still, their histories coincide in the death of Cazimes and Jaureyvo


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spirit that harmonizes with late 20th- and 21st-century definitions of Viequense

identity (Rabin). The foundational meaning acquired by the I14 C arib-Spanish clash

suggests that for many Viequenses Isla Nena was indeed conceived early on in the

Spanish colon ization ven ture, even if she came to life thre e cen turies later and even if

the concep tion could only be recognized in retrospe ct as typical of myths of origins.

regn ncy

For three centuries after Cristbal de Mendoza's incursion, Vieques remained a

silhouette, however uncomfortable, in the global map of the Spanish Empire.

Th e Caribs had been m assacred but, according to Abbad y Lasierra, the F rench,

English and Dutch that succeeded the Caribs in their islands, adopted their ferocity

and savagery; spreading te rro r and fright in all the Spanish colon ies, carrying

everything in blood and fire (Abbad 1959: 82-3).4 The islands referred to by

Abbad must have included Vieques. By the 1788 publication of

his

History

of Puerto

Rico

France, England, Denmark and Brandenburg had all attempted to establish

communities in Vieques. The island, furthermore, had developed a reputation

for being th e lair of a perfect synthesis of the fringes and enemies of the Spanish

Em pire. Not only were other European em pires attem pting to establish a presence in

Vieques, but also runaway slaves, deserting soldiers, pirates and others were flocking

to the island. Spain simply lacked th e resources and m anpower to populate or

properly claim Vieques. Pue rto Rico, the nearest Spanish colony to V ieques, was in

itself scarcely populated until the late i8th century, when the dem ographics began to

increase (Vzquez1987).Thus, imperial policies favored for three centuries random

pohcing acts designed to discourage enemy settlem ents. Th ese policies also favored

the equally random exploitation of the island's natural resources like lumber.

N o t only were other European em pires at tem pting to

establish a presence in V ieques, bu t also runaway slaves,

deserting soldiers, pirates and others were flocking to

the island.

The redefinition of Vieques into a proper Spanish colony responded to the

impulse of Bourbon reformism (1750-1791), to the Latin American independence

wars (1810-1825) and to cycles of political instabihty in the Iberian metropolis.

Imperial legislations like the Reales Cdulas of 778and 1815 help ed to

redistribute land for exploitation and to liberalize slave trade, commerce and

imm igration. The opening of Spanish econom ic and im migration policies

attracted to Vieques workers and migrants from neighboring Caribbean islands


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stability of

a

Spanish Vieques (Flinter 2002). If taken , different bure aucra ts

concurred, Vieques could be turned into a pirates' nest, encouraging contraband

and slave desertion and threatening to infect Puerto Rico with revolutionary

doctrines.' ' Puerto Rico had since the early i6tb century been described as the

key to the Caribbean.7 Yet the short distance dividing Puerto Rico from Vieques

made impossible the establishment ofaclear and hygienic imperial limit. Such an

imperial division would have been desirable, for example, to avoid contagion with

the abolitionist ideas of the British Empire present in nearby islands like 'I'ortola.

Thus , the Spanisb imperial border had to stay east of Vieques. Vieques, in turn,

evolved into an island-boundary separating the last vestiges of Spanish Am erica

from a prolifera ting array of na tion -sta tes and from the colonial possessions of

other European empires.

If Spanish officials hoped to maintain possession of Puerto Rico, the Empire

had to secure its control over Vieques. However, after three centuries of neglect

the island could not be easily won over. The Spanish Empire had never attempted

to colonize or otherw ise populate Vieques. On the contrary , it had forcefully

terminated all colonization ventures from the pa rt of England, Denm ark, France

and Brandenburg during the years 1685-1693 and then throughout the 1700s

{Documentacin 322-30). Spanish diplomats based themselves on Christopher

Colum bus's 14 November 1493 arrival on th e island, where he proclaimed Spain's

rights as the first inventor and discoverer. Meanwhile, bo th England and Denm ark

credited themselves u^itb more and longer-lasting settlements across the 17th and

i8th centuries {Documentacin 590). Thu s, at the beginning of the 19th century,

three European empires regarded themselves as Vieques's rightful owner.

The Spanish Crow n, concerned w ith the challenges to the ir claims over Vieques,

approved a discrete colonization plan in 8 devised by the Governor of Puerto

Rico Salvador Melndez. T he plan included a military detachm ent under Jua n

Rosell with orders to establish a uthority over the unwanted othe rs of the Spanish

Em pire and to foster the beginnings of a modest but stable colony.

Tbe task of civilizing Vieques was not easy. On the one hand, Rosell might

have lacked gumption to engage the colonizing enterprise.^ On the other hand,

Spanish officials in Madrid and in San Juan diverged on th eir co m m itment to

the colonizing of Vieques. While San Juan officials generally favored an assertive

establishm ent of Spanisb con trol in the island, officials in Madrid w ere more

hesitant. Given the predominance of metropolitan policies, the first 50 years of

the colony's life were spent under ambiguous imperial stances tbat would not

attract either England or De nm ark's diplomatic com plaints. For example, acting

under the mandates of

a 5

May

83

Royal Order, the Governor of Puerto Rico

Miguel de la Torre instructed Vieques' Military Com man der Francisco Rosell

(1828-1832) to refrain from exercising any kind of au tho rity over the English and

Danish citizens in Vieques {Documentacin 804). The instructions included the


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Real y General Archivo de Simancas e Yndias.'*^ In fact, as soon as the possession

controversy started, Spain armed itself with as many geographical and historical

iacts as the imperial archives could muster. One ofthe most powerful weapons

produced within the metropolis was a chronology of Vieques written in 1829 by

Jos de la Higuera. This imperial instrument was woven through the 1685-1735

foreign attempts to colonize the island and their subsequent expulsion by Spain.

This imperial instrument, furthermore, represents the first Viequense history ever

writ ten {Documentacin 322-30). Tellingly enough, th e first Viequense history was

plotted through an imperial drama. Yet the historical weapon was only as effective

as its users' craft. The new geographical imaginings in general depended on the

wittiness and feistiness of th e battling interlocu tors. Early on in the diplomatic

battle, Lord Castlereagh shifted the imperial boundaries to the west of Vieques.

In l jan ua ry 1816, tbe English diplom at asserted to the Spanish crown th at the

island was indeed one ofthe Virgin Islands. Eleven days later Conde de Fernn

N ez emp hatically denied such allegations by claiming Spain's indisputab le

possession of her

[Vieques}.

The possession, the Spanish diplomat argued, was

evidenced in Spain's repeated dismissals of would-be possessors {Documentacin

8-9). The ambiguity ofthe virginity debate, leaving open to interpretation whether

Vieques was part o fth e eastern V irgin Islands group or untouc hed by a masculine

empire, provided the interlocutors with a very ingenious and less confrontational

way of discussing th e island's history and statu s. If Vieques was a virgin, it could

belong to the British Empire. However, if Vieques was not a virgin, it was because

for three c enturies it had belonged to Spain. Th e G overnor of Vieques, Teop hile

Le Guillou, engaged the debate with the President of Trtola and Governor of the

Virgin Islands, Isaac Hay, mo re than two decades after the Castlereagh-N ez

exchange. In aju ne 26, 1840 letter recounting the episode to the Go vernor of

Puerto Rico Le Guillou wrote:

The conversation fell on the richness of Vieque s soil,and on the p overty of the V irgin

Islands. Mr . President H ay, only one who spoke French told me tha t those Virgins we re

very decrepit young ladies and full of sicknesses, that Goat Island (V ieq ue s), w as the

most b eautiful, youngest and richest of the virgins. I told him tha t V ieques was not a

virgin after her marriage with Spain. iDocumentadbn 6 4 1 -2 ) | |

The Le Guillou-Hay conversation, similar to the Nez-Castlereagh exchange,

represented a non -threaten ing and feminized way of imagining Vieques. The

imagining both silenced any previous Carib presence in tbe island and contrasted

with prior narratives of Vieques as a ferocious and savage space. If th e post-1514

island had remained unconquerable for the Spanish Empire, as Abbad y Lasierra

suggested in the 1788, a more manageable V ieques was emerging.


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quest.'^ Whatever the reasons might have led to Le Guillou's establishment in

Viequ es, the English and Spanish archives concluded tha t he gradually established

a sort of irregular authority over the lawless horde by which he was surrounded

{Sovereignty 1119:

216). Le Guillou was endowed with official auth ority when the

Governor of Puerto Rico Miguel de la Torre appointed him as the first political

andm ilitary governor of Vieques (1832-1843). During his years as Governor o

Vieques, Le Guillou made decrees against contraband, oversaw the distribution

of land for cultivation, looked out for the security of the island as a Spanish

dependency, and embodied the law when there were still no clear judicial texts or

organized government structures to follow. These measures helped establish the

administrative basis for the future colony of Vieques.

Teop hile Le Guillou was not only an administrator but aletradowho produced

prolific writte n tex ts in an island described by Spanish bureaucra ts as governed

without written precepts that give the one in charge and the one obeying the

norms of their respective co nduc t {Documentacin: 210).' His thoug hts, actions

and historical inte rpretation s were written down in trilingual records. These

texts,

written in Spanish, English and French and safeguarded in archives across

the Atlantic, have been able to travel through time with more clarity and urgency

than most of the records produced by his predecessors, contemporaries and close

successors. Thus, historians, playing their part in imagining Vieques, are prone

to engage Le Guillou's assessments like the following passage in his ompendio

Topogrfico estadstico e histrico de

la Isla

Espaola de

Vieques:

Vieques must be considered the key to Puerto Rico, from whom it s inseparable.

From the year 1493 when discovered by the A dm iral Columbus to 182 8, that island

was inhabited by the Carib Indians, filibusters, pirates, dese rters, evildoers, thieves,

corsairs and underground dealers. Sometimes these have played their p art together.

This enchanting island has been witness to scenes capable of being exalted by a

great poet, more so if some episodes from the good neighbors of Trtola and Saint

Thomas w ere included, then it would be a complete drama that w ould rage in Paris.

Of all these qualities of individuals, the Indians were the less savages; and surely

the C aribs were not the most barbarous. [The n Captain Teophile Le Guillou reached

Vieques on his brigantine Cadeln on Ma y

1 1823.]

Order started to be established.

7 4 5 - 5 2 H

This eariy colonization narrative shared Jos de la Higuera's concern w ith unwan ted

others inhabiting Vieques. The excerpt also harmonized with the virginity debate

discussed above insofar

as

it juxtaposed an untam able 1493-1828 era to a more civilized

post-1828 Vieques. The chronological break marked 828as the foundational conjuncture

when the Spanish colony of Vieques started to take shape. Le Guillou's em phasis

on the year 1828 might have respon ded to various factors. First, the 1828 Vieques


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illiterate and dependant on Le Guillou's literary services. Thus, the emphasis on the

year

828

has ultimately highlighted for later generations Le Guillou's involvement as a

prominent actor in the colonization drama documentacin:3-4, 474,

753).

Such narratives

and emphases have fostered foundational narratives detailing how, if the Caribs

had consecrated the Viequense earth in

1514,

Teophile Le Guillou du ring 1828-1843

disciplined the unruly island and established the basis of the future Spanish Vieques.

As fate would have it, however, the colonywasformally founded only after his death.

bor

The Spanish colony of Vieques, dependent on but not integrated with Puerto Rico,

was officially founded in 1844. Still, it represented at the time a project more than

a reality. The small island was a disparate mosaic of languages, religions, races and

cultures. ^ The dilemma for imperial officials now sta tioned in Madrid, San Juan

and V ieques was to subtly harm onize a colony of foreigners dispersed througho ut

the island with the aim of achieving a secured Spanish dependency. Following the

Crown's orders, in 84 the Governor of Puerto Rico Santiago Mndez de Vigo

formed a commission to suggest approp riate m easures for developing V ieques

without attracting international attention. Out of the numerous recommendations

came the 1844 establishment of the parish-capital of Isabel II on the northern

coast of Vieques. In accordance with Spanish urban traditions, the town's plaza

was gradually surrounded by the most im portan t religious, governm ental and social

stru ctu res .Th efo un da tion of the town and the habilitation of a nearby port led to

the congregation of settlers in the island's capital.

Another measure in the creation of the stable Spanish dependency

actually started as an

83

solution to Spain's inability to properly claim Vieques.

Th e 1831 Royal O rder proscribing the exercise of authority over or the collection

of taxes from English and Danish citizens set the precedent for subsequent

fiscal policies favoring less governmental intervention and economic impositions

in the island. In turn, the 1841 Com mission prop osed tha t for a period of 5

years Vieques would not be charged the territorial and commercial taxes

imposed in Puerto Rico. The entrance of foreign merchandise without the

added 6 pe rce nt tax officially gave Vieques the free po rt stat us that held de facto

since1831. Even if originally designed to appease Danish and English complaints,

the free port status and other fiscal privileges allowed local commerce to flourish

and spurred the young colony's economic growth. In 1828 for example, a total

of

24

acres were cu ltivated in Viequ es, out of which 10 were d edicated to

the sugarcane. In 1834 the total had grown to 1,447 acres with 196 employed

on sugar. The num ber of slaves, con sequen tly, grew from 152 in 1834 to 369

in 1845. The 143 percent increase of slaves in 2years evidences Vieques's

economic growth {Documentacin: 209,

462-3,

721,

733,

803-4). Slavery, however,

was gradually replaced throughout the 19th century with immigrant labor from


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Th e investm ent in the fort, the last one constru cted by Spain in the A mericas,

also evidenced the strategic intentions behind the island's colonization.

These intentio ns, defended by Colonel Flinter, made clear that Vieques's

identity was truly intended as an outpost to Puerto Rico. Vieques needed to

be secured in order to make Puerto Rico safe. The fort, in turn, formed part

of the defense system of the Puerto Rican archipelago and of the weakened

Spanish Empire in the Americas. Still, the Fortn was never finished. Nor did

its cannons ever fire a single shot to defend Vieques from an enemy attack,

not even when th e Un ited S tates of America laid siege to the island in

1898.

Th e fort

might not have been employed for defense. It did, however, play an imp ortan t part

in disciplining the heterogeneous local population. The military structure, according

to Robert Rabin, became early on a prison. Its focus, in turn, shifted from foreign

aggressors to the enemies within (Olazagasti and Rabin 1991). Th e Fortn Con de de

Mirasol, however, did n ot cease to be a symbol of Spanish control over V ieques to

other empires. The structure's presence and Isabel II's prosperity helped convince

England to formally renounce its claims over V ieques in 1864.'^

Yet the military building evidenced Spain's

pretensions to physically possess the island through

claims to the exclusive right to exercise violence.

The year 1864 was a crucial one for Vieques. With Denmark relinquishing

claims over Vieques and with England's formal renunciation of Crab Island,

the Spanish colony of Vieques was officially incorporated as the 8th Military

D epa rtm ent in Pue rto R ico. As suggested by the Carib name Small Island,

Vieques's identity had for centuries been conceived as relational to Puerto

Rico. In fact, many Spanish officials in Sanjuan throughout the 19th century

considered it only a matter of time before the smaller island was integrated to

the neighboring colony. In the 1850s Vieques's population was reaching the

2,000 mark. The total was subject to a migratory influx of itinerant workers from

neighboring colonies. In addition, the island's annual exportation of commodities

like sugar exceeded the o,ooo pesos. Due to the population and commercial

growth officials expressed that the progress of Vieques was such that it should

be assimilated within Puerto Rico politically and economically as it already was

judicially {Documentacin 209). The inhabitants of Vieques must have had the

same expectations. Yet they were not consulted in the incorporation process

und ertak en after 184. As would be typical of colonial relation ships, the process

was dictated from M adrid and Sa njua n. Such an incorporation did not sit well


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Inten den te de Hacienda Manuel Jos Cerero over the restriction versus the fostering

of Vieques' commerce.'** Aguadilla's Custom s Administrator An tonio Caldern

argued to the cen tral government in 25 July

1846,

that, the wanting to encourage

Vieques at such great expenses to Puer to Rico and the N ation is the wanting to kill a

mother in the midst of delivery to save the life of a fetus tha t stilJ has not been seen

{Documentacin 704). ' Th e problem, as identified by people like Caldern, was tha t the

fiscal exception m ade for Vieques burdened the main island with the younger colony's

administrative costs. The exceptions, furthermore, facilitated both contraband and

competition to local and Spanish produces by allowing the introduction of tax-exempt

foreign comm odities through Vieques. Yet A ntonio Caldern's words are more than

simply representative of those opposed to Vieques' privileges, for his quo te might

actually be the first metaphorical construction of the Puerto Rico-Vieques relationship

as tha t of m othe r and child. Still, the child, as acknowledged by both Caldern and

the Crown that endorsed the fiscal privileges, was not fully born in 1846. What

Vieques would become was yet to be seen, but the delivery, according to some in

Puerto Rico, was already taking a heavy toll on the m othe r.

irth

Twenty-four years after the foundation of the Spanish colony of Vieques, and with

at least nine sugar haciendas and two cattleestanciasestablished in the island, the

Crown's opinions shifted. Spain declared through the

3

May 1868 Royal Decree that

the child was alive and k icking. Th e decree ordered Vieques' residents to start paying

subsidiary contributions to the Royal Treasury. These amounted to the percent of

the island's registered wealth, or to 3 701escudosin 1868-69{Documentos 6 June 22,

1868).

As an 14 O ctober

873

Hacienda report argued, the tributary exceptions had

become an unjustified privilege favoring a portion of Puerto Rican inhabitants in

detriment of the others {Documentacin 847). Th e report detailed the characteristic

postureo aciendasince the T840S supporting a no-privilege policy. The stance,

however, had more ample supp ort in San Juan by the 1870s, so that by

873

the

Dipu tacin Provincial, acting under the 1870 Ley de Ayuntam ientos, incorporated

Vieques within Puerto Rico as another municipality. The island's last privilege,

its free po rt status, was taken away seven years later.^ By 1880 Vieques had been

integrated to the colony of Puerto Rico.

Vieques's wealthiest residents, mostly merchants and hacendados with permanent

representation as major contrib utor s in the Municipal Board, were in dismay at the

prospect of such a dire predicament.^' The island had been dependent on Puerto

Rico throughout the 19th century. Yet the imposed integration process commenced

after

864

m ade very clear the residents' subordinated bargaining position w ith respect

to Madrid and San Juan . Sensing tha t a new language was needed to appeal to their

two metropolises, the Governor of Vieques Toms Font andagroup of merchants,


12/29

28 th year of being settled. Vieques is a fragile child from who cannot be expected the

work of an adult; its strength would be exhausted and it would die of consumption.

Documentacin:

Th e petitioner s argued in 87 against Vieques' further incorporation to Pue rto Rico.

They argued instead for derogating the recently established subsidy contributions

and for maintaining the free port status. Their argument employed the child-parent

metaphor previously articulated by Antonio Caldern. Yet in

87

the metaphor

was designed to appeal to the sense of paternal responsibility over a frail offspring.

If Puer to Rico had indeed pro crea ted Vieques, it could not leave the fragile infant

to die. On th e contrary, the virile father had to make sacrifices for the newborn if it

ever hoped to reap the rewards of successful child rearing in the future. Th e irony

was that to save the child th e pa rent had to intrude in the child's life as little as

possible. The parent, furthermore, had to assent to foreign intervention. Apparently,

the parent could not provide all the nourishing its newborn needed. One thing is

evident tho ugh: by the 1870s the child had definitely been born .

Baptism

After England's formal renunciation, the argument that Vieques, asayoung island-

community, was an exceptional case in need of special atten tion fell on the deaf ears

of colonial officials. Subsequently, for many Viequenses the years 1864-1880 evolved

into a historical turning point for the wo rst. If by the mid-i9th century Vieques had

been a prospering sugar colony, the post-1868 policies imposed from Madrid and San

Juan bred an air of pessimism among the Viequense society. The island's upper sectors

faced the mounting municipal deficit, the heavier tax burden and the more expensive

imports. Meanwhile the lower strata faced unemployment and, if non-Spanish citizens,

deporta tion and the forfeiture of work contracts.^' In the words ot the M unicipal

Board mem ber Jos Garca Marn, It is also said that V ieques heads to its ruin, that

it is decaying especially since it was assimilated to th e o ther towns of this Province

[Puerto Rico],imposing the payment o fth e subsidy that had no t satisfied before

{ ocumentacin

838),^4 For Garcia Marn, as for many ofhiscolleagues, the May 1868

Royal Decree had been collapsed with the

873

incorporation of Vieques to Puerto

Rico. Th e collapse m ade bo th equally suspicious and d etrimental to th e welfare of

Vieques. Th e belief led to support o fth e separation from Puerto Rico in order to

continue under a more direct Spanish colonial regime. The late 19th-century separatist

sentiment in Vieques must be contextualized. Th e island's Municipal Board, composed

of hacendados, merchan ts and appointed officials from Puerto Rico, was hardly

representative of Vieques's population . The local population, in fact, was quite diverse

in terms of ethnicity , language and religion. The diversity combined w ith the limited

comm unication venues with Puerto R ico did not provide fertile ground in Vieques for

the sense of Puerto R ican-ness developing across parts of th e main island. ^^ Thus, th e


13/29

changed, Puerto Rico remained the key to the Cahbbeati. Only tbis time the

island of Culebra, located just north of Vieques, was considered to be the key to

Puerto Rico. As Culebra with its coal station appeared in the foregroutid of U.S.

strategic considerations, Vieques temporarily slipped into the backgroutid of the

new imperial drama.

Throughout the first three decades of the 20th century, Vieques kept an

agricultural economy based on a prospering sugar industry. The prospe rity earned

the island the nickname of acita deOro Th e m ain changes resided in the improved

technologies, the replacement of an immigrant for a Viequense-Puerto Rican labor

force, the hacendados' displacement by companies like the United Puerto Rico

Sugar Company, and the open ing of the U .S.market. f Tbe se changes resulted in

the consolidation of four major sugar mills; Arcadia, Santa Maria, Puerto Real and

Playa Grand e. Tbese four mills tbat came to occupyasignificant portion of Vieques'

landscape, especially in the western half of tbe island, reached their zenith during

the early ig2os. Tbe last tbree mills, for example, produced a total of 17 276tons of

sugar in 1920 and a tota l of

15 531

tons in 1922. Playa Grande, however, reacbed its

maximum prod uction of13 088tons of sugar in 1928 (Bonnet 1976: 125-9). Som etime

in the midst of this sugar world Luis Llorns Torres (1876-1944), tbe Puerto Rican

from the mountainous municipality ofjayuya, dreamt of Vieques. Tbe dream took

the shape of a poem he titled La Isla Nen a.

Vieques: don Pepe Benitez,

Cayita, (caa y cancin),

vegas del sol y de azcar,

playas de coco y de

sol ...

La isla madre, la isla encinta,

rompi en el mar su dolor;

la isla madre abri su entraa

y la isla nena naci:

Vieques, Isabel Segunda,

Cayita, caa y cancin.

La caa canta en el llano,

y en el monte el ruiseor...

La isla madre abri su entraa

y la isla nena naci:

del herldico cordero

se fue a la mar un velln ;

polluelo que de debajo

de las alas se sali;

becerrito, bece rrito,

becerrito corredor,

Vieques: Don Pepe Benitez,

Cayita, (cane and song);

lowlands of sun and sugar

beaches of coconuts and of

sun ...

The mother island, the pregnant island,

broke into the sea her pain,

the mother island opened her entrails,

and the daughter island was born;

Vieques, Isabel Segunda,

Cayita, cane and song.

The cane sings in the plain,

and in the mountain the mockingbird...

The mother island opened her entrails,

and the daughter island was born:

of the heraldic lamb

escaped to the sea a tuft of woo l:

chick that from beneath

the w ings escaped;

little caif, little calf,


14/29

Through a swift stroke of the pen Luis Llorns Torres baptized the Puerto Rican child

conceived in the i6th century and born in1868.She wasagirl, and her nam e u'ould be

Isla Nena. The name, roughly translatable to G irl, Child and/or D aughter Island,

wotild beaconstant reminder of the familial bond shared between daughter and mother.

Yet Isla Nena, according to Llorns Torres,bythe early 20th century was no longer the

fragile child of 87 whose futurewasuncertain. Her identitywasbetter defined.

She was sunshine, coconuts and songs, but above all shewassugar. No t onlywereher

lowlands and plains inscribed with sugarcane, but her name cotild be collapsed with tha t

of Pepe Benitez, the hacendado who consolidated under his control the Resolucin,

Santa Helena and Playa Grande sugar mills in the w estern half of Vieques.^7

The sugar baptism Luis Llorns Torre s gave to Vieques could n ot conjure a sweet

future for the island. The Santa Maria sugar mill had its last harvest in 1922, and

Puerto Real followed in1927.Playa Grand e, outlas ting all the oth er sugar mills in

Vieques, had its last grinding in 1942 before being expropriated by the U.S. Navy.

Arcadia's closure must have preceded these three . Th e p lantations of Puer to Real

and Playa Grande were handled from 1946 to 1967 by the Compaa Agrcola de

Puerto Rico. The Compaa shipped the sugarcanes to mills in Humacao and

after 1950 in Fajardo. Th is governm ent agency could not revive Vieques's sugar

economy, which had rapidly decelerated after the mid-i92os when sugar prices

globally plumm eted (Bonnet 1976). Th e d eceleration created an economic vacuum

for the 1930s in an island with resources already unequally distributed. Isla Nena's

misfortunes, how ever, would not end any time soon. If anything, during the 1940s

they got worse.

nnocence lost

Th e U nited S tates' 1903 establishmen t in the F ortn Conde de Mirasol of the first

Caribbean Magnetic and Seismologic Observatory represented a prelude of things

to come (Olazagasti and Rabin 1991). Vieques, under the new imperial hands,

became a militarized colonial laboratory part of the Roosevelt Roads base centered

in the eastern Puerto Rican m unicipality of Ceiba.^' Throu gh two massive waves

during the years 1941-1942 and 1947-1948, the United States Congress, with the

approval of the Pue rto Rican legislature, expropriated two-thirds of Vieques.

The Naval Am mu nition Facility (NAF), covering some8 000acres, was situated

in the western third, and the Inner Range of the Atlantic Fleet Weapons Training

Facility (AFW TA ), covering some 11,900 acres, occupied the eastern third.

The AFWTA, in turn, was divided into the 11,000-acre Eastern Maneuver Area

and the 900 -acre Live Imp act A rea. As their names suggest, NAF was designed to

store ammunition and AFWTA to practice with it (IJ.S. Special Panel 1999)-

In other words, the western and eastern th irds of the island evolved into a colonial

landscape reserved for military practices and experimentations. The change in land

usage left the rem aining middle third of the island populated by approximately 10,000


15/29

during the 1940s. Many, having witnessed the razing and burning of their former

communities, relocated their zinc and cardboard houses to slums bearing tragically

wistful names like M onte Santo, a barrio withou t mountains or evident blessings

in the 1940s. Many othe r Viequenses simply dwelled under the sky, for neither the

planned Isabel II nor the slums that quickly enveloped the town could sustain the

population influx (Villegas 2001: 9-12). Those who the island s m iddle stretch could

not sustain were free to em igrate. Th e p referred destinations w ere Pue rto R ico s

main island, St. Croix and the United States. Exiled communities, nonetheless, kept

in touch with the island throug h civic organizations like P uerto Rico s Asociacin de

Hijos de Vieques and New Y ork s Club Viequense.? Throug h these organizations

exiled Viequenses nostalgically re-imagined Vieques.

Em igration, as evidenced in the 1940s and again in the 1960s, was encotiraged by

the Puerto R ican government and the U.S. Navy. The Pue rto Rican government s

endorsement of emigration to the United States as a solution to the archipelago s

unemployment coupled with the Navy s attempts to expropriate the complete island

of Vieques. During 1958-1964 the D epartm ent of Defense (DO D) and the W hite

House secretly pushed forth plans to expropriate the com plete islands of Vieques and

Culebra. The negotiations of Project V-C were confidentially conducted between

a Washington-based group headed by the Secretary of Defense R obert McN amara

and a San Juan-based committee led by the Governor Luis Muoz Marn. In these

negotiations the Pue rto Rican Governor, trapped between defending the needs of

Viequenses and appearing pro-American, skillfijlly argued against the expropriations.

In a28December 96 letter to President Joh n F. Kennedy, Governor M uoz Marn

wrote that am ong the many adverse political, social and hum an repercussions of

expropriating Vieques was the fact tha t:

There are about8 000 people in Vieque s. They and their ancestors have lived there

for many generations. The ir roots have grown around family, neighbors, schools,

churches, houses, land and jobs . The project involves forcible upro oting of these

peopleeven removal of the bodies from the cemeteries because, we are told , the

people of Vieques will not be allowed to return to visit the graves. Vle z 2 0 0 2 :1 9 4 )

The Governor s letter had the purpose of recapitulating his concerns about Project

V-C expressed to the President in a December i6th conversation. In these occasions

Muoz Marn emphasized to President Kennedy that Viequenses had inhabited the

island for m any generations. T hese p eople, Muoz added, were very serious a bou t

paying tribute to their dead, especially in All Saints Day. If removed from the island,

Viequenses would have to be allowed back at least once every year, or their dead

would have to be unearthed and expropriated w ith them . The Governor s arguments

had not deterred the D O D s expropriation plans. On the contrary, the D O D ,

as no ted by Muoz in the letter, was willing to unearth the dead. Th is was the reason


16/29

Faced with th e N a v /s claims over Vieques, a section of the island's inhabitants

began to openly denounce its practices as contrary to the island's progress. In 1964

Viequenses mobilized against the DOD's revival of Project V-C stipulating the

expropriation of the civilians' southern stretch of the island. Nine years later

Viequenses, with the felt presence of the poltica left, forced the Navy to withdraw

frotn the municipality's patron saint festival and, subsequently, from the island's

cultural arena. Then in 1977 a cross-partisan mobilization headed by the pro-

statehood Mayor Radams Tirado (1976-1980) fought to prevent the approval by

the P uerto Rican governm ent of a Navy aviation easement over Vieques's southern

coast (Tirado

2003;

Guadalupe 2001). Th e sector of Viequense society denouncing

Navy practices, although marked by the left, defied allegiances to political parties.

Through such mob ilizations, in addition, Viequenses began to app ropriate LIorns

Torres's "Isla Nena" with an Albizu-Soto twist.-W For Pedro Albizu Campos the

U.S.

Navy's activities in V ieques were

vivisection of the Puerto Rican nation.

Th e vivisection, as Pedro Juan Soto acknowledged through his phrase "colony of

colony," was carried out vi^ith the assent of the Puerto Rican government. Post-i96os

interpre tations, in turn , embraced Vieques as an island child, an island daughter.

Yet the daughter had been abandoned by its mother, who handed the child to a

foreigner. The foreigner raped her. As the late Viequense poet Angel Rigau wrote:

Con su mar circunscrito, dem sus campos;

alambrados sus ptimos terrenos

por el U.S.A Property y el

No Trespassing

Vieques para el na tivo es suelo adverso

y hasta en sus prop ios lares, relegado,

ya con su isla y su mar, ni el parentesco,

y abocado a no hallar un da cualquiera

ni un terrn sepulcral para sus muertos

pues la tierra, en su mxima existencia

es de la Base Naval y de su imperio

(Rigau 1984: 33).

W ith its sea circumscribed, as herland;

fenced her best lands

by the U.S.A. Prope rty and the

No Trespassing

Vieques for the native is enemy soil

and even her own pastures relegated,

with her island and

sea,

no more kinship,

and driven to not finding any given day

sepulchral earth for her dead

since theland,in its maximum existence

belongs to the Naval aseand her empire.

(author's translation)

Vieques, following Rigau, was no longer the sugar paradise LIorns Torres

envisioned. The island, prostituted and scarred with barbwire, now read "U.S.A.

Property" and "No Trespassing." Isla Nena had become so estranged tbat neither

the living nor the dead could find solace in her soil. This reading of the orphaned

and raped Isla Nena was as much a den unciation as it was a wake up call.

ove

In a culture where honor and manhood were based on the worth and protection of


17/29

in hand. For hours their small boats outmaneuvered the N A T O ships and

interposed themselves as human barriers between the m ilitary vessels and Isla

Nena. Their grassroots and very despera te act of civil disobedience was successil

in stopping , if only momentarily, the live am mu nition practice (Vieques Libre;

McCaffrey 2002: 74-7). For a couple of hours Isla Ne na b reathe d more easily.

The fishermen and Viequenses in general, united under the Cruzada Pro Rescate

de V ieques, continued challenging the m ilitary practices in Vieques. Their feats, as

ingenious as they were rebellious, attracted the atten tion of th e Puerto Rican m edia

and audience inaway tha t previous Viequense mobilizations against Navy practices

had not. The charisma of their spokesperson Carlos Zenn and the theatricality of

the fishermen's efforts, so well recorded by mediums like documentary photography,

drew the Puerto Rican public, whether approving or disapproving of the events, into

the dram a o fa small island many had never visited

J

This public, in turn, took an

active part in the re-imagining of Isla Nena. The Puerto Rican left appeared at the

forefront ofthe initiative. This sector encompassed different groups like the pro-

independence (PIP) and the socialists (PSP) that had come together during the early

1970s to protest the Navy's presence in Culebra. Through mobilizations and cultural

productions these groups infused the historical conjuncture with an anti-imperialist

motif not provided by the fisherm en. It was, furtherm ore, as if these groups were

trying to prove Isla Nena had never been orphaned. In the words ofthe Vega Alta-

born activist Nilda Medina, former P IP and PSP partisan, Vieques was an island

that like Culebra was totally ignored by us the Pue rto Ricans From the Isla Grand e

(Medina 2003).37 This was a situation she sought to personally address as she moved

to Vieques in 98 with the clear idea of joining the struggle against the Navy.

O ut of this con text arose Ha ciend o Punto en O tro Son's 1978 song Isla Nena :

Hay una Isla Nena en lontananza,

que es como la Isla Grande en carne viva.

Hay cantos de pitirre en la Esperanza

y hay deseos de amar y dar la vida.

Quietud interrumpida a cada instante,

nios despiertos en la madrugada,

el sol va despuntando por el este

y en la tibia maana se oye una nana.

Hay miles de pedazos de esta tierra,

con miles de ocasiones de injusticia.

Hay una isla chica en que la guerra,

roba tiempo al amor y a la caricia.

Un da que mi cancin se hizo oleaje,

un da, que repos en la blanca arena,

le di mi corazn y mi coraje,

There is an Isla Nena in the horizon,

that is like the Isla Grande in flesh.

There are bird songs in Esperanza

and desires to love and give life.

Tranquility interrupted at every instant,

children woken up at dawn,

the sun is surfacing in the east

and in the warm morning there s a lullaby.

There are a thousand pieces of this earth

with a thousand occasions of injustices

there is a little island in which war

steals time from love and for a caress.

One day my song made itself into waves

one day that I rested on its white sands

I gave my heart and my courage


18/29

to him and provides him with the realization tha t th e m ilitarized Isla Ne na is one

of the thousand pieces of this earth. If Vieques was indeed an integral part of

Pue rto Rico, then P rez, as a fellow Puerto Rican, could no t but become one with

the V iequenses. Still, the song ends with Isla N ena again being watched from a

distance. To the extent that Prez vindicates the Isla Nena-Isla Grande relationship,

Viequenses remain trapped between the categories of us and others.

The relationship, in turn, distances as well as subordinates Vieques to Puerto Rico.

The separation expressed between the narrator and Isla Nena, however, did not

deter Viequenses from appropriating the song as their municipal hymn.

Viequenses were internally divided as to what the fishermen's actions m eant.

For many Viequenses caught in the m idst of the C old W ar, the U .S. military was

the ultimate embodiment of democracy and freedom. Thus, even though the

fishermen's movement was headed and endorsed by pro-statehood sympathizers

like Zenon and Mayor Tir ado , their critiques of the Navy were seen by some as

suspiciously anti-American. Puerto Rico's late 1970s and eariy 1980s political

climate in general was polarized. Th e governmen t's repression of leftist and pro -

independence stances encouraged the atmosphere of intolerance toward critiques

ofU.S.policy. A significant p ortion of Pue rto Rican society, in turn, considered the

fishermen's protest anti-American and regarded the events unfolding in Vieques

with disapproving eyes. Yet neither the internal division of Viequenses nor the

disapproval ofaconsiderable sector of Puerto Rican society provoked the grassroots

movement's demise. The movement finally receded in 983with the signing of the

Memorandum of Mutual Understanding between the pro-atatehood Governor of

Puerto Rico, Carlos Romero Barcel, and the U.S. Navy. The accord, ending the

legal battle between the signing parties, basically stipulated tha t the Navy would

cooperate with the civilian population and help protect the local environment if

allowed to continue the ir m ilitary practices in Vieques. Th e Navy, however, did no t

do what it had committed to do, and the Puerto Rican government did not oversee

or enforce the agreement (Garcia 2001:102). The Memorandum thus resulted in the

perpetuation of the status quo. The expectation surrounding the conciliatory pact

undercut the impulse of the fishermen's movement.

ori ound

During the 1980s and 1990s civil resistance to th e Navy's presence and practices

in Vieques resurfaced. While the resistance was not as widely followed inside and

outside the island as with the fishermen, the protests against the installation of the

Relocatable Over the Horizon Radar (RO TH R) in the Naval Amm unition Facility

marked a shift in the way Isla Nena was imagined. Env ironmentalist sensibilities

arose as comm unity activists denounced th e R O TH R as toxic to human beings

and the V iequense environm ent in general. Isla Ne na, dissected, enclosed and


19/29

M.D., and Rafael Cruz Prez, environmental engineer, had been linking to

the po lluting practices of the Navy in the island (Rivera2001;Cruz 1988).^

The Isla Nena that had been sunshine, sugar cane and coconuts was evolving at the

close of the 20th century into a barren and polluted landscape, into one big graveyard

unable to reproduce anything that was not d eath. Isla Nena , orphaned and m oribund,

agonized as the cancer-stricken bodies multiplied.

C

ancer, however devastating an illness, represents a silent and gradual process

of

loss

endured by individuals and families who usually confme their suffering

to domestic spaces. The confinement can render invisible the sickness and

its effects. In V ieques, the deadly invisibility of cancer did not provide the stimulus

needed for the c om mu nity to collectively engage in Isla Nena 's revival process.

The engagement followed the

9

April 1999 death of David Sanes. Th e erroneous

bombing of the Viequense's watch post inside Cam p Garcia (AFW TA) ignited four

years of civil disobedience against the Navy's activities in Vieques. The unprec edented

union of Viequenses and Pu erto Ricans cem ented a strong network of civil

disobedience groups, with ample international support, th at established camps in

Navy restricted territory. If the Viequense fishermen had been human barriers in the

sea, the civil disobedience camps were com mun ity barriers in the shores.

Th e civil disobedien ce groups were n ot centrally organized. Y et they collectively

accomplished one very imp ortant feat: the inscription with V iequense-Pu erto Rican

meaning of the two-thirds of Vieques that had been voided of such geographical

imaginings. Th e ceremo nial placing of a wh ite wood en cross where David Sanes died

and the subsequent re-baptizing of the site as Mount David began the ingenious

appropriation of a space that had been sealed for more than 60 years. The symbolic

white crosses proliferated along the island, claiming places like Mo un t David and

the entra nce of C amp G arcia. But the crosses were not the sole landscape m arkers

with a religious mo tif De ep in restric ted territory the civil disobedients built a rustic

chapel further consec rating Navy land, a strategy previously em ployed in Culeb ra.

The chapel provided witnesses with an unfolding drama that contrasted land usage:

the Navy destroyed while Viequenses comm uned. Civil disobedients m ade the

contrast a central part ofthe ir anti-Navy campaign. They published in the Inte rne t

documentary videos and photographs of a polluted landscape of missile craters,

rusted airplanes and dead wildlife. These visual texts portrayed a clear inte ntion to

expose affected landscape and wildlife th at the Navy had agreed to protec t in the

1983 M emo randum and whose conditions co ntemp orary environmental sensibilities

rendered unacceptable. Civil disobedients further appropriated Navy sites through

subversions. Disobedients, for example, hung a hammock from the cannon of an

abandoned tank they further decorated by inserting through its barrel the Pue rto

Rican flag (Vieques Libre). Th e transform ation added a sense of tense dom esticity

and Puerto Rican-ness to the site. These publicized subversions, photographs

and videos published, for exam ple, in the webpage of V ieques Libre helped a


20/29

of her bald and cancer-stricken face looking forward with the pr inted wo rds

Peace and Health for Vieques loomed near the numerous crosses, as ii asking

the transient viewer to make sure she did not literally make the journey into death.

Milivy's centrality in the consecration of the military base's entrance was not random.

She embodied the unrecognizable Isla Nen a. She was the young daug hter who had

not had the chance to fully live, but was already agonizing. In fact, Milivy and isla

Nena were united by the sickness they shared. The same pollutants that lodged in

Isla Nena's mango trees, not readily visible but imagined in all their pervasiveness,

circulated through Milivy's veins. Th us, Milivy's pleas could not but appeal to

Viequenses in general, especially to pare nts . Sadly, the five-year-old died on 17

Nov ember 2002. Meanwhile V ieques, some say, convalesces.

Conclusion The making of a virgin

Th roug hou t the last six centu ries the inhabitan ts of Vieques have engaged in a

long and violent process to forge a stable island com mun ity. From the times of the

Caribs to those of the U .S. Navy, with the possible exception of the late 19th and

early 20th century, different empires have opposed such plans for very different

reasons. The two recurring themes in this colonial history have been the strategic

importance assigned to Vieques with respect to European maritime voyages to the

Caribbean, and the deilnition of Vieques's identity as subordinated to the Pue rto

Rican main island. In this sense, the attempts to colonize Vieques have been

exceedingly militaristic and the welfare of its inhab itants has come in second place

to the needs of distant and not so distant metropolises. To meet such challenges and

survive, would-be Viequenses have had to define and redefme themselves and their

com mu nity in close dialogue with de finitions from outside the island. In the midst

of the ingenious maneuvering Isla Nena was conceived and born, evolved and several

times almost died. Such a capacity to be born, to react and adapt to the environment

and to possibly perish, presents Isla Nena as a living being. Th e life endowed to such

a representation, by Viequenses and non-Viequenses, has established an organic

relationship between the island and the community Isla Nena embodies. Viequenses

and Isla Nena are thought to have lived together as one throughout the last three

to six centuries in the northea stern Caribbean. The temporal and spatial charac ter

of Isla Nena, an island-community imagined through an infantile and feminine

metaphor, has legitimated the islanders' claims on Vieques's history and landscape.

To the ex tent that isla Nena occupies and is the island as it has evolved over the past

centuries, so Viequenses have too come to inhabit that space and time. The se claims

to inhabiting Isla Nena have translated into concrete political projects designed to

face challenges like those posed by the U.S. Navy, coercive arm of the U.S.global

empire, at the closing of the 20th century.

At the o pening of the 21st century, the N avy has formally left V ieques.

After the 1999 death of David Sanes the political lobbying, social mobilization and


21/29

W hile the N avy is undertaking the long process of decontamination, Viequenses

still have no control over m ost of the island. Th e U.S. Congress transferred a

significant portion of the ex-Navy land to the federal agency U.S. Fish and Wildlife.

The rest of the land is eithe r sealed off until th e decontam ination process is

com pleted or under study by the municipal government so as to decide its best usage.

The Navy, in addition, maintained ownership of the ROTHR. In the meantime,

the civilian m iddle third of the island has become th e object of an unrestra ined land

grab by N or th A merican capitalists looking to exploit the undiscovered Spanish

Virgin Island (Connelly 2003). Th eir search proves that th e virginity deba te engaged

by Lord Castlereagh and Conde de Fernn Nez in 1816, even after 200 years of

imperial rule and six decades of continuous bom bardm ents, is far from settled. In the

midst of the renewed debate and the cosm etic surgeries, Vieques is being subjected

to in order to appear virgin, Viequenses are witnessing the rapid gen trification of

the m ostly untitled land of th at same civilian one-th ird they have now occupied for

generations (Berman 2006 ; McCaffrey 200). If they were uncomfortably squeezed

for the last 60 years between two m ilitary bases, they are now being squeezed out of

the civilian one-third they can hardly afford to inhabit.


22/29

KNOWLEDGMENTS

The author would like to thank her parents for being such compassionate storytellers, and

Lenny Urea, Juan Hernndez, Rebecca Scott and the anonymous reviewers of this essay

for their comments and suggestions.

NOTES

' Geograph ical imaginings, as formulated by Pat Jess and Do reen Massey, refer to

interpretations ofthe past and present and character ofa place that can guide or justify

the future ofthe same place.

2 M ichel de Certeau argues that users, those wh o lack a place for empo we rm ent,

engage in tactics like walking and other everyday practices to creatively weave spaces

they are otherwise disempowered to claim. The tactics ofthe disempowered, in turn, are

characterized by a sense of spontaneo us m obility that creatively disrupts and redefines

spaces users are nonethe less unab le to possess.

' For studies of pre-Colum bian indigenous cultures in Vieques see, for example, the

works of Luis Chanlatte Baik, Ivonne Nargannes Storde, Alfredo Figueroa, Miguel

Rodriguez and Diana Lpez.

4 Los franceses, ingleses y holande ses que suce dieron a los caribes en sus islas,

adop taron su ferocidad y barbarie; esparcieron el terror y espan to po r todas las colonias

espaolas, llevndolo tod o a sangre y fuego. [Th e prese nt and following qu ote s have been

translated from Spanish to English by the author ot the article.]

5 In P uert o Rico the 1778 Real Cdula helped liberalize slave trad e, gave land titles to

those already occupied or cultivated under the condition of its continued exploitation and

stated that unoccupied lands would be given to those without lands. The document also

created the towns of Arecibo, Aguada and Coamo to accompany the established Sanjuan

and San Germn, and authorized the importation of knowledgeable Catholic workers

from neighboring, m ostly French, colonies along with sugar machinery and utensils. T he

1815 Real Cd ula de Gra cias o pen ed for 5 years all the Puerto Rican ports to commerce

with friendly nations willing to pay the high taxes imposed on the com mercial ex change.

The Cdula also abolished the

alcabala

tax imposed on merchandise and ecclesiastical

diezmos and substituted it fora subsidio of equal or superior quantity than the alcabala.

Finally, the text permitted the immigration of Catholic foreigners from friendly nations,

promised unoccupied land to wealthy immigrants, allowed the importation of slaves

from neighboring foreign colonies, and admitted the free importation of machinery and

utensils for agriculture (Scarano

1993:

321-4, 383-6).

^

After the Haitian Revolution much ot Spanish Am erica feared the pote ntial power

and violence of revolted slaves. Considering that England abolished slavery in

1833,

t he

Puerto Rican government and settlers feared that an English Vieques would be converted

into a haven for runaway slaves and freed blacks. The haven would encourage the

massive desertion ofthe black field hands moving most ofthe 19th-century Puerto Rican

e c o n o m y

{Documentacin

35).

7 Pu erto Rico was tirst described as the key to the Indies by Baltazar dc Ca stro


23/29

3OO;Caro

1991:

322-3). I thankjos Cruz for sharing his insights on such strategic titles

assigned to Puerto Rico.

^ Rum ors circulated that Vieques's first military com ma nder, Jua n Rosell, was not

very successful in facing Spain's unwanted others. In fact, it was apparently common

knowledge in the island th at w henever pirates or smugglers appeared, Rosell would hide

in the forests for as long as the visit lasted. The settlers, however, might not have had high

expectations of the military commander since he reached Vieques at the age of45and

was already considered an old m an at the time

{D ocumentacin:

749; Rivera 1963).

> Acco rding to Jo s Bonn et Benitez the population of Viequ es totaled 120 residents

in 1838,1,036 in 1845,5 938in 1899, 6,642 in 1900,10,425 in 1910,11,651 in 1920, 10,582 in

193 0,10,362 in 1 940, 9,228 in 1950, 7,210 in i9 60 and 7,762 in 1970 (Bo nne t 1976: 118).

' T he now called Archivo Gene ral de Simancas holds doc um ents dating from t he

late 15th century to 1800. According to the Spanish Subdireccin General de Archivos

Estata les, this archive, initiated by Charles V and created by Philip II, was the first one

ever constru cted as well as the first one with an archival guide. T he A rchivo G eneral de

Indias located in Seville was not founded until

1785.

T he Archivos Generales de Indias,

Simancas y de la Corona de Aragn Home Page. 2000. Subdireccin General de Archivos

Estatale s. 28 Ju ne 2005. .

recay la conversacin sobre las riquezas de los terren os de Viequ es, y sobre la

pobreza de las Islas Vrgenes. El Sr. Presidente Hay, nico que habl francs me dijo que

esas Vrgenes eran se oritas m uy decrpitas y llenas de enfermedade s, qu e la Isla de C abra

(Vieques), era la ms bella, ms joven y ms rica de las vrgenes. Y o le co nt que Viequ es

no e ra virgendespus de su matrimonio conla Espaa. T he name Isla de Cab ra (i.e., G oa t

Island) could be a confusion w ith Crab Island which was England's name for Viequ es.

Spanish officials during the early r9th century, however, stated that some foreigners

employed Isla de Cah ra to refer to Viequ es{Docum entacin:747).

' Acc ording to records of the Archivo H istrico Nacional in M adrid, Cap tain Te oph ile

Le Guillou reached Vieques on his brigantine Cadeln on i May

1823.

W hile his original

purpose had been to buy wood, a conversation with Juan Rosell about the hardships

encountered in the island convinced Le Guillou to stay and undertake the colonization of

Vieques\i ns\{D ocumentacin:751-2).

'3 governed with out written prec epts that give the one in charge and the one obeying

the norms of their respective conduct. As propose d by ngel Rama, the letrados in Latin

Am erica were originally those that m astered written com mun ication. D uring the colonial

period the letrados wielded the almost sacred power that writing had acquired to perform

and legitimize themselves in their roles as bureau crats and ideologues of the Spanish

Empire (Rama 1996: 17-28).

'4 Vieques debe ser conside rado como la llave de Pu erto Rico, de quien es inseparable.

Desde el ao 1493 que fue descubierta por el Almirante Coln hasta 1828, aquella Isla ftje

habitada por los Indios Caribes, filibusteros, piratas, desertores, malhechores, ladrones,

corsarios y contrabandistas. Estos han representado su papel algunas veces juntos. Esta

enca ntado ra Isla ha sido testigo de escenas capaces de exaltar un gran poeta , sobre to do si


24/29

persons surveyed,617were from Pu erto R ico and Vieques,3 from Spain,361from Franc e,

18 from England, 18 from Denmark, i from the Philippines and T8 from other different

nations. Of the 1,036 total population, 249 inhabitants were recorded as White,411as Free

Mulattos,8as B lacks, and39as Slaves. It should be noted that these numbers identifying

races exceed by

1 1

the census's 1,036 total population figure

{Documentacin:

733).

'7 T he British Em pire formally renoun ced its claim over Vieques after prolonged

discussions, especially during the years 1862-1862, about the intelligence gathered by

British Virgin Island colonial officials revealing the growth of the Spanish colony and

the establishment of the garrison fort, and after ineffective diplomatic negotiations with

Spanish officials (Soverei^ty).

' T he Inte nden cia, established in much of Hispan ic Am erica during the 1780s, was

an adm inistrative organ in charge of the orderly functioning of fiscal i nstitu tions and

fostering of the colonial economies. In Puerto Rico, the Intendencia was officially created

in 1803 but came to be occupied, as an independe nt administrative en tity trom that of

the Go verno r, in 1811-1812 (Pic 1988:130-1). D uring the 1840s the In te nd en te Ce rero

opposed the exp enditure plans, proposed by the G overnors of Puerto Rico from Santiago

M ndez de Vigo to Jua n Prim y Prats, designed to foster and defend Vieques (Bonnet

1976).

^9 el querer que se fomen te Vieques a tan grandes expensas de Puer to Rico y la Na cin

es querer matar a una madre que se halla de parto por salvar la vida de un feto que an no

se ha visto .

^

An tonio Rivera M artn ez argued in

As

empez Vieques that Vieques lost its free port

status in

188.

T he date is unlikely given the21July1871petition signed by the Gov ernor

of Vieques T om s Fon t and othe r Vieques residents in defense of the con tinuation, as

opposed to reinstallation, of the tree por t statu s. For this reason, J. P astor Ruiz's proposal

of 1880 as the year when Vieques lost its free port status is more feasible (Ruiz 1987;

Rivera 193).

T he Ju nta Municipal or Municipal Board was not a democratic organ. Instead,

it was presided by a Governor or, after

1873,

^ Mayor app ointed by the Governor of

Puerto Rico. T he rest of the board was compose d of members of Vieques' mayores

contribuyentes,

or main con tributors, which included m ostly merchants and hacendados.

^ Vieques necesita para salvarse un gobiern o paterna l y econ m ico que en vez de

imponerle nuevas cargas, lo libre si es posible de las que hoy le oprimen; necesita que

su puerto contine francamente abierto al extranjero, porque del extranjero, recibe

los elemento s qu e lo sostien en...Pue rto Rico es un pueblo viril que cuen ta siglos de

existencia, Vieques, Seor, que apenas cuenta algunos aos, no puede ser comp arado con

Pu erto Rico ni en lo poltico ni en lo adm inistrativo. N ingn pas en el mu ndo . Seor, ha

podid o prod ucir beneficios al G ob iern o de su Metr polis a los 28 aos de ser poblado.

Vieques es un dbil nio del que no puede exigirse el trabajo de un adulto; sus fuerzas se

agotaran y morira por consuncin .

3 Slavery, first record ed as existing in the Vieques during the 1685-1693 non -H ispa nic

colonization v entures, was abolished in Pue rto R ico on M arch 22,1873. Althou gh Ro bert


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que se le asimil a los dems pueblos de esta P rovincia {Puerto Ric ol, impo nind ole el

pago del subsidio que antes no satisfaca.

^ In the Pu erto Rican main island the re we re large secto rs of th e po pu latio n, especially

Caribbean migrants settled in the south and blacks in the northeast, who did not identify

with the cultural nationalist discourses being fashioned by San Juan -base d intellectuals in

the late 19th century. For the influence of Caribbean immigrants in Vieques see the work

of Ro bert Rabin Vieques: La conexin antillana (Rabin).

^ T he 1900 Foraker Act established a quo ta of Pu erto Rican sugar tha t could be

introdu ced to the U nited States. The sugar, increasingly backed by capitalists from

eastern states like New York and M assachusetts, had an added 5percent tax creditable

to the Puerto Rican treasury (Pic 1988: 233-6). For a study of the evolution from sugar

haciendas to centralized mills in the production of sugar in Puerto Rico see, for example,

the work of Andrs Ram os M attei Lah ciend zuc rer (1986).

^7 On 8March 2006, the Museum and Archive Fortn C onde de Mirasol opened

Bonnie Donohue and Csar Ayala's exhibition, titled Vieques:

A Long Way

Home T he

exhibition contained photographs of Vieques's western third taken by Donohue after

2001. These photographs of dense woods and military bunkers contrasted with the 18

M arch 1941 aerial pho togra phs taken by Pfc. Bradt portraying the same western third

of the island com partm entalize d by sugar plantatio ns and the Playa G rand e sugar mill

working at full capacity. These 1941 photographs were part of the documentation

gathered by the U.S. Navy for its acquisition of approxima tely 10,130 acres from juan

Angel Ti , ow ner since 1939 of the Playa Gra nde sugar mill and plantation . To see some

of the photograp hs visit the Vieques,

A Long Way Home

Internet Home Page at .

^^ Th e U.S. military interests in Vieques and Pu erto Rico have been studied by jua n

Giusti Cordero,Jorge Rodriguez Beruffand Humberto Garca Muiz and others. Scholars

iike Csar Ayala and Jo s Bolivar have studied the exprop riation waves in Viequ es.

'* It could be argued tha t Vie quen ses were made Pu ert o Rica ns in 1873. In turn,

Pu erto Ricans were m ade U.S. citizens through the Jo ne s' Act of

1917.

Th us , following

Jos Bonnet Benitez's population figures, there were 10,362 Viequenses-Puerto Ricans-

U.S.citizens in Vie que s by the 1940s (Bonne t 1976: 118).

30 T he sugar mills mu st have congrega ted in the we stern half of Viequ es due to t he

proximity of the Punta Arenas port, located in the island's northwestern tip, to the

Pu erto Rican m ain island. Th is western area, in turn, possessed right until 1941 a mo re

developed infrastructure in terms of roads, schools, cemeteries and other organized

administrative organs than its eastern counterpart. The infrastructure fostered the

hybridization of Viequense culture. The communities that grew around the sugar mills

had a strong non-Hispanic Caribbean influence to the extent that their inhabitants

were mostly itinerant workers from neighboring Caribbean colonies like Trtola and

Martinique. As the communities evolved, the area's once foreign names and character

were gradually appropriated as Viequense.

3' T he emigration of Viequenses had begun, as Clarence Senior argued and Jos


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3 T he archipelago of Diego Garcia provides an example through which to com pare the

United States policies towards Vieques. The local population of this Indian Ocean atoU,

known as Hois, was completely expropriated in 197-1971 by the British Government,

which owns the archipelago but leased part of it to the U.S. until the year 2016. It should

be noted that cementeries in Diego Garcia were not unearthed as locals were allowed to

return in 2006 to tend their family graves (BBC News April 14, 2006).

3 Am ong the unfriendly measures formulated by the U.S. Navy for Vieques was the

secret accord it forced during the mid-1960s on the Puerto Rican government to not

develop the island as a tourist destina tion in exchange for the N avy's renuncia tion of

future expropriation plans. In accordance with the no tourist-no further development

plans,

the Navy proceeded to consistently deny petitions to improve the island's only

civilian airport located in Navy-owned land. T he d ocu me nts regarding the confidential

negotiations between the Pu erto Rican government u nder Luis Muoz Marn and the

Department of Defense can be found in the archive of the Fundacin Luis Muoz Marn

in Trujillo Alto , Pue rto R ico.

34 Pe dro Albizu Camp os visited Vieq ues som etim e betw een T947 and 1948 and

denounced the U.S. Navy's actions in Vieques as the vivisection of the Puerto Rican

nation. I le also accused the Pu erto R ican and Viequense gov ernm ents of being the

accomplices to colonialism. He further emphasized the danger he perceived in the

growing militarization of the island, and pointed out to his audience that what was

happening to Vieques could happen to any other Puerto Rican municipality (Albizu

1948: 50-7). Approxim ately ten years after Albizu's visit to Vieques P edro Juan Soto

wrote Vsmail. In the novel he tells the story of the illicit son of a black Viequense

woman and a white American named Usmail, who despite being abandoned and

orphaned, must grow up and eventually leave the U.S. Navy-occupied Vieques of the

1950s (Soto 1973).

y>

In the civilian sector of Vieques violent encou nters betwe en Vieq uenses and sailors

were fairly common during the early years of Navy presence. The violence usually took

the forms of street fights and rapes (Guadalupe 2001). T he tense situatio n is portraye d in

Pedro Juan Soto'sUsmail

{ii -^ .

'f* M any of the docu me ntary photog raph s taken of the Viequense fishermen in

action, like Roso Jua n S abaloncs' 1979 pho togra ph of Fisherm an fires slingshot at U.S.

Navy vessel off Vieques, can be found published in the In ter ne t. To see some of the

photographs visit the Vieques Libre Home Page at .

Th ese photo graph s have been in circulation since the late 1970s and are widely known to

Viequenses. I have nonetheless taken the photographer's name and title from Katherine

McCaffrey ' s M ilitary Po we r

an d

Pop ular Pro test (2002).

37 fue un a isla qu e co m o Cu le br a fueto ta lmen te ignorada por noso t ros los

p u e r t o r r i q u e o s d e la Is la Grande.

38 Fo r th e de ath rates rela ted

t o

can cer and h ear t and cerebr al vascular diseases

in

Vieques and for acompar i so n wi th t h eres t o f Puerto Rico, see forexample t h e1987

Indicador es eco nmicos y sociales p o r mu nicipio s {VK}ux\VAt Pla nific ac in 1988: 3, 453), Fo r


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BBC News. 14 April 2006. Emotional Return for Chagossians. Onlitie. BBC News.

Internet,

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Sanjua n: F. Ortiz Nieves

Brau, Salvador. 1981. Mcolonizacin de PuertoRico:Desdee ldescubrimiento delaIsla hasta

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Inhabiting Isla Nena- Imperial Dramas, Gendered Geographical Imaginings and Vieques, Puerto Rico.

Documents

Transcript of Inhabiting Isla Nena- Imperial Dramas, Gendered Geographical Imaginings and Vieques, Puerto Rico.