By Bill Keegan and Betsy Carlson

“Guinea John . . . made his way to the East Coast, mounted the cliff at Manzanilla [Trinidad],

put two corn cobs under his armpits and flew away to Africa, taking with him

the mysteries of levitation and flight . . . He loved his children. It was their living that would

make him an ancestor. His wisdom was theirs to have; but they had eaten salt and

made themselves too heavy to fly. So, because now their future would be in the islands,

he preferred not to place temptation in their way by revealing to them the mysteries of flight.”

Earl Lovelace, Salt (Faber and Faber, 1996, p. 3)

Among some of the enslaved Africans who were brought to the Americas there was a belief that people could fly (as did Guinea John). However, as people spent more and more time on the land they became grounded and lost the ability to fly. In the epigraph, Lovelace uses salt as a trope for becoming grounded (the book’s title is Salt, but there is no further mention of salt in the book).

It is salt-raking season in the Turks & Caicos, although we suspect that the only attention the salt ponds are getting today is from tourists. Solar-distilled salt, meaning salt that precipitates in shallow ponds from evaporation driven by the sun and winds, was once the major industry in these islands. This focus on salt can be traced to the first inhabitants (Tainos).

There is some debate concerning how much salt is good (or bad) for you. Some of you may recall the old American Middle School film “Nemo the Magnificent,” which pointed out that the main component of the human circulatory system (blood and plasma) is best described as salt water. People who live, and do physical labor outdoors, in hot, tropical climates require more salt to replace what is lost through sweating. (OK, horses sweat, men perspire and women glisten). The estimates for how much salt the human body needs ranges from 300 grams (2/3 pound) to eight kilograms (16 pounds) per year! The lack of medical consensus makes it hard to determine how much is needed versus how much might lead to hypertension and heart disease. One thing is clear – salt deficiency causes headaches and weakness, then light-headedness, then nausea.

No one is more familiar with these symptoms than Bill Keegan. Working with Shaun Sullivan on Middle Caicos in the summer of 1982, they headed off to the south coast to do additional mapping at MC-6 and MC-8. About halfway along the 3.5 kilometer trail Keegan became dizzy and developed a horrible headache. By the time they reached Armstrong Pond, he was vomiting continuously. These were the days when Gatorade1 was not so widely available, and so Sullivan required all of his crew to take a daily salt tablet (someone didn’t listen). Fortunately Armstrong Pond was in full salt bloom and after a pinch of salt and a bit of rest it was possible to drink water, without nausea, and then walk back to Bambarra.

There is no mention in the Spanish chronicles that the Tainos salted fish. However, there is compelling evidence that they did. First, at least in Hispaniola, the Tainos lived in large villages (up to 3,000 people), many of them in the interior of the island, that must have required a reliable daily supply of meat. Given their lack of domesticated animals and a paucity of terrestrial animals, they must have been dependent on fishes. In fact, Columbus described villages on the south coast of Cuba that lacked adequate agricultural land and thus specialized in fishing. The fishes that they captured were shipped to the large, interior agricultural villages in exchange for cultigens.

There are two main problems with fishes as food. First, in the absence of refrigeration the meat spoils quickly, especially in tropical climates. According to a Caribbean Commission report in the 1950s, fish will remain edible without refrigeration for up to seven days if kept in a cool and dry place. This alone probably was not adequate to meet the Tainos’ daily demand for meat. The Spanish did record that the Tainos smoked fish on a lattice of sticks positioned over a fire (barbacoa) in order to preserve the meat for future use. They don’t mention salting fish, but this may be due to the fact that salted (“corned”) meat and fish was the mainstay of European diets at the time and thus not worthy of mention.

Being able to keep fish for seven days may seem adequate, except for the fact that fishing can be very dependent on weather conditions and season of the year. According to Ramón Pané (1496), the Tainos used the position of the constellation Orion in the night sky as a way to judge the efficacy of fishing. The difficulty in getting fish was brought home to us during fieldwork on Middle Caicos. We spent a month eating chicken wings because no fish were available, despite the fact that we were surrounded by fishermen. When we inquired as to the availability of fish we were repeatedly told that they weren’t fishing because “the bottom is walking” (meaning that despite the beautiful clear day there was too much sediment in the water to make it worth their while to go fishing!).

We have written about Armstrong Pond and the associated archaeological site MC-6 in several of our previous articles. It is a truly amazing site on the south coast of Middle Caicos that has the only central court and astronomical stone alignments in the entire Bahama archipelago. These alignments have been associated with both the summer solstice and the constellation Orion through the very careful investigations and mapping conducted by Dr. Shaun Sullivan. As Sullivan recognized, the major resources in the vicinity of MC-6 are solar-distilled salt on the margins of Armstrong Pond and fishes in the waters of the Caicos Bank. Cementing the relationship between the site and the pond is a one-kilometer aboriginal road connecting them, and unusual stone alignments on the margin of the pond that seem to have been used for drying the salt slurry collected from the pond. Sullivan and his 16 member crew collected almost half a ton of salt in 15 minutes from Armstrong Pond in 1977. Recent studies have suggested that Anguilla, Puerto Rico and a number of sites in the Lesser Antilles also were strategically placed for access to salt ponds.

With regard to fishes, the most common in the site is bonefish. A recent study of fish bones from the site revealed an inordinately high number of head and tail bones (both heavy and inedible) which suggest that fish were being processed (and probably salted) for export to Hispaniola. In addition, the enigmatic stone-lined pit structures surrounding the central plaza (found nowhere else in the Caribbean) may have been used to store salted, smoked and fresh fish prior to shipping. These stone-lined pits would have provided the cool and dry atmosphere recommended by the Caribbean Commission.

In previous essays we have noted that the most common Taino sound is gua, which was used in words to denote the most valuable of items and the most important people, places and things. Granberry and Vescelius (Languages of the Pre-Columbian Antilles, 2004) translate -gua as salt water. The use of this term seems to emphasize the great importance of salt (water) in Taino life. For example, the Taino place name (toponym) Inagua might seem a corruption of the word iguana, but more likely refers to the broad expanse of wetlands on the island that today is home to Morton Salt.

The Morton Salt operation is very impressive. Salt is solar-distilled in a seemingly endless array of shallow ponds. When the salt is ready, road graders push the salt into long rows and then combines blow the salt into huge dump trucks. The trucks bring the salt to a sorting machine to separate it into two grades and the salt ends up in 40-foot tall piles from which it is taken by conveyor out a long pier and dumped directly into the holds of ships.

The salt ponds create an interesting ecosystem. Just prior to crystallization the ponds often develop red alga that is eaten by tiny brine shrimp. These shrimp are the favored food of flamingos, and the red coloration of the alga and shrimp give the flamingo its bright red coloration.

Today, when salt is so inexpensive and plentiful, we tend to take it for granted.  In fact, it is so abundant that we can spread it on our roads to melt ice (although this practice has fallen into disfavor due to the adverse effects of salt on the surrounding vegetation). Yet salt might be ranked as the most valuable commodity in human history; it is the only rock we eat on a regular basis, and at times it has been called “white gold.” Let us recommend Mark Kurlansky’s fascinating book, Salt: A World History (Penguin Books, 2002). Salt has for centuries been associated with sex, as reflected in the word “salty” being associated with virility:  “With salting, front and back, at last strong natures they will not lack.”2  Kurlansky also suggests (p. 203) that:  “THE HISTORY of the Americas is one of constant warfare over salt.  Whoever controlled salt was in power.”

Salt cod was an extremely valuable commodity in Europe by the 15th century. There is credible evidence that European fishermen were capturing cod off the coast of North America before Columbus’s first voyage. As Kerlansky notes, explorers tell you where they went, but fishermen are loathe to divulge the best fishing grounds. History books talk about the triangle trade, but fail to mention that salt was the main cargo and often used as ballast during these voyages – a valuable sale item, as opposed to river rocks which also were used as ballast.

Starting in the 16th century, Spanish vessels may have stopped in the Turks & Caicos to load salt, although there is no tangible evidence that they did so. It wasn’t until Bermuda was settled with the promise of a salt source close to the American fisheries that attention turned south. Bermuda lacks the climate for successful salt making, but they did have wood and they built the fastest sloops out of local cedar. In the 1650s they began to visit the Turks & Caicos to rake salt, and by the early 1700s they had established permanent settlements. As Kerlansky (p. 212) notes, “On these flat, and little islands, everything failed but salt.” Today, the feral donkeys (recently rounded up so as not to offend the cruise ship passengers) are the lasting legacy of the Bermudians.

The modern salt industry notes more than 14,000 uses for salt. Recently it has become fashionable to purchase salts of various textures and colors as a gourmet additive to food. Salt continues to be an important ingredient in various spices such as soy sauce (made with salted soy beans), ketchup (originally made with salted anchovies) and pepper sauce (the best known is certainly Tabasco®, which came originally from salted hot peppers grown on Avery Island in Louisiana where salt was the main resource). With regard to the latter, we were just a little surprised to find a tiny bottle of Tabasco® included in one of the U.S. military’s MRE packages (“Meals Ready to Eat;” the modern equivalent of K-rations).

To learn more about salt, we suggest you read H.E.  Sadler’s local history Turks Islands Landfall and visit the Turks & Caicos National Museum in Grand Turk. While you are there, be sure to buy a bag of local salt – a sure taste of the local history.

Dr. Bill Keegan is Curator of Caribbean Archaeology at the Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida. Dr. Betsy Carlson is an Archaeologist with Southeastern Archaeological Research, Inc., Jonesville, Florida.

1 Gatorade was invented by a team of physicians at the University of Florida (UF) in 1965. Dr. Robert Cade, who passed away in 2007, is given primary credit for this drink that was developed to enhance the performance of the UF football team, which plays its games in “The Swamp.” There is a rumor that the Florida State University Seminoles tried to outdo their rival University of Florida Gators by creating their own sports drink. For some reason, their drink, called Seminole Fluid, never caught on.

2The quote is from an AD 1157 Paris engraving titled Women Salting Their Husbands that demonstrated how to make your man more virile (Kerlansky 2002, p. 4).  Perhaps Morton Salt needs to start competing with Viagra!

By Laura Adzich-Brander

Sitting down to coffee with a local fisherman, I innocently asked, “Is there a chance of going snapper fishing this week?” With a twinkle in his eye, the reply came back, “Just what snapper are we talkin’ about? There’s Red Snapper, Gray Snapper, Black Snapper, Mutton Snapper . . .” and the list went on. “And they aren’t all found in the same place.”

The snapper is actually a large family of perciform fishes, a group that consists of approximately 40% of all fish, and are considered the largest order of those that have backbones or spinal columns. In fact, they belong to the ray-finned fish, which are made up of over 7,000 different species of varying shapes and sizes! However, only about 100 of those species are recognized as actual snapper. All find their home in the tropical and subtropical regions of all oceans, yet some enter into fresh water to feed.

Snapper are recognized by their sloped profile and their spiny dorsal fin; their bodies are fairly narrow in depth when viewed head-on. All have short, sharp, needle-like teeth, and several varieties also have prominent upper canine teeth. This is due to the fact that they feed on crustaceans, animals with a stiff exoskeleton, or other fish. There are also a few that are plankton-feeders. The most commonly known, the Red Snapper, can grow up to a metre in length.

Donnie Killom, the eco-tour manager at Big Blue Unlimited, explained that a snapper’s life begins in the grass beds of the lagoon where eggs are laid and then come of age amongst the roots of the Red Mangrove tree. Thriving in the intertidal zone along the south side of the Caicos Islands, the Red Mangrove is the only mangrove species that utilizes a prop root system, which together with the shallow water, keep the larger predators at bay, producing a sanctuary for juvenile fish to spend their formative years before venturing out to the reef.

In the Turks & Caicos, it is the people of South Caicos (“The Big South”) that have continued with the tradition of fishing as their livelihood. It is considered by many as the heart of the fishing industry today, and has been for almost a century.

Mr. Lewis Cox has made his living from the sea for over 50 years. Originally from Provo, he migrated to South Caicos after the hurricane of 1945 wiped out his family’s home along with many others’-and also carried to sea, the boat that held his older brothers who were fishing, never to return home again. The Coxes packed up what was left and headed over to South instead of rebuilding on Provo, given that “all there was in those days was fishin’ and it was far easier off South than back here.  Unless you wanted to work salt . . .”

There they could drop a line in off the docks or anywhere along the shoreline or put down a trap to snap up the fish. “You didn’t have to use a boat,” Lewis recalls. Conch could be scooped up in shallow waters, lobsters were plentiful. And from South Caicos, men plied the waters back and forth to Haiti, trading fish for fresh fruits and vegetables that could not be grown on the more arid terrain of the Turks & Caicos.

When Lewis turned 17, he headed to the Bahamas to make some money “cuttin’ pine.” That only lasted a couple of weeks before he decided it was definitely not for him and thought he would head for home. But he only made it to Nassau where he was picked up to do contract work in the US. He was chosen from a crowd of many because he looked like he could “work hard.” And that he did for five years, following the seasons while harvesting pole beans, pigeon peas, apples, tomatoes, celery and cane – staying at most eight weeks in any one place.

With no telephones to keep regular communication with folks back home, it came as a shock one day when he received a message. It seemed that his ma and brother-in-law had sunk their boat off shore. With only their heads above water, they waited to be rescued for hours on end. When Lewis heard this, he told his boss, “Fix my time ’cause I’m goin’ home.”

He began to build his future, relying on the ocean’s bounty. Where he collected conch and fished from the shore, Lewis gradually reclaimed land and built a fishery, along with several other businesses that service the community. And when asked about his best day of fishing, his smile broke into a wide and wonderful grin. “Fishin’ grounds were so much more plentiful when I was a young man. I remember a day when I went out with Patrick and brought home 2,300 lobster in one day by hookin’ em with a toss. The boat was so full that the lobsters were jumpin’ out and there was barely enough room for me. That’s what we used to do.” Hard work, considering that the toss is simply a stick with a loop on the end that is slipped over the lobster.

Many folks still make their living on the water, but times have changed. Smaller boats are now necessary when fishing for Black, Gray, Yellowtail, Pot and Mutton Snappers out in the shallower waters, either between the reef and shoreline or out over the shoals. Much larger boats with more advanced gear head into deep water for the Red Snapper, found in depths of up to 450 metres. They say, “Dem are considered the real snapper.”

Chris Stubbs of Bite Me Fishing Charters asks that anyone wishing to fish for snapper give a boat captain advance notice. A boat needs to be specifically set up for it and, if they’re fishing for Red Snapper, a deep-sea boat is necessary.

If your mouth waters at the thought of fresh fish on your plate, your best bet is to head off to a local restaurant. Their owners have personal connections with boat captains to ensure that they “snap up” whatever comes in from the sea. Their demand is much smaller than that of Provo’s Grace Bay restaurants; these tourist-oriented establishments most often buy abroad where their source is more consistent. (Of course fresh fish is not always guaranteed in the local haunts either, as rougher seas and Sunday church services can keep the boats at anchor.)

Horse-Eye Jack’s is a popular beachfront restaurant located in the charismatic community of Blue Hills. Head Chef Kirk Scott offers fresh snapper whenever he can get his hands on it, most often from fishermen out of South Caicos. “It’s a fish that is done in a variety of ways local-style,” he explains. “If you grill it, the layers of the fish become exaggerated, flaky. The alternate ways of preparation produce a softer, more tender consistency.” Restaurants prefer to use Red Snapper since the larger the fish, the less bone there is to deal with. The Pot Snapper is the smallest and often deep fried in its entirety.

There is a myriad of ways to prepare the fish, all utilizing the various ingredients and implements that have been native to this country over the decades. Of the various renditions, Kirk says, “Steamed is to sauté carrot, onion, tomatoes and okra to begin. The fish is then seared in butter and added to the vegetables in a pan with a little water. It’s covered with a tight lid and left to steam for 5 to 10 minutes before serving. ‘Stew’ fish begins with the same vegetables as before, the fish pan seared a little longer. Butter is melted to the stage of being almost burned when flour and a dollop of tomato paste are mixed in to form a roux, (elders say, ‘browning the flour.’) The vegetables and fish are then added with a little water and cooked for 5 to 10 minutes, but this time with the lid slightly cocked to let a little steam escape. For souse, in a pot, you’d throw in a piece of fish, potato, carrot, green onion, a lick of vinegar, lime juice and water, and then boil it all to a broth. Drinking this concoction gives your body a real boost! These dishes are often served with johnnycake, a heavy, slightly sweet quick bread.”

Kirk continues, “Snapper is also fried. Lime juice is added to local ‘goat pepper’ or scotch bonnet pepper crushed together with salt to create a marinade. Enough oil is added to a pan to float the fish as you would to deep fry, brought to temperature and then the fish is fried until its flesh is ‘milk white.’ In grilling, the fish is first marinated with lime, salt and black pepper. Before popping it on the grate, the fish is coated with a dash of oil to stop it from sticking. Last, but not least, snapper can also be baked. This style includes cut-up vegetables, fresh thyme, salt and pepper, all mixed in with a bit of soft butter to stuff into the fish with fresh lime drizzled over the top. It is wrapped in a foil pouch and cooked over an open fire from 10 to 25 minutes depending on the heat. The lower the temperature, the longer the time, which allows more intense marinating to bring out the flavors.”

In a restaurant, these dishes are most commonly served with macaroni and cheese. Locally, there could be a bit of onion and red pepper thrown in, fried plantain, okra ‘n’ rice, or peas ‘n’ rice. Rice dishes are often prepared with a pork base or have pigtail, salt beef or ham skin added.

With development bringing a more diversified population, snapper preparation can take on an ethnic twist.  For instance, at Pilipino Lutong Pinoy Restaurant (on Leeward Highway, east of Price Club) owner/manager Alberto Araojo’s favorite snapper dish is Manila Sweet and Sour Fish. A small, whole red snapper is deep fried to create a crispy skin and tender flesh before being smothered in a sautéed concoction of chopped carrots, red pepper, green pepper, pineapple, onion, ginger and minced garlic to which brown sugar, white vinegar, soy sauce, salt and water is added. The whole fish is presented surrounded by fresh red and green pepper, sliced fresh tomato and lemon wedges and served with jasmine rice.

Within Providenciales’ north shore tourist hub, there are a number of fine dining, five-star restaurants with chefs that have years of culinary training. These establishments go to great lengths to have the very best on hand, with fish often flown in fresh several times a week to fulfill their patrons’ wishes. Lauren Callighan, head chef of O’Soleil Restaurant at The Somerset on Grace Bay, has spent significant energy finding the perfect combinations to enhance the flavor of snapper for her clientele.

The fish of the day at O’Soleil is always exquisitely prepared with ingredients from all over the world. Lauren has created a Red Snapper Ceviche, lightly sprinkled with sea salt, with a watercress topper dressed in light vinaigrette. You might also find her Pickled Cucumber Cold Consommé with Watermelon Sorbet served alongside a Pan-seared Fillet of Snapper. As the preparation involves sake vinegar, this dish has a hint of Japanese flavor. For the very health conscious or European palate, Lauren prepares a simple, incredibly moist Oven-roasted Snapper using only olive oil and salt and pepper. She keeps the scales on to keep the aroma and flavors intact and serves an orange and ginger sauce alongside, with an arugula salad to complement. Another favorite is the Red Snapper with Wild Mushroom Crust incorporating truffle oil, the topping beautifully enhancing the wild flavors of the fish. The dish is lightly drizzled with basil-infused olive oil and served on a bed of crisp French beans alongside a roasted leek garnish.

Of course, you may wish to try your hand at creating your own masterpiece when dining in the privacy of home or holiday rental. On Providenciales, you can find seafood in a number of spots. Graceway IGA (on Leeward Highway, soon with a second location in Grace Bay) and Island Pride Supermarket (downtown) bring in an assortment from the US and occasionally purchase locally, the best chance of getting fresh, rather than fresh-frozen. You can also check out Island Seafood next to Neessy Restaurant (across from Discount Liquors and Club Celebrity). If you’re adventuresome, head into Five Cays around 4 PM when fishing boats land with their catch at two fish plants. The plants normally sell only conch and lobster, but if you ask, they can steer you to a boat that has fish for sale if they have none on hand. Here, snapper will run around $6 to $7 per pound for the shallow-water varieties; over $11 a pound for Red Snapper.

Oh the horrors of slavery! How the thought of it pains my heart!

But the truth ought to be told of it; and what my eyes have seen I think it is my duty to relate;

for few people in England know what slavery is. I have been a slave – I have felt what a slave feels,

and I know what a slave knows; and I would have all the good people in England to know it too,

that they may break our chains and set us free.

Mary Prince, 1828

Mary Prince, a West Indian slave who had five owners in her lifetime before finding her way to freedom in 1828, struggled under the yoke of her most barbarous slaver, the now infamous “Mr. D.,” while living for ten years, approximately 1802 to 1812, on Grand Turk Island. Under his hand and that of his son Master Dickey, she witnessed cruelty and injustice, and she and others were beaten and subjected to abuse time and time again as they struggled with the burden of relentless, back breaking work in the salt ponds.

Yet Mary Prince survived to become the first British black woman to write an autobiography, The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, Related by Herself, and a polemic against slavery, refuting many of the myths abroad about slavery in British white society of the 1820s. Her story builds respect and appreciation, not because of the hardships and indignities she suffered at the hands of the slaveocrats, but because of her unwavering determination to prevail over Evil and because of the triumph of her rebellious spirit. Indeed, Mary Prince is a true heroine of freedom and her remarkable story is her legacy.

Life with her first owners

Born into slavery on a farm owned by Mr. Charles Myners in Brackish Pond, Devonshire Parish, Bermuda, about 1788, was a child named Mary Prince who was to live a hard, anguish-filled, but eventful life and who was to become the best-known black British woman to walk away from slavery. Her mother was a household slave and her father, named Prince, was a sawyer owned by Mr. Trimmingham of Crow Lane. Scholars and historians report that he was none other than David Trimmingham and his wife was Frances.

Mr. Myners died when she was an infant and the household slaves were divided amongst the family. She and her mother were bought by old Captain Darrell and she was given as a gift to his grandchild Betsy Williams, “who made quite a pet of her” (Prince, 57). Her first 12 years were spent with Captain John Williams and his wife Sarah, “a kind-hearted good woman,” the daughter of George Darrell, a period that she claims was “the happiest of [her] life” (57).

This claim to happiness, however, is in spite of the fact that Captain Williams “was a very harsh, selfish man; and [that the family] always dreaded his return from the sea” (58). His wife Sarah was afraid of him, and he often left her in distressed circumstances to take up with female society elsewhere in the West Indies.

Mary Prince was but a child at the time, yet had she seen into the future, she would have dreaded what was to be her fate. The Buckra men (whites) with whom she was to become associated were of a much too similar ilk to Captain Williams.

The death of her mistress Sarah precipitated her sale and the sale of all her siblings. On the “black morning” of the leave taking, Mary Prince’s mother, while dressing them, cried aloud, “See, I am shrouding my poor children; what a task for a mother! . . . I am going to carry my little chickens to market” (61).

When at the vendue, the public auction, Mary Prince writes that she was “surrounded by strange men, who examined and handled [her] in the same manner that a butcher would a calf or a lamb he was about to purchase, and who talked about [her] shape and size” (62). In the end she sold for ₤57 Bermudian, about ₤38 Sterling, “and the people who stood by said that [she] had fetched a great sum for one so young” (63).

Her new master was a “Captain I.,” later identified by scholars and historians as Captain John Ingham, and her new mistress was his wife Mary Spencer Ingham (nee Albuoy), both of Spanish Point, Bermuda. Brutal members of the slaving classes, under their ownership Mary Prince witnessed the torture of children and the murder of a French black called Hetty whom the master had stolen in privateering from another vessel and made his slave.

Hetty, who was Mary Prince’s predecessor in the household in regard to duties, died of puerperal fever after Captain Ingham “flogged her as hard as he could lick, with both the whip and the cow-skin, till she was all over streaming with blood” (67). The result was that Hetty went to childbed before her time and was delivered after severe labour of a dead baby. “Her former strength never returned to her [and] ere long her body and limbs swelled to a great size; and she lay on a mat in the kitchen, till the water burst from her body and she died” (67).

Mistress Mary Spencer Ingham, just as reprehensible a tyrant as her husband, displayed all the characteristics of the jealous slave mistress. She had Mary Prince sleep on a blanket outside her bedroom door, and by her hands Mary Prince was “licked, and flogged, and pinched by her pitiless fingers in the neck and arms” and she would “strip [her] naked . . . hang [her] up by the wrists and lay [her] flesh open with the cow-skin” (66). She also robbed Mary Prince of much needed sleep as she “used to sit up very late, frequently until morning; and [Mary Prince] had to stand at a bench and wash . . . or pick wool or cotton” (67). Repeatedly punching Mary Prince on her face and head with a “hard heavy fist” (66), Mistress Ingham may have caused her blindness later in life.

One day Mary Prince was sent to empty a very old and deeply cracked earthen jar of rainwater. It fell apart in her hands. When Mistress Ingham found out, she “stripped and flogged [her] long and severely with the cow skin; as long as she had the strength to lash” (68). Later, when Captain Ingham heard of it, he “fell a swearing . . . abusing [her] with every ill name he could think of . . . and giving [her] several heavy blows with his hand” (68). He said, “I shall come home tomorrow morning at twelve, on purpose to give you a round hundred” (68). True to his word he came, “tied [her] up upon a ladder and gave [her] a hundred lashes with his own hand” (68) with Master Benjy, his son, who was two years younger than Mary Prince, counting them off.

While the flogging was underway, a powerful earthquake hit Bermuda, shaking everything so that even “part of the roof fell down” (69). Mary Prince seized the opportunity in the ensuing confusion to get away from her attacker, crawling away to a refuge under the front steps of the house. She lay there until morning “moaning piteously,” her “body all blood and bruises” (69). She relates that, as she lay there, “the life was very weak in me and I wished more than ever to die” (69).

Not long after this incident, a cow got loose on the Ingham farm and into tender plantlings where it ought not to have been. Master Ingham, though it was his own fault, took off his heavy boot and “struck [Mary Prince] such a blow in the small of her back that [she] shrieked with agony and thought [she] was killed” (69). Then he beat her until he was weary. The injury he inflicted upon her stayed with her for life.

Understandably, she ran away to her mother who was a household slave to Richard Darrell. Eventually her father, Prince, heard of the affair and brought her from where her mother had hidden her back to the Ingham property. What else was there to do? He beseeched Captain Ingham “for the love of God . . . to forgive her running away, and . . . to be a kind master to her in the future” (70). Mary Prince told Captain Ingham herself that “[she] could stand the floggings no longer” (70). He insisted that she should be punished for running away, but he did relent, however, and not flog her that day.

In 1788, about the time Mary Prince was born, the cultivated land in Bermuda – an archipelago of 7 major islands and numerous smaller ones that altogether encompass about 20 square miles of land – was approximately 200 acres. The population ranged from 10,000 to 11,000 souls, with 5,000 of these individuals being black.

There had been uprisings in the previous century, some involving poisonings of whites, with the most recent being in 1761 in which half the black population was implicated. The slaveocrats, therefore, were in precarious and personally dangerous situations. The promised and felt sting of the rope, whip and cow skin were the means of keeping order in the land, a social order with the Buckra men in control.

Mary Prince’s time with the Ingham family taught her who was dominant and who, under this system, had the right to brutalize whom. But it was also the first time she stood up to her owners, staking out her own self determination. It was also when she learned to milk cows, care for children, cook for a family and do all household chores. Mary Prince was acquiring knowledge and skills she would later use to bring about her eventual escape to freedom.

The infamous “Mr. D.”

Sometime in the years 1802 to 1806, Mary Prince was sold to “Mr. D.” of Turks Islands and Bermuda, and she was soon transported to Grand Turk where she was sent to be appraised at the local vendue, as was a common custom, and found to be worth ₤100 Bermudian or ₤67 Sterling. In spite of the horrors of living with the merciless Ingham family, what she experienced at the hands of Mr. D. was far worse.

She relates that “there was no satisfying Mr. D.” (72). She had hoped when she left Captain Ingham that she would have been better off, but she found that “it was but going from one butcher to another.” However, she did notice a difference between them: although Master Ingham used to beat her “while raging and foaming with passion,” Mr. D. was “usually quite calm. He would stand by and give orders for a slave to be cruelly whipped, and assist in the punishment, without moving a muscle of his face; walking about and taking snuff with the greatest composure” (72).

Repeatedly, he ordered her to be stripped naked, hung up by her wrists, and beaten. Yet in 1812, when he could have been done with her, leaving her behind on Grand Turk, he took her with him when he returned to his home in Bermuda, there to stay. Back in Bermuda, she refused to wash him while he stood naked in his bathtub. Very likely, his licentious behaviour and demands had been ongoing while on Turks Island but, when she refused him there, he was able to beat her mercilessly until she gave way. In Bermuda, she was able to refuse him without the same severity of consequence, as his barbarities would not be so easily tolerated as they had been in the relative isolation of Grand Turk.

His son, Master Dickey, was no better than his father. It was he who murdered Sarah, an older slave, “who was subject to several bodily infirmities, and was not quite right in her head, [and] did not push the wheel barrow fast enough to please him” (75). He threw her on the ground, beat her severely, and then “flung her among the prickly-pear bushes, which are all covered over with sharp venomous prickles” (75). Her body “swelled and festered all over, and she died a few days after” (75).

Interestingly, “Mrs. D.,” the wife and mother of these two slavers, does not take a prominent place in the account. Mary Prince simply states that upon her arrival at Grand Turk, “the first person [she] saw . . . was Mr. D., a stout sulky looking man, who carried [her] through the hall to show [her] to his wife and children” (71). Nothing more is said. It seems a glaring omission in the narrative, one the significance and implications of which we can only ponder.

Once back in Bermuda, Mary Prince again stood up to her master, this time telling Mr. D. that she “would no longer live with him, for he was a very indecent man – very spiteful, and too indecent; with no shame for his servants, no shame for his own flesh” (78). She took this stand against him after she had saved Miss D., his daughter, from one of his attacks in which Miss D. was “all black and blue with bruises” and “he had beat[en] her with his fist and almost killed her” (77).

Thereafter, he hired Mary Prince out to work at Cedar Hills where she earned “two dollars and a quarter a week, which was twenty pence a day” (78); however, every Saturday night she gave her money over to her master, Mr. D.

Eventually, Mary Prince convinced Mr. D. to let her accompany Mr. John Wood, a Bermudian merchant, and his wife to Antigua, it being an attractive place for a slave as free black men could vote there. Although this law did not apply to Mary Prince, its relative spirit of freedom in the Caribbean Islands was significant in her very purposeful move towards her own freedom.

Her Antigua years:

Master and Mistress Wood

Master Wood did not purchase Mary Prince straight off. Once in Antigua, he wrote to Mr. D. to inquire what was to be done and, when he replied, ironically, “that [she] should not be sold to any one that would treat [her] ill,” Mr. Wood purchased her for ₤100 Bermudian. Thus, Mr. D. had exploited Mary Prince’s labour and body for a decade with no cost to himself. (In fact, he had made a small profit since, when she took in work from outside his household, she had to turn her earnings over to him.)

Initially, Master Wood and his wife regarded Mary Prince highly as a slave, entrusting her with many important duties. She would care for the house when they were absent, which was frequent; she was to attend the chambers, nurse the child and go down to the pond to wash the clothes. But she fell ill with rheumatism, got Saint Anthony’s fire in her left leg and had to walk with a stick. Had it not been for the kindness of a neighbour, a Mrs. Greene, who sent a slave of her own to help Mary Prince and bring her a little soup, or bathe her every night in a medicinal bath made of “the bark of some bush that was good for pains,” she might have “lain and died” (79) in a small outbuilding she occupied on the property when she was in ill health.

Eventually, Mary Prince recovered and was able to work again in the house, but she still complained of severe rheumatism, especially in her hands and arms, and had difficulty completing her round of chores. Mistress Wood hired a free mulatto woman, Martha Wilcox, to nurse the child and assist with the chores, but she was a “saucy woman, very saucy” (79), and she caused trouble, inciting Mistress Wood to threaten Mary Prince with a flogging of 50 lashes.

In a later incident, Mistress Wood sent Mary Prince to be put in the “Cage one night, and next morning flogged, by the magistrate’s order, at her desire” (80), as she had been in a quarrel about a pig with another slave woman. She received 50 lashes on her naked back for this but afterwards, Justice Dyatt said that she was in the right and ordered the pig returned.

In spite of her status as a slave, Mary Prince evinced an admirable entrepreneurial spirit and was able to carry on small business ventures, such as the getting of a pig aboard a ship come to harbour, and then the selling of it for double the money, once fattened up, on shore. Also, by the “selling of coffee,” the selling of “yams and other provisions to the captains of ships,” and by “tak[ing] in washing” (81). In this way, Mary Prince, “by degrees acquired a little cash” (81), and with it she attempted to buy her freedom.

Eventually, she had saved ₤100 Bermudian, what she apparently was worth in the slave market and, with it, she tried to financially negotiate her manumission. Twice, Master Wood, in a fury, “gave her a note and bade her go and look for an owner” (81) and each time when she had done so, first with Adam White, a cooper and a free black man, and then with a Mr. Burchell, he declined to sell her and put the would-be purchasers off. For her first attempt at finding a new owner, one who would subsequently free her, Master Wood whipped her himself.

As her years in Antigua came to a close, Mary Prince became interested in the Moravian Church and to consider Christian teachings. The Moravian ladies taught her to read and “[she] was admitted a candidate for the holy Communion” (83). About the same time, she met and married, autonomously, Daniel James, a free black man, at Christmas, 1826.

Master and Mistress Wood were outraged. Mrs. Wood went so far as to compel her husband to flog Mary Prince with a horsewhip. She said that “she would not have nigger men about the yard or premises, or allow a nigger man’s clothes to be washed in the same tub where hers were washed” (85). Although Mistress Wood was constantly abusing Mary Prince in regard to her husband and “fretting the flesh” off of her, Master Wood relented and did finally allow Daniel to have a place in the yard.

Her bid for freedom

Mary Prince had been about 26 years of age when she had accompanied the Wood family to Antigua. Thirteen years later, in 1827 or 1828, they were going to England to put their son in school and to bring their daughters home. It was arranged that she was to leave her husband Daniel James in Antigua and accompany the Wood family to London to care for their young child.

Mary was in agreement, for in March, 1807 the British Government had outlawed the slave trade abolishing slavery in the United Kingdom which reaffirmed the fact that slavery had never actually been legal in England or Wales. London meant another step closer to freedom. However, still ill with rheumatism that worsened as she travelled north into colder climes, she was yet expected to wash exceptionally large loads of heavy laundry, such as bed ticks and coverlets, in cold water which caused her much pain. When she refused, Master and Mistress Wood “made a dreadful uproar, and from that day on, they constantly kept cursing and abusing [her]” (87). Indeed, they were exceedingly vexed at what they saw as her sabotage of their notion to exploit her to the maximum.

Four times they threatened to throw her out of the house to the mercy of London streets or send her “down to the brig in the river, to carry her back to Antigua” (87) but, when she asked if she could buy her freedom, they refused, Master Wood saying, “he would never sell [her] freedom – if [she] wished to be free, [she] was free in England, and [she] might go and try what freedom would do for [her], and be d—-d” (88).

The fourth time this happened, she placed her trust in Providence and left. In the ensuing months, she was first taken in by Mr. Mash, a shoeblack, and his wife; she then found service with a lady, a Mrs. Forsyth, for a six month period until the lady left London. It was at this point that she approached the Anti-Slavery Society and found employment as a domestic worker for Thomas Pringle, the Methodist secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society, and his wife.

A petition, two court cases and freedom at last

Mary Prince lived in Thomas Pringle’s house working as a paid domestic servant in the years 1829 to 1830 and, during this time, the abolitionists tried to convince the Woods to sell Mary her freedom, but all their attempts failed. They then mounted a Petition to Parliament, dated June 24, 1829 for her return to “West Indies not as a slave,” but this, too, failed. Mary Prince was deemed free in the United Kingdom but, should she return to Antigua and her husband Daniel James, she would run the risk of enslavement and, subsequently, severe punishment for her bold actions in Britain.

Thomas Pringle’s friend Susanna Strickland transcribed Mary Prince’s narrative during this time, and Thomas Pringle was its editor. The publication of her narrative brought about nothing less than a fury of intense public controversy. Mary Prince and Thomas Pringle, on the one side, were hotly contested by anti-emancipationists, primarily by James Macqueen, editor of the Glasgow Courier. Two court cases ensued.

In the first, Thomas Pringle sued Thomas Cadell, publisher of Blackwood’s Magazine which had published James Macqueen’s diatribe against Mary Prince, Thomas Pringle and emancipation. In the second, John Wood, identified as John Adams Wood in the court records (Mary Prince’s former owner), brought an act of libel against Thomas Pringle.

In the second case, Wood v. Pringle, Mary Prince testified, reaffirming the acts of brutality reported in her narrative but also revealing intimate relationships that she had engaged in with two men which had been omitted from her narrative due to the censorship of Thomas Pringle’s evangelical Christian sensibility. This revelation came to light in cross examination as she had been charged with “gross immorality” (Wood v. Pringle, 147) and depravity.

In retrospect, it seems odd that John Wood did not take the proffered sum of ₤100 for Mary Prince when it was offered to him if she was as immoral and depraved as he claimed. It seems more likely that she was an excellent worker whom he was able to exploit to his and his family’s benefit, and he did not want to see an end of her labour in his household. Caught in the exposure of her narrative, he attempted to save face by slapping her character with charges of vice in court.

The first relationship brought into question had been with Oyskman, a freeman who had been the first to court her when she had arrived in Antigua and had “made a fool of her by telling her he would make her free” (148) when he could in no way deliver it. The second had been with a Captain Abbott, a white man, with whom “she had lived 7 years . . . in a hut which she had, in addition to her room in [Master Wood's] yard” (147). Hindered with the status of a slave, she had not been in a position to marry either and, even if she had been, interracial marriages were not in favour at the time.

Both court cases were settled the same year that the Emancipation Bill finally passed the House of Lords, 1833. In the first, Pringle v. Cadell, Pringle won with damages coming to him in the order of ₤3. In the second, Wood v. Pringle, Wood won, the judge saying that Mary Prince’s testimony was exaggerated; damages coming to Wood were in the order of ₤25. However, Thomas Pringle was not able to produce much needed witnesses from the West Indies to support his case, whereas Wood had several witnesses: his daughter, persons who had known him but briefly and those who were proprietors of slaves themselves. One witness, Dr. John M’Goul, for example, stated when cross examined that he “never ordered more than a dozen and a half or two dozen lashes himself” (Court Case, 143).

Her contribution to the cause

It would be a fine ending to the story to say that Mary Prince lived a life of comfort, basking in her freedom in the years after the publication of her narrative and that she walked out of those courtrooms a free woman, embarking on a new phase of her life in London. However, her appearance in court the second time was the last heard of her, and, although some scholars hope that under the cover of anonymity she found her way back to her husband and family in the West Indies, there is also the possibility that she died.

Some who read or hear of her tale may think it exaggerated, as did the judge in Wood v. Pringle, believing that the radicals involved in the emancipation movement moulded it into a heady slave tale fit to rouse the passions of the British in order to dig them out of apathetic graves. True enough, it went to print three times in the first year of its publication and the public was incensed, raising a hue and cry that reached all the way to Parliament.

Others may think that it was softened and, thereby, made palatable to the British public so that much of what actually transpired in Mary Prince’s story was downplayed. Indeed, her editor Thomas Pringle did choose to mask the identities of Mr. I. and his wife and that of Mr. D. and, additionally, much was revealed in the Wood v. Pringle court case that had been omitted in the narrative. However, we might then beg the question: What else in the narrative was couched in the darkest of euphemism or altogether excluded? If nothing else, let us say that it exposed the degraded behaviour of Englishmen in the Caribbean as opposed to their counterparts in Britain.

Mary Prince was not a militant leader of slave revolt, although she may have been influenced by knowledge of slave uprisings in the past: those that had occurred in Bermuda in her parents’ lifetimes and those that had occurred in Antigua where, with its prevalence of freed black slaves and its two stalwart heroes of slave uprisings, Tacky and Tomboy, freedom was a tangible reality. She may also have known slaves who escaped from Grand Turk to Haiti, a neighbouring country whose revolution had begun in 1791.

She did, however, contribute greatly to the radical tradition through the writing of her extraordinary narrative which added immensely to anti-slavery debates of the time. In truth, she is a heroine of freedom, a heroine who has gone unsung for far too long.

Perhaps it is timely to remember Mary Prince in a more substantial way. Her determination to survive in the face of institutionalised slavery and barbarity, her intelligence in manoeuvring herself ever closer to freedom and her rebellious spirit that eventually turned the tables on not only her owners, but the entirety of the slaveocracy of her day, demand honouring.

Endnotes

Prince, Mary. The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave, Related by Herself; Edited with an Introduction by Moira Ferguson. Revised Edition. (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997) pp. 57-94.

“Court Case Involving Mary Prince, Wood v. Pringle, March 1, 1833.” The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave, Related by Herself, Edited with an Introduction by Moira Ferguson. Revised Edition. (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997) pp. 140-149.

Editor’s Note:  The author of this piece has done substantial research aimed at uncovering the identity of the infamous “Mr.D.” Read the Fall 2008 issue of  Times of the Islands to learn more about Mary Prince and her Grand Turk master.

To commemorate Emancipation Day (August 1) this year, David Bowen, Director of Culture for the TCI Cultural and Arts Commission, is working on a dramatic presentation of the Mary Prince story to be presented in Grand Turk.

David Bowen and Margot MacFadyen are also preparing a resource package for TCI students and teachers to help them study the legacy of Mary Prince, slavery and emancipation as it affected the Turks & Caicos Islands.

Story By Suzanne Gerber ~ Photos By Barbara Shively

We get the English word camouflage from the  French camoufler (to disguise), which likely derived from camouflet, meaning “a puff of smoke” or “smoke blown in someone’s face as a practical joke.” But to fish, who exist in an eat-or-be-eaten world, survival is no joke. Humans have a veritable arsenal of self-protective means, but marine animals rely on just a few: the strike-first (or better) philosophy, the swim-faster approach, or the old hide-out-in-plain-sight routine. Some fish, of course, change color in the course of their mating rituals, but that’s a subject for another time. Here we’ll take a look at four absolute masters of disguise: the scorpionfish, the peacock flounder, the southern stingray, and the flying gurnard, who over the millennia have evolved and perfected their game of aquatic hide-and-go-seek.

Now you see me . . .

There are a few primary types of underwater camouflage: deploying what’s known as cryptic camouflage, a creature blends in with his environment or disguises himself as something uninteresting-or, better yet, something dangerous. This can be a permanent affectation (like a stonefish or scorpionfish) or temporary (a trumpetfish that can change from bright blue to yellow to olive before your very eyes). Some peripatetic organisms actually change their colors or patterns continuously as they move across different colored backgrounds. Now there’s a sight to behold!

Often a critter will imitate the movement of something else in nature (grass blowing, something leafy fluttering in the water column); this, not surprisingly, is called mimicry.  And finally, using simple protective camo, certain fish will attract or attach foreign materials to their body to hide beneath.

The science behind camouflage is complex enough to earn serious students degrees in the subject, but to simplify things, we can attribute disguise-behavior to either the employment of pigment cells, called chromatophores, which the animal can control through his nerves or hormones (as in octopi and many color-changing fish), or to a change in diet (like the nudibranch). Fish have the ability to concentrate their chromatophores into the center of each cell, giving them a lighter appearance, or they can expand the pigmentation over a larger area and make the color all the more intense. There have even been reports from snorkelers and divers that certain species of fish have gotten close enough and stuck around long enough to alter their camouflage to match the human’s swimsuit!

Depending on whether they’re active in the daytime or at night, different species will utilize different types of color camo. At night when they’re resting, diurnal fish often effect what’s called disruptive coloration-blotchy patterns like bold stripes that alter their silhouette and make them hard to distinguish from the background. Nocturnal (and some deepwater) fish are red, because underwater, everything loses its color in accordance with the ROY G. BIV spectrum, and red is the first color we lose. Instead, it looks merely dark, and those fish become nearly invisible at depth or in the dark. This is why if you ever cut yourself underwater, it seems to bleed black or blue. You haven’t turned into a blueblood, it’s just the underwater law of nature, and fish are the true juris doctors.

Scorpionfish

The Caribbean scorpionfish is related to the Pacific stonefish, and both are extraordinary creatures. Some snorkelers and divers consider this the ugliest fish in the world (certainly the poutiest), while others regard it as one of the most glorious sights in the ocean. This lumpen creature just sits around rocks on coral reefs, hiding out rather conspicuously (once you learn to recognize him) and waits for his next meal to swim by unawares. He’s got the distinction of being the fastest shot underwater, able to grab and swallow prey in .015 seconds! This innocuous-looking fish is also poisonous (particularly cousin Stoney), with his 13 needle-like (but deceptively powerful) spines that shoot out venom if pressed. The poison is painful, capable of numbing the body instantly and induing heart failure.

New divers are always impressed by divemasters who seem to have personally placed down and positioned scorpionfish, so uncanny is their ability to pick them out of the matching environment. But with practice, you, too, can spot your own scorpion. Last February, my dive buddy John was very proud of himself for finding three in a row on a single dive, each one larger and harder to detect than the last!

Peacock flounder

This sand-sweeping, lightly spotted cutie changes its color and pattern to blend in perfectly with the ocean floor. Their rolling eyes stick up on little stumps above the dorsal side of their body to give them a better view of the environment. Each eye moves independently-so he can look in two directions at once.  But it also makes him vulnerable: if the eye gets covered by sand and the flounder can’t assess his surroundings, his camo won’t work.

You may not realize this, but when it’s born, a flounder actually has one eye on each side of its face and swims upright, like other fish. But as he matures, one eye migrates until the two are close together on the same side of the head. Because his mouth doesn’t move, he develops a lopsided face-all the funnier-looking because of his sideways swimming. Barbara and I love to “hunt” for them in the sand. Sometimes, when we’re been in just the right place at the right time, we’ve seen half a dozen on a single dive.

Flying gurnards

These well-camouflaged creatures live on shallow sandy bottoms, sometimes alone, often in pairs and occasionally-as Barbara, her husband Dick and I discovered a few years ago on a muck dive in Grand Turk-in groups of three, four and even five! We had the thrill of our diving careers when on that single dive (OK, it was 100 minutes long), we counted 15 gurnards!

Although slow-moving, gurnards can turn rather feisty when excited (around divers, say, or when feeding or mating). This is when you want to see them. Their plain, lizard-like bodies are transformed Cinderella-like, and when they fan their pectoral fins (which you would swear are wings), they’re as glorious as any land peacock. And while they can move swiftly, they don’t technically fly. We humans love the show, but believe it or not, potential predators are usually scared off. Mission accomplished!

Southern stingrays

These exotic, outer-spacey creatures are characterized by their large, flat, diamond-shaped disks and lack of distinct head. And what could be a better disguise for a creature that spends half his life burrowed in the sand than a dark upper body and white belly? To divers and predators, often the only peekaboo is the pair of eyes poking out of the sand. It’s a thrill (and occasionally gives a start) to be finning along and suddenly realize those “stones” you’re passing over in the sand are actually the eyes of a buried six-foot-long stingray!

They are truly remarkable animals: because of those top-mounted eyes, they depend on electro-receptors and keen senses (smell and touch) to locate food. A preferred method is to uncover buried prey, like crabs, shrimp, clams and worms, by forcing jet streams of water through their mouths or flopping their fins over the sand.

When they shuffle in the sand it’s a heart-pounding site-as is watching them lift off and glide through the water, gently flapping their “wings” like an extraterrestrial. By the way, the stingrays we find in the Caribbean are benign and not the same species that stung and tragically killed Steve Irwin.

New York-based Suzanne Gerber writes about scuba, travel and health for a variety of publications. Book your next dive trip by contacting Suzanne at suzanne@worldofdiving.com.

Avid underwater photographer Barbara Shively discovered Grand Turk diving in 1997 and has returned every year. It is her passion to share the coral reefs’ beauty through her photographs, many of which can be viewed and purchased at http://shivelygallery.com/. A variety of her prints are on sale at Art Provo, located in The Regent Village, Providenciales.

By Kathy Borsuk ~ Photos By Christine Morden, Provo Pictures

Michelangelo is considered a virtuoso for his paintings on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel; Michael Caffiero and his crew at Caffiero Painting Co. TCI are virtuosos in painting not only ceilings    . . . but walls, trim, decks, railings and just about every surface of the many new and existing structures spanning the Turks & Caicos Islands.

With virtuoso being defined as having “masterly skill or technique in the arts,” Michael Caffiero has worked hard to blend his years of experience with a reputation for professionalism. He explains, “Since we got started here in TCI in 2005, my goal is to run a full-service painting company that supplies and installs quality products led by trained professionals.”

The robust, straightforward Caffiero, never long without a cigarette in his hand, says he’s spent his whole life painting . . . or at least since the age of 16. That’s when he was taught by Walter Schmitz, a German from Long Island New York, the man who gave him a chance and had the foresight to see that he had the drive for perfection. (Although when dealing with less then perfect surfaces and situations, Caffiero qualifies, “You need to create the illusion of perfection.”)

With nearly 30 years of experience behind his brush and running Caffiero Painting in Hawthorne, New York since 1990, Michael came on vacation to Providenciales in 2002 with his wife Alexandra. He explains, “Our good friends who lived here suggested that the Islands could use an experienced painting company, but I was here to relax, not to expand. Actually, it was my wife who encouraged me to open up shop here. Without her intuition and support, this never would have happened.” After returning a week later to investigate the options, Caffiero decided to start small and went into business with a local partner, one truck (the same one that’s always dashing around Provo) and a handful of painters from his operation in New York. He recalls, “We faced tremendous hurdles and lost a lot of money at the beginning, but we were committed to doing it right from the start.”

To this perfectionist, “doing it right” means a number of things. “First of all, we offer full service. This means that we take care of everything relating to painting from start to finish. This includes all the prep work, moving and protecting furnishings, cleaning up . . . in fact, we usually take pictures of the rooms so we know exactly how to put everything back in place. Then there’s the trust factor. I am a man of my word and I expect my crew to follow suit. Not only does this mean that we complete the terms of our contract for the price quoted, but that owners can trust us with their keys, knowing their home and its contents will be secure. A lot of our smaller customers I have never met, including some of the famous people with houses on Parrot Cay. We just go in, do the job, clean up and leave. When they return, their house is just as they left it – except freshly painted.”

Caffiero also relies on his extensive knowledge and industry contacts to choose the proper paints for a project and determine how and when to apply them. He uses Benjamin Moore products, which are publicly accepted and known worldwide, and maintains a large inventory of paint and supplies on-island, ready to be mixed as needed. When working as a contractor for larger developments, Michael says an important part of his job is understanding the role of the other trades and knowing “when it’s his turn,” to avoid back-tracking or expensive revisions. He also says he feels a professional responsibility to recommend the best product for the job (especially important in an island environment) and speak up when he sees a client – large or small – making a mistake. “Our customers know that we know the painting business period . . . if they have any question related to paint they know we will have the correct answer.”

After touring several sites, I can concur that “crispness” and “perfection” (or at least its illusion) are Caffiero trademarks. Moldings, baseboards, doorways and ceiling/wall interfaces sport “razor-sharp” lines, while large surfaces, indoors and out, are uniformly colored and blemish free as a clear summer sky. Michael thinks that no job is too small. “If I paint your closet, no doubt I’m going to paint your house . . . and your neighbor’s house and the house down the street . . . that’s how confident I am in our work. Most of our jobs come from referrals by satisfied clients.”

Michael Caffiero credits his loyal crew for maintaining the company’s high standards. Led by Antonio Espinosa, formerly one of his lead painters from New York, and coordinated by Michael himself, his work force is carefully trained to his specifications to handle any job and includes trusted family members and friends.  Michael explains, “I know everyone’s best talents and can assign them to jobs that bring out the best in them.” The respect with which I saw “the boss” treat his crew is reflected with a strong sense of loyalty. In fact, Michael says he is like a father figure to some of the younger workers, who are away from home for the first time and struggling to get used to a new environment. Having each employee wear a clean “Caffiero” t-shirt and white pants on the job fosters an image of professionalism. “When I enter a job site, I and everyone there know exactly who my guys are.”

The Caffiero TCI portfolio is varied and steadily growing, with an estimated 25/75% ratio of existing homes and businesses to new construction. Some projects are more plebian, such as Quality Supermarket, The Saltmills Plaza and parts of Graceway IGA. Others comprise the hospitality sector, such as re-spraying all the louvered windows at Ocean Club or painting The Alexandra, Grace Bay Suites and the new SkyBase terminal. Still others represent the country’s upscale market, including The Somerset penthouses, several celebrity homes on Parrot Cay and, most recently, the Isle Homes at Leeward Marina and the entire interior of the new Nikki Beach Resort. But Michael Caffiero will never forget his first real job as a sub-contractor for Johnston International. “We were new to the island and really excited about being hired to paint the St. Charles condominiums on North Caicos. Then we realized we had to use a boat to ferry our guys and all the supplies over to North everyday. It was a challenging job, but we passed the test.”

Indeed they did. Besides the massive Leeward Marina project, TCI building mogul Johnston International has also contacted Caffiero to discuss painting the long-awaited hospitals on Providenciales and Grand Turk. Rob Marks, Johnston’s building project manager, explains why Caffiero Painting is right for their jobs. “We require quality, detail and professionalism and they supply the whole package. I like the fact that Michael always returns phone calls and emails and shows up when we need him. He’s able to answer our questions quickly and thoroughly. In industry, it’s important to have that close working relationship. For the hospital projects, he worked with his supplier to come up with just the right material for the project’s environment and was able to secure quality products at a lesser cost. This is someone who is in tune with his profession.”

To successfully work on larger projects calls for special skills, explains the savvy Caffiero. “When writing your estimate, you have to choose the best product for the best price, and developers are consistently demanding high-end finishes, yet want to remain competitive. You have to be able to function inside what’s already occurring on site – there’s often a lot going on at the same time – and work extra or odd hours to finish under tight deadlines. I also think its key to take responsibility for any unexpected issues that come up. Handling them positively and successfully only enhances your reputation.”

As business expands, Michael Caffiero gave up his New York operation to focus exclusively on the Islands. “Because of my personality and way of doing business, I like to be very hands-on. Dividing my time just didn’t work anymore.” His love for the country, its people and its beautiful sea, was also an enticement. “To me it’s priceless to be able to be here, enjoy the place and earn a living at the same time. The business gives me an opportunity to do just that. I have no desire to go anywhere else.” In fact, with a new island partner and miles of unpainted surfaces on the horizon, he assures the community that “We’re here to stay.”

Michael Caffiero can be reached at 649 941 4615 or mcaffiero@caffieropainting.com.

By Katya Brightwell

Thousands of residents of the Turks & Caicos Islands, past and present, have passed through the doors of a modest ground floor office at the end of a narrow driveway in a residential area of Turtle Cove, Providenciales. Most have four legs, some have two, and all owe their health, well-being and many their lives to an extraordinary group of people who make up the Turks & Caicos Veterinary Associates.

A little different from your average veterinarian’s practice with one or two doctors and a few support staff, this innovative organisation has almost 50 practicing vets as members. They are all volunteers who spend two weeks working, unpaid, in the Islands every year. These people hold such passion for their trade that they have chosen to devote their yearly vacations to caring for the animals of the Turks & Caicos Islands, and many have been doing so since the group was established over 25 years ago.

The TCI Veterinary Associates function much like a property timeshare scheme, but with the members willingly diagnosing disease, vaccinating and performing surgery as part of their allotted vacation time. A total of 52 shares are shared between 46 members, all registered veterinarians. The share (or two) entitles them to part-ownership in the clinic in Turtle Cove, the two-bedroom house above the clinic, a car and a 17-foot motor boat (long ago named Whichdoctor in reference to the most-often-asked question about the practice). Allotted their two week stints each year (or for some, every year and a half), these dedicated vets travel at their own cost to Providenciales from their respective parts of the globe, bringing much-needed supplies of drugs to restock the clinic’s shelves, and settle themselves into their temporary home above the clinic. When here, mornings are spent treating and caring for pets of all shapes and sizes and afternoons and weekends enjoying what the Islands have to offer (although the vets are on 24 hour emergency call, too). When their time is up, they fly back home, handing the medical baton to the next vet.

The Turks & Caicos Veterinary Associates was set up in the early 1980s after members of a similar practice in the Cayman Islands were invited to the country by a few Grand Turk residents. Dr. Nancy Logue was one of these members. She recounts how the then Chief Minister, Hon. Norman Saunders, welcomed them with open arms “and within a few months the project was off the ground.”

In 1981, on their first official visit, Logue flew in to Grand Turk from the United States with fellow founding-member Dr. Dick Frame and their respective spouses, in Frame’s Beech Baron, loaded to maximum capacity with medical supplies. “The plane was so heavy that we had to take off at 5:30 in the morning when the temperature was cooler to get to altitude. I do remember we were so full that I had to take my shoes off because the space was needed for supplies,” she reminisces, smiling. “Oh to be so young again!”

The team toured the Islands performing examinations, vaccinations, heartworm tests and even surgeries. “Several days were spent spaying and neutering dogs and cats in homes on kitchen tables,” Logue recounts. At Pine Cay, microscope tests to check for intestinal worms were conducted in the sand outside the Meridian Club. “So as not to offend any of the posh guests, we worked over to one side using the umbrella tables,” Logue recalls.

The first official office of the Turks & Caicos Veterinary Associates was established in warehouse space in Turtle Cove, Providenciales not long after. It was the first veterinary practise in the Turks & Caicos Islands. Logue says it was nice to finally put things on shelves, but practice was still somewhat ad-hoc, with an adapted picnic table for surgeries. In 1985, business grew with an increase in the expatriate population on the island, and the practice moved to its current location. The green and yellow sign at the entrance to the road off Suzie Turn is still the original, with the old four-digit telephone number and the VHF call sign “Whichdoctor” for those times when mobile phones had not even graced the shores of the island.

The practise now has a modern, fully equipped clinic and is able to provide extensive medical, surgical, dental and preventive veterinary care. Patients are mostly dogs and cats, although some goats, horses, exotic birds and the odd wild bird are also known to visit. A number of the members are bird specialists, and some also deal with reptiles. Logue was, for a few years, the first and only full-time veterinarian on site. She has since left the group but a few of the original members, if they have not retired, remain.

Although a working holiday may not be everyone’s idea of a relaxing vacation, this intriguing mix of surgery and scuba-diving has attracted a wide range of vets over the years, with current members coming from as far afield as California, Alaska, Ontario and Austria. Current President of the group, Dr. James Brown of the Blue Cross Animal Hospital in New York State, explains the members’ dedication succinctly: “We are able to leave behind our busy practices and snowy weather while we vacation on the Islands. What we can’t leave behind is our compassion for animals and the people who care for them.”

Dr. Brent Hoff has been coming to the Islands for 34 years. “I had a big practise in Toronto in the 1970s,” he tells. “And in the winter, to get away from the cold, we used to fly our plane down to the Caribbean. We liked the Turks & Caicos the best!” Before the Veterinary Associates was set up, he would provide veterinary care (for free) for animals on North Caicos out of the Prospect of Whitby hotel. He then joined this practise in 1984, so he is no stranger to the working holiday concept. “Most of us can’t sit still,” he says of his profession. “We’re not the types to sit on the beach and do nothing.” Dr. Laurence Wahl, who has his own animal hospital in California, goes one step further. “I thought this would be a way to force me to take a vacation,” he says.

Drs. Paul and Jackie Frederickson have been members since 1985, joining soon after the practice was first formed. Travel down to the Islands from their home in Anchorage, Alaska is a two-day trip, but one that is still, they say, “well worth it.” Besides enjoying “the water, the beaches, the reefs, the food and dining outdoors,” they appreciate the professional challenge of keeping up with tropical parasites and diseases never found in their hometown. “We also like being here as somewhat contributing members of the community rather than just tourists,” they add.

This is a sentiment echoed by many members of the group. Some say they feel “almost local” after so many years. Many have simply fallen in love with the Islands, the people and, of course, the animals. “The biggest pleasure we have is dealing with the potcakes,” says Hoff. “They are my favourite dogs and the most loyal dogs I have met in my whole life.” Potcakes, the indigenous Turks & Caicos Islands dog, are named after the caked remnants of cooked food at the bottom of the pan – fed to the pets after a meal. “There are many island peoples in the Caribbean but to us the TIs are the best,” say Dr. Gretchen Allen and Kurt Lutgens from New York, members since 1994. “What better than to try and give back something by helping their pets and the island potcakes.”

The Veterinary Associates practise is very popular – the timeshare concept works – and pages of the Veterinary Journal are reportedly scoured by many for people selling their shares. Dr. Jasen Trautwein from Texas “stumbled upon” the practise when he came to Providenciales with his family on holiday as a vet student in 2000. He was “sold” by the timeshare concept but had to wait until 2006 to buy his first share and his second a year later. “Life is so busy, it’s hard to make plans in advance, but now I have to go to Provo . . . for my kids to grow up getting a chance to visit every year is a pretty amazing thing.”

Dr. Terry Fisk, brought down for the first time from Canada by Dr. Hoff on his latest visit to help with surgeries, was converted to the working holiday idea immediately. “I had never heard of the Turks & Caicos Islands, but I am considering moving here after just three days on Providenciales.” Many of the vets have introduced their friends to the Islands too, bringing them down to stay in the house and enjoy the view of the ocean.

The clinic and the adjoining house are a constant commotion of arrivals and departures, packing and unpacking, kids, guests and all. But amongst this hubbub is the steady and experienced continuity of the only paid employee of the practise – Peggy Perkins. Although officially the group’s veterinary technician, the hats she wears are many. As well as normal technician duties, including assisting the vets as they carry out their work, giving vaccinations, doing blood work and caring for recovering animals, she manages the practise and acts as general concierge to new and returning vets. As if that is not enough, she even ran the front desk until Jaliyllah Rosati dutifully stepped in as volunteer just over a year ago.

Described by Dr. Allen as “the heart and soul of the Turks & Caicos Veterinary Associates,” to many, Peggy is the Veterinary Associates. People on the island are known to say they are taking their pets to “Peggy’s” rather than to “the Vets.” And although she is embarrassed to admit it, the driveway to the clinic – Peggy Lane – is actually named after her, a surprise present from some of the vets in appreciation of the work she does.

Peggy is animal lover extraordinaire who lives and breathes compassion for her patients. A chance working vacation from her home in Pennsylvania with her former boss (then a member) in 1985 led to meeting her husband Scott, and she eventually moved to Providenciales in 1990. She has been working at the practise in Providenciales ever since. The Veterinary Associates’ current President, Dr. James Brown, praises her work. “Her unwaivering devotion to the animals has eased untold pain and suffering,” he says. “Her professional and interpersonal skills allow a practise such as ours to exist.”

Peggy has nothing but praise for the vets that are part of the Veterinary Associates. “You have to be a special kind of person to do the volunteer work as a vet here. It’s like a cook cooking in someone else’s kitchen. And I’m there to guide them through – where the drugs are, where this is, that is, how we do this here, what’s acceptable here and not acceptable here.” She says she has a lot of “family” through the group too – in some cases having seen children grow from toddlers to college-goers. She jokes that, with all these vets coming and going, working here has enabled her to learn 36 ways to carry out a single procedure. “There are many paths to the right answer,” she says, stoically.

Modest about her talent and knowledge, she has seen the practise develop from a warehouse space where surgeries were performed on a picnic table to the fully-equipped clinic that it is today.  “We have a brand new X-ray machine, a state of the art dental machine, an anesthesia machine, blood monitors, anaesthetic monitors, cardiac monitors . . . some of the vets that come down say that we have more equipment than they do! It’s amazing how we have evolved over the years,” she says.  “For the most part we are able to handle most anything that comes our way.”

Roughly 2,000 humans are registered at the vets, some with well over your average one dog/one cat quota. The working holiday concept means that opening times are limited and the clinic is always busy. “Peggy and Jaliyllah work their tails off, and we fit a full day’s work into a few hours – we’re all jumping,” says Jasen Trautwein.

Peggy has known many of the island pets since they were kittens and puppies. After 18 years, those that she has helped turn into healthy and happy dogs and cats are now coming to the end of their lives, and it is her job to help put these sick pets down when necessary. “And I feel it too,” she laments. She has sad days such as these, and then special days “when you can save something.” She recounts a story of a C-section on a cat which produced kittens pronounced dead by the doctor. “I said, ‘Are you sure?’ and he said ‘yes.’ I couldn’t just throw them in the trash, so I wrapped them in a towel and came back after a meeting to deal with them. As I walked in the clinic. I heard a tiny ‘miaow.’ One had lived. I bottle fed her and she lives with me to this day.”

“Every day is unpredictable,” Peggy adds, smiling. “One day, a woman from California invited me outside to meet her iguana. It was eight feet long and on a leash. I even had a flamingo live in my bathtub for a while.” She loves her job. “I get to help so many people on the island. Otherwise, what would I do?”

Like the veterinarians, this is more than a job to Peggy. She jokes that she needs cuts in the vet bill with her pets at home (three Jack Russells, a Great Dane, a parrot, eleven cats and two ponies) but in fact, this is her passion and her life.

When the members and Peggy meet once a year at the American Animal Hospital Association conference, they talk business but they also reminisce. “When we meet together as a group, our memories and shared stories surround a fracture repair on a potcake, heartworms diagnosed and treated, or a Christmas Eve laceration repair,” says Dr. Brown.

Although Providenciales has changed almost beyond recognition since the Veterinary Associates founding members set up shop over 25 years ago, the animals have not. In fact, says Dr. Hoff, their needs have become even greater. Many diseases endemic in the Caribbean have been kept out of the Turks & Caicos Islands due to excellent preventative veterinary care, but a tragic outbreak of canine distemper last year saw a large number of the island potcakes affected. This struck a chord with all of the visiting vets and only served to strengthen their reason for volunteering. “Our mission is to provide the Islands with the best veterinary care available. We strive to become 1% better . . . every day,” states Dr. Brown.

In the early days, when fewer people meant things were a little slower, the practise used to provide care for animals on the other islands on a regular basis. Now the clinic is too busy (although Dr. Hoff still manages to find “free time” to visit North Caicos and carry out vaccinations there). There was talk of expanding but ultimately, if hours were extended, the whole ethos of the practise would be lost. Dr. Wahl enjoys being called for an emergency as he emerges from the water after a dive off French Cay, Dr. Trautwein enjoys surfing the swell in between caring for the new government’s new “drug dogs,” and Dr. Allen enjoys chasing a screeching parrot around the back room before relaxing for the afternoon with her friends.

Perhaps slightly ironically, the house above the clinic that has provided shelter to these vet volunteers for so many years has been eaten by termites and is now being re-built. Although these insects may not have shown their appreciation for the visiting animal lovers of the Veterinary Associates, it is certain that the thousands of cats, dogs, birds (and even that iguana) who owe their well-being to these volunteers would all rouse in swarms of gratitude if they could.

But they can’t. So the people must. And this admirable organisation will be able to continue for at least another 25 years to come. As Nancy Logue says about her work, “There’s no better feeling than when you really love what you do and then feel the appreciation that others feel for your passion.”

Story & Photos By B. Naqqi Manco, Sr. Conservation Officer, Turks & Caicos National Trust

They come every year. The spring rains awaken them and the Islands are subject to the onslaught of a creepy crustacean invasion. Most welcome these creatures, but I’m still working on feeling anything but pure terror.

This invasion is the spring emergence of the Great Blue land crabs from their dry season burrows. The Great Blue land crabs (Cardisoma guanhumi) are well known to the inhabitants of the less populated islands of Middle and North Caicos, though can be just as familiar on the more populated islands of Providenciales and Grand Turk.

Most visitors to the Turks & Caicos Islands never have the privilege of meeting a Great Blue land crab. They’re not common on the most populated islands because of the culinary fondness that the people of the Turks & Caicos Islands have for them, and the development that has filled in the low-lying areas they need to live. Whether in the traditional seasonal favourite crab ‘n’ rice, minced in salad, fried in cakes or stewed into crab-soup ‘n’ dumplings, the emergence of the crabs with the beginning of the rainy season figures prominently into the menus – and pocketbooks – of many island people. Due to extensive development and thorough hunting on Providenciales, they are not especially common there now, though there are still plenty around in remote areas. But in Middle and North Caicos, where there are fewer people and a lot more bush where crabs can live and eat, they are commonly met on warm, moist nights from May to September.

Met all too commonly for my tastes. I’ll expose my emotions upfront so that it is understood that I am by no means an unbiased author on this subject. I do not like land crabs. Why? It isn’t just because their claws are insanely dangerous and could remove a toe. It isn’t just because they look like mechanical robot spiders from Hell. It’s mainly because they are terribly destructive to gardens. They eat seedling vegetables in my plot. They ravage my bok choy patch and overturn my potted plants.

Still, as wild animals, they intrigue me. What were these crabs, which look like clockwork nightmares, doing several miles inland in my backyard? Shouldn’t crabs be at the bottom of the sea, where they can neither be seen by me nor upset my vegetable patch? Also, I often wondered where these huge crabs “went” after September, when they seem to disappear, aside from the odd stray crab that is seen on the road after unseasonably heavy rains in the dry times. Their habits interested me. So I set out to learn more.

These gigantic crustaceans emerge from deep, muddy burrows with the warm spring rains in May. The burrows are usually dug in compacted silt around salinas and seasonally flooded mangrove ponds or open salt marshes. Land crabs battle – by pushing and shoving – for the best real estate, and low areas with plenty of food and deep muddy silt can have up to 7,500 burrows per acre. Burrows can be six feet deep, and they are always dug down to the water table. At the bottom of each burrow is a chamber that lies flooded with about half a gallon of water. The water can be fresh, brackish or salty (sometimes more so than sea water). Land crabs, like all crabs, have gills. Unlike aquatic crabs that have a constant flow of water over their gills, a land crab has to carry its water supplies with it, inside its body. The water only lasts about 48 hours before it evaporates with the crab’s breathing action, and so it must be replenished at least every other day. This is why the crab digs a burrow down to the water table – to create a private reservoir of breathing water; a personal respiratory swimming pool hidden safely underground.

Mostly, Great Blue land crabs prefer to live alone, though they will sometimes escape from predators by retreating into burrows that are not their own. Only mature crabs have the stamina to dig down to the water table, so young crabs, not yet of breeding age, will often room with adult crabs. The adult crabs tolerate these boarders until they are mature.

Adult and immature land crabs emerge from their burrows in late afternoon when shadows are long and the worst of the day’s heat has passed. Their favourite foraging times are dusk and dawn, but they will also spend all night out when the moon is bright, and they sometimes venture out on overcast and rainy days. Land crabs forage for food indiscriminately, though they do have their favourites. They are mostly vegetarian – favoured foods include the leaves of red and white mangroves, buttonwood and purslane. They will also eat other plants, and will occasionally catch insects and other small animals, including lizards and snakes. Dead animals are also welcome feasts, and they are even known to be cannibalistic. As the crabs forage for these salt marsh delicacies, they begin putting on weight and preparing for courtship.

Male crabs, locally called “bull crabs,” court females soon after they emerge in May. Male Great Blue land crabs are larger than females, with longer legs, a brighter blue hue and one hugely enlarged “biter” or claw. This enlarged claw’s two “fingers” meet only at the tips, and is used to wave at other male rivals and occasionally in battles to turn other males over. Despite its terrifying appearance, the large claw is less dangerous to people than the other claw, which is smaller, has a jagged internal surface and meets along its lengths like a pair of cutters. Females, which are usually lighter in colour with rounder bodies, have two such shear-like claws, making “she-crabs” dangerous pinching machines.

Fertilisation is internal, but when the female lays eggs, she carries them on the outside of her body, clutched tight to her belly with a broad, triangular tail. Female Great Blue land crabs lay large numbers of eggs in relation to their body size, and can produce egg masses numbering from 300,000 to 700,000 eggs. The eggs are brown, gummy, and each about the size of a poppy seed. Female crabs carrying eggs are locally said to be “with sponge.” Within two days of laying eggs, the she-crab must deposit them into the sea, which can mean an adventurous journey for a crab that may live as far inland as five miles.

Using the setting sun’s light at the horizon, sensing ground vibrations, remembering landmarks and feeling for wind direction, she-crabs with eggs make their way toward the sea at night, within a few days of the full moon.  At the water’s edge, they “wash sponge” – that is, release their eggs into the sea water. Female crabs then return to their inland homes and will breed several more times in a season if the food supplies in their home territory allow.

What becomes of the eggs after the she-crab “washes sponge” was only recently understood. The eggs hatch into free-swimming larvae that look very little like the crabs they will someday be. They go first through a phase of drifting called a zoea, then as they grow and moult, feeding on other plankton, become an actively swimming megalops. After 30 to 40 days, the megalops has grown and moulted enough to go through a final aquatic moult, and emerge from the sea as a tiny land crab.

The land upon which the tiny crab emerges may not be its homeland – the planktonic larvae can drift miles on ocean currents and end up on shores far from where they are laid.  However, on islands with still lagoons and abundant tidal saltwater creeks intruding into the land (such as the southern shores of the Caicos Islands), crab larvae may well end up on the same islands from which their parents came.

Young Great Blue land crabs start out life with a brown body and orange legs, and it takes them four years to moult enough to reach adult size. These crabs are slow growing, and they may moult as many as 60 times before they can reach their maximum size. Moulting is carried out during inactive seasons, when the weather is dry.  After actively foraging in the warm, wet Turks & Caicos summers, the Great Blue land crabs seek out their burrows as the dryer winter months approach. By October, most crabs have not only retired to their burrows, but have even plugged the entrances with mud to keep out enemies. Underground in their deep, wet haunts, they moult. Moulting is a six to ten day process by which the crabs shed their outer shell so that they can put on a rapid burst of growth before the new shell hardens. After the moult, the crabs may remain in their burrows, living off of stored fats in their bodies, until the next year’s warm spring rains entice them to emerge and forage again.

When Great Blue land crabs do emerge and forage, people, and some birds, are waiting for them. In Kew, North Caicos, “crab season” is heralded by the sounds of young boys hard at work hammering together scrap plywood and pallets to build crab pens, and the sight of them walking the roadsides at night with flashlights and rice sacks. Often, entire families join in the hunt for crabs. A single crab can sell for three to five dollars locally on Middle and North Caicos, but can bring as much as seven dollars when sent air freight to Grand Turk.

Most people prefer to leave town to hunt crab – a crab found in a settlement may be the same one that was seen crawling out of a neighbour’s latrine the night before.  A visit to the airports of Middle and North Caicos in the warm months can often yield the sight of a cardboard box riddled with holes from which the odd leg or claw pokes, rattling with the sound of tightly packed crabs scratching around inside, taped securely shut with handwritten lettering indicating the destination as Grand Turk or Provo.

Having accompanied friends, both old and young, on crab hunts I learned that there are a number of methods people use to avoid the horrible “biters.” A machete can be used to press down on the crab’s back before lifting it by the hind pair of legs or the back of the shell. Alternatively, a solidly shoed foot can clamp the crab down while each claw is firmly grasped. Hooks and nets can also be used, and a dog I once had even learned to chase crabs out from the bush into the open so his former owner could catch them. (This dog was a potcake, but due to his crab hunting prowess, I considered the possibility of registering a new breed – the Caicos crab-hound!)

But one doesn’t necessarily need a light and a machete and a bag to hunt crabs – a pickup truck will replace all other equipment. Drive down any North Caicos road on a rainy summer night and no doubt you will encounter a slow-moving pickup truck. It’s not careful driving, it’s 21st-century crab hunting. Simply sight crabs in the headlights, blind them with the high beams, jump out and sling the crab into the bed of the truck. This method isn’t without its own risks as Great Blue land crabs have been known to puncture tyres!

Once the crabs are bagged up (or in the bed of the pickup truck), they are transferred into the crab pen – often a clapboard hutch rife with the sound of scratchy sideways scurries of a hundred pokey feet. Feed the crabs up with old rice, vegetable peelings . . . pretty much anything (the preferred food for fattening in the Bahamas is soaked corn), give them a pan of water and you have a pantry of fresh crabs available indefinitely. Though one will occasionally find a she-crab carrying sponge in a crab pen, most gravid females are left alone. Crab hunters understand that those thousands of eggs need to get to the sea in order to replenish populations for future generations. Nonetheless, some old timers enjoy the taste of crab eggs roasted in fire!

Most crabs will end up as crab ‘n’ rice, though there are a multitude of dishes made from crab. The crab’s fat reserves are used to flavour rice dishes and the meat in the claws and upper leg segments can be steamed and picked out to make crab salad or crab cakes. Only the shell and guts are discarded. The meat from the tips of the legs is excellent fishing bait. Crabs happened upon out of season will occasionally be eaten, but they are not popular because they lack the fat reserves of in-season crab.

It is not only humans who pursue these delicacies. The crab’s number one enemy is the Yellow Crowned Night Heron, locally called the gaulin. Gaulins strike the back shell of a crab with a stout, sharp beak, puncturing the crab’s nerve centre and stunning it. They then eat the legs, smash the claws and shell against rocks and devour the innards. Night herons can’t digest crab shells, and spit them back up in a mosaic-like pellet. Finding a crab shell with a half-inch hole through it is proof that a gaulin has been eating well in the area. During the winter, gaulins have to hunt ghost crabs on the beach and the young black and orange colored Great Blue land crabs, locally called “kittykee,” as they emerge from the sea. But during crab season, gaulins eat as well as the people do.

Crab season is defined, in the Turks & Caicos Islands, by the crabs. There is currently no legal open or closed season for crab hunting, and there is no bag limit. In Florida, crab season is open only when they are not reproducing – from November 1 until June 30 the following year – and there is a strict bag limit of 20 crabs per person per day. In some areas of the Bahamas, crab replenishment areas have been created where hunting is prohibited, to ensure abundant future stocks. At this time, Great Blue land crabs remain plentiful in the Turks & Caicos Islands.

Great Blue land crabs aren’t the only land crab hunted in the Islands. The Black land crab, known in the Antilles as the Mountain crab Gecarcinas ruricola is said to have a sweeter taste than the blue land crab, though it has less meat and fat and is therefore more work to prepare. The smaller Rainbow crabs Gecarcinas lateralis zoom swiftly along the sand dunes, though are too small to be worth eating. Likewise the well known Soldier or Hermit crabs Coenobita clypeatus make better pets than they do dinner.

The Great Blue land crabs, though, are most numerous . . . and most coveted. Recently, I knew I had a Great Blue in my garden when I saw the damage to my hot pepper plants and the telltale scratchety feet tracks in the soil. I knew it was hiding under a piece of plywood. So I picked up the plywood. Ugh! Not one horrible windup mechanical vindictive spider robot. Three! I dropped the wood; I’d need reinforcements. I grabbed my garden trowel and donned my flip-flops because one can’t go into battle unprotected. I lifted the plywood. I stomped and swung my garden trowel and swore and hissed. The crabs did the same. Except they all did it in different directions while attempting to remove my extremities. This called for more backup, so I beefed up my weaponry with a big plastic plant pot. There was screaming, and falling, and kicking, and stomping, and thwarted crab claws and garden trowels. One got away. But I successfully cornered the other two arthropodic horrors in the plant pot and dumped them quickly into a bucket. I looked down at them, out of breath from my partially successful attack, and wiser to their lifecycle and role in the ecology of the Islands – and slightly happy that one got away to continue that cycle. I then whisked the other two away immediately to my neighbour, who had been looking for some. She’s having company tonight, for dinner. And the crabs aren’t the company.

Bibliography

Arthur, Jannay. Turks & Caicos National Trust, May 2008.

Hill, K. “Cardisoma Guanhumi.” Fort Pierce Smithsonian Marine Station, 25 July 2001.

http://www.sms.si.edu.IRLspec/Cardis_guanhu.htm

Hostetler, Mark E. Mazzotti, Frank J. & Taylor, Amy K. “Blue Land Crab.” University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, January 1999.

http://edis.efas.ufl.edu/UW013

Lockhart, Kathy. Department of Environment and Coastal Resources, May 2008.

Story & Photos  By  Dr. Donald H. Keith, Trustee Turks & Caicos National Museum and President, Ships of Discovery

June 12, 1998.  “Some people say there’s five and some say six.” Jack McWilliams yells to Jon Moore and me as we drop over the side of his boat into the clear shallows off Ft. St. George Cay (also called Fort George Cay). He’s referring to the cannons below us, lying partially buried in sand on the seabed. The water is clear and only waist deep. There are three of them within a few feet of one another, all heavily camouflaged by marine growth, but readily identifiable. Jon and I are just over for the day from the Turks & Caicos National Museum, at Jack’s invitation. The informal head of an informal group of Pine Cay residents who have made it their mission to learn more about the cay and its history, Jack is looking for suggestions on how to proceed with documenting the Turks & Caicos Islands’ only British fort.

We set to work taking rough measurements, compass readings for orientation, and photographs. Two of the cannons are quite large-over 9 feet in length. The third one is much shorter, only about 6 feet long. They seem to be arranged in an arc, pointing out to sea and covering the horizon from west to north. Jack hops in and swims directly to another location about 50 feet farther to the south. When we join him he points out two more cannons, one pointing southwest and the other more to the south. The one pointing south seems to be out of place and almost completely buried in the sand, so we can’t be sure of its size. The other is only about 7 feet long, and is unlike any of the others.

We stand up in the shallow water for a conference. The main question is why are the cannons in the water in the first place? Jack tells us that Brooke Fox, a long-time Pine Cay resident who has been visiting Ft. St. George Cay for years, thinks that the cannons were originally mounted on land, but over the past 200 years creeping coastal erosion ate away the land beneath, eventually undermining them and toppling them into the sea. This hypothesis is bolstered by the way in which the five cannons still point out to sea covering almost the entire anchorage between Ft. St. George Cay and the outer reef.

Remembering first-hand accounts of visitors to the cay in the early years of the 19th century, one of which mentions seeing “two 24-pounders in a tolerable state and three smaller ones much honeycombed, with carriages quite decayed,” I wonder if these are the same five cannons. Then, because another report from about the same time period mentions “The fort has 11 guns, most of them dismounted,” it occurs to me that other cannons might lie buried in the sand, perhaps in the curious 50-foot gap between the two groups visible today. Jon, an archaeologist with Parks Canada and veteran of the Museum’s project to mold and cast replicas of the inscriptions on Sapodilla Hill, observes that at least two of them still have intact trunnions (the cylindrical lugs at the balance point on either side of the barrel that enable it to be elevated or depressed when aiming). This is an important clue, since it was normal practice to knock the trunnions off any cannons that were to be abandoned, rendering them unserviceable to the enemy. It implies that when the fort’s garrison was removed, the fort may not have been formally abandoned, but rather turned over to a Loyalist militia who would then have been responsible for their own defense. This hypothesis makes sense in light of the fact that many of the Caicos Loyalists had been officers or soldiers during the American War of Independence and had seen a lot of action. This, in turn, could mean that the fort was in service a good deal longer than military records would suggest.

As we wade ashore, Jack points out abundant evidence that the island’s high ground, the northwest point, is indeed losing its battle with the sea. We measure the distance from the shore to the submerged cannons and find that if Brooke’s hypothesis is correct, Ft. St. George Cay has already lost at least 150 feet of land on its seaward side. Strange features on the ironshore catch our eye:  curious parallel lines of holes oriented almost perfectly east-west emerge from the sand on the beach, march across the ironshore, and disappear into the sea. The lines are about 24 inches apart and the holes are about 4 inches in diameter. There is no question but they are man-made, but what was their purpose? Jack shows us another anomaly: a dense, peaty deposit of organic matter apparently wedged or trapped in a fissure in the rocks. It is utterly unlike anything else we have seen in the Islands. We have no idea what formed it or what it means, but an embedded wooden plank strongly suggests human involvement. A short distance away, well above the high tide line but still susceptible to storm wave action, five courses of carefully cut native stone, seemingly only recently exposed, are weathering out of the bluff. It is the corner of some kind of structure, but the rest of it is hidden in the dense undergrowth. Jon and I are itching to push into the bush, but now darkness is coming on and we still have the boat ride to Leeward Marina ahead of us. Little did I suspect, as we packed up and loaded our equipment into Jack’s boat, that 10 years would pass before I would set foot on Ft. St. George Cay again.

February 19, 2008.  “Over here!” a disembodied voice cries up ahead. Museum Director Neal Hitch and I follow the sound, weaving and bobbing to avoid the tangled branches and vines of Fort George’s dense undergrowth. Suddenly we come upon Walt Brewer and Jack McWilliams standing beside a massive, waist high stone ruin and grinning like Cheshire cats. “This is probably the shot furnace they talk about in the sailing directions,” Walt opines. “What, they made cannonballs here?” Jack-knowing what kind of heat it takes to melt iron-asks incredulously. “No . . . this is where they would heat up shot until they were red hot, so when they fired them at enemy ships it would set them ablaze,” Walt says with authority. He’s been doing his homework, honing up on the fine points of 18th century ordnance. Idly, Neal toes the leafy duff at his feet, exposing a potshard. He picks it up, rubs off the dirt, smiles. After spending 10 years with the Ohio Historical Society maintaining scores of historic sites Neal knows his ceramics. “Creamware,” he says. “We find this stuff all the time in Ohio.” Then he adds, “Late 18th century, mean date 1791, but in production for another 30 years,” and puts the artifact back where he found it.

Jack and Walt, both residents of Pine Cay, have been visiting Ft. St. George for years, trying to unravel its mysteries. Ten years ago they founded the Fort St. George Bicentennial Project, the purpose of which was summed up in a statement by Jack McWilliams, the group’s coordinator:

“It has come to the attention of a group of members on Pine Cay that the ruins of Ft. St. George are rapidly being washed into the sea. The front of the old fort is changing with trees and shrubs falling into the water after each high tide and storm. We feel there is little or nothing we can do to stop this natural process.  However, we do see a need for preservation.

For many years we have taken it for granted and have enjoyed walking the beaches and showing our friends the cannons with really little thought to the history. But now, with the fort in danger of fastly disappearing, we are hopeful we can do something to save it for its history.”

Neal and I came to Pine Cay to give a presentation on one of the Museum’s projects, but before we knew it Jack and Walt, anxious to show us what they found in the island’s interior, had us on Ft. St. George Cay, plunging into the bush, following the faint outline of a low stone wall or foundation that soon disappeared into the leafy compost and branches that litter the ground. The underbrush was thick and progress was slow and halting. In the airless gloom of the understory I was soon aware of a cloud of biting midges traveling in formation with us. For 100 yards we saw nothing but bush, punctuated occasionally by a building stone jutting out of the leafy litter, until we came upon the supposed shot furnace. We won’t know for sure if that’s actually what it is without proper excavation, but it’s a good possibility because the log of the survey vessel Blossom, which passed by the fort after it was abandoned, states:

“Ft. St. George was erected to protect the anchorage. Two 42 Pounders only are now fit for service. The furnace for heating shot is still standing, the chimney of which can be seen a few miles round, here are some pools of tolerable good water the most convenient for shipping in this neighbourhood . . . .”

The 1856 edition of the Columbian Navigator also references a furnace:

“. . . Fort Kay, a low sandy islet, covered, like the others, with bush, it is not more than a quarter of a mile across, and has three or four wells of indifferent water, which probably might be improved by cleaning out: there are the remains of a fort, a magazine, and a furnace for heating shot . . . .”

As the most salient features of Ft. St. George Cay, the cannons and shot furnace bear silent witness to the reason for its existence. Two centuries ago, in this very spot, British soldiers endured heat, privation, clouds of mosquitoes and disease against which they had no defense, laboring to build a military base and shore battery to defend the homes and fields of 40 or so plantation families thinly scattered throughout the Caicos Islands. North and Middle Caicos were the population centers in those days, having been settled only a decade or so earlier by Loyalists forced to leave their land when the American rebels succeeded in winning their independence. The plots of land that they occupied and millions of dollars in cash settlements that were given to them were a grateful government’s way of recognizing their loyalty to the Crown and re-compensating them for the sacrifices they made.

Why here?

But how did they end up in the Caicos Islands, of all places? It all began in 1783 when Lt. John Wilson was ordered to proceed to the Bahamas, which belonged to the Crown, to make a general survey of the Islands in order to determine where land grants could be made to the Loyalists. Although he visited the Turks Islands he could not make a determination of the population because it varied according to season (like today!), but it seems to have been less than 100. Interestingly, his report does not even mention the Caicos Islands, and from this we may safely assume that they were essentially deserted.

The first Loyalists began to arrive in 1787. During the ensuing plantation period, hundreds of new immigrants cleared huge areas for agriculture and pasture, built imposing structures of stone and wood, planted cotton and sugar cane, and built a road connecting Middle and North Caicos. It is important to appreciate that the Crown had a considerable investment to protect once the Loyalists, their families, and dependants moved to the Islands. When, in the final years of the 18th century, the colonists became concerned that social upheavals in Haiti might result in an attempted invasion, they petitioned the Crown for military assistance. Ft. St. George was the physical manifestation of the Crown’s concern and its effort to reassure the colonists that they would be protected. That the Loyalists did indeed need that protection is substantiated by an incident reported in the Bahama Gazette, August 21, 1798. While attempting to return with cargo salvaged from a supply vessel wrecked near West Caicos, five boats sent by the Caicos Loyalists were attacked by a French privateer. A running gun-battle ensued, unfortunately resulting in the colonists losing not only the salvaged cargo, but also the five boats!

Just the facts

Most of what precious little we know about Ft. St. George comes from the writings of H.E. Sadler, a transplanted Jamaican and amateur historian who wrote copiously about the Turks & Caicos Islands. Unfortunately for us, he never realized the importance of including citations. He could have saved the rest of us an enormous amount of time (and vouchsafed his own conclusions) if only he had mentioned what sources he used. Until those sources can be re-located and verified, it would be wise to approach the “conventional wisdom” about Fort George, most of which comes from Sadler, with a healthy dose of skepticism.

So what do we think we know about Ft. St. George? What authority, other than Sadler, has ever mentioned it at all? How do we know it really existed? What original sources do we have to go on? Sadler gives us the following: Work on Ft. St. George was begun December 1798. In one year, the 200-man detachment of the 67th Royal Hampshire Regiment, first commanded by Ensign Neil Campbell and later by “Lieutenant Owen” suffered 15% fatalities, not to combat but to hardship and disease. Sadler says the fort was abandoned in 1799, but research in England uncovered reference to a “large detachment” being sent to the Caicos Islands in September 1797. At the end of 1798, the unit was transferred to Jamaica and in 1801 the 67th Royal Hampshire Regiment shipped back to England-but “some men were left in the Islands.” Yet another contradiction comes from a 1788 London Times article which seems to indicate that Ft. St. George existed 10 years earlier: “The loyalists are men of capital. They have a decent trade with England, receiving their supplies from that quarter and sending in return their sugar and cotton from Ft. St. George.”

Regardless of exactly when the fort came into being, why it was located on the tiny island that subsequently became known as Ft. St. George Cay is less of a mystery:  the cay is perfectly situated to guard the best anchorage for small vessels on the northern side of the Caicos Islands. A passage in the Columbian Navigator of 1856 describes in considerable detail how to find the cut in the reef and where to anchor inside.  It makes reference to “A set of chain-moorings [that] were laid down here by a Bahama merchant some years since” which would seem to indicate a relatively high volume of ship traffic. An additional attraction was the availability of fresh water on both Ft. St. George and Pine Cay. “The greatest advantage of Pine’s Kay is a great lagoon of fresh water, sufficient for fifty ships: it is very drinkable, and not far from the beach.”

Land grants made to the Loyalists Missick, Stubbs, Penn, Williamson, and Hyett on Parrot Cay and North Caicos were the closest to Ft. St. George; they and other Loyalist planters undoubtedly  depended on it to protect their commerce. The plantation period lasted only a few decades. When the land failed to be as productive as they had hoped, most of the planters departed for greener pastures. Now the only vestiges of their passing, other than their surnames, are the forlorn ruins of their once-imposing homes and buildings, the expertly dry-laid stone walls that surrounded their fields, and the fort that once protected them.

Rediscovering Ft. St. George Cay

Today, Ft. St. George Cay’s location is again attracting attention, but for entirely different reasons. TCI government officials announced plans to develop the cay with a Sea World-style aquarium, featuring among other attractions, captive dolphins. Development of tiny Ft. St. George Cay on such a grand scale would likely necessitate dredging to permit large vessels carrying scores of visitors to access the island, heaping the spoil on the land to increase elevation, and completely eradicating the old fort and any recognizable trace of the original island and its ecosystem.

Since 1992, Ft. St. George Cay has been listed as one of the seven historical locations recognized by the TCI government as deserving National Park status, and it was included in the 600 acres of National Heritage Sites placed under the protection of the Turks & Caicos National Trust. Oddly, title to the 600 acres was never actually transferred to the Trust, leaving Fort George, Cheshire Hall, Salt Cay, Boiling Hole, Wade’s Green, and all other Heritage Sites subject to sale and development.

We live in a day and age of unprecedented population pressure on cultural and natural resources. In developing countries the world over, it is the same story. Human population’s understanding of and appreciation for historical heritage boils down to a single conviction: “Old is bad, new is good.” When there is a choice between preserving remnants of the past or bulldozing them to make way for development, almost invariably development wins, and the building, wall, windmill, house, shipwreck, graveyard or fort disappears, usually without a trace.

A better and more appropriate alternative for Ft. St. George is to “take the high ground,” enhancing what is already there rather than replacing it with something completely different. The obvious first step with such an approach is for the TCI government to transfer title to the National Trust, legally establishing Ft. St. George Cay as an historic park. This simple action would save the cay and prove the government’s commitment to the protection and preservation of the Islands’ environmental and historical heritage. The second step is to conduct comprehensive archival, archaeological, and environmental surveys of the cay to learn what is actually there. Armed with this information, a long-term plan could be implemented to protect and preserve the resource in perpetuity. But what information do we need and what would it take to get it?

Building a base of knowledge

Everything we now know or will learn in the future about the history of Ft. St. George will come from the written word-”primary sources” in historian-speak: official records of exactly who and what was sent from Jamaica to the Caicos, their orders, where the ordnance came from and exactly what and how much of it there was; official and personal letters describing the place, the people and events; manuscript maps of the anchorage and plans of the fortifications. Because the regiment that occupied the fort came from Jamaica, and because H.E. Sadler purportedly drew much of his information from there, the Institute of Jamaica repository is a logical place to start. Another likely source is the Public Records Office in the UK, but there are many other possible places to look. In terms of finding out what happened at Ft. St. George 200 years ago, the importance of archival research cannot be overestimated.

The Ft. St. George anchorage and waters around it are ideal for conducting an underwater archaeology survey. That such a survey would be fruitful is verified by last year’s chance discovery of at least one shipwreck site in the anchorage between the cay and the reef. Undoubtedly there are others. A state-of-the-art instrument survey would include use of a marine magnetometer which can detect the presence of iron objects like cannons and anchors even when they are buried beneath sand or coral. Given that the sea has encroached on part of the fort, we may expect to find remnants of it in the shallow waters around the land.

The main effort would be a comprehensive archaeological survey of the terrestrial part of the cay to locate and map the extent of the remaining ruins with test excavations to determine each structure’s original use. The survey should also seek to locate sub-surface features such as trash pits, latrines, wells . . . and graves. Sadler reports that 30 British soldiers died in the first year of occupation at Fort George, a statement that seems to be verified by reports of human bones having been discovered eroding out of the soil on the cay. Military graves are a sensitive issue and must be cared for respectfully and properly. It must be remembered that the point of a survey is to get a better idea of what’s there, not to find and excavate everything or try to reconstruct the ruins. Those things could come later, but not until we know what we are dealing with.

It is highly likely that the main fortification on Ft. St. George Cay would have had outposts on the surrounding islands of Stubbs, Pine, and Dellis Cays. Pine Cay explorers have discovered foundations and clay pipe fragments on Stubbs Cay and historic potsherds have been found on Pine Cay itself, but neither of these areas have been examined by professional archaeologists. It is also possible that burials were made on nearby islands rather than on Ft. St. George Cay itself.

A basic first step in any environmental impact study is cataloguing the flora and fauna. This job would likely fall to biologists working for the Overseas Territories Environmental Programme, who would look for, among other things, the presence of endangered plant or animal species deserving special attention. A good example of the latter is the rock iguana, once widespread throughout the Caicos Islands, but now found only in protected areas.   Dr. Glenn Gerber of the San Diego Zoo’s Center for Conservation and Research for Endangered Species has in the past expressed an interest in trying to re-establish iguanas on Ft. St. George and possibly Stubbs Cays, much as he has already done elsewhere in the Islands.

Coming up with a plan

Along with the authority to decide what is to be done on Ft. St. George Cay comes a great deal of responsibility for problem solving and decision making: Can anything be done to halt or slow down the rate at which Ft. St. George Cay is eroding into the sea? Already, artifacts such as cannonballs, grape shot, rifle shot, gun flints, ceramic and glass shards, iron fragments, copper nails, uniform buckles and buttons have been found on Ft. St. George Cay. Should we proceed with complete excavation and restoration of the fort? If sufficient evidence remains, should we try to re-create it? Excavations will undoubtedly produce artifacts, all of which will need proper conservation treatments. What will it cost? Where will the money come from? How long will it take? Who will be responsible for protecting and maintaining the park? How can the archaeological features, flora, and fauna be made accessible to the public and protected at the same time? Will it be necessary to limit the number of people allowed to visit the cay? Once results of the studies listed above are in hand we will be in a position to answer these questions and create a long-range plan based on knowledge rather than mere speculation.

Any such plan should take advantage of the fact that the fastest-growing segment of tourism globally is eco- and heritage-tourism. Ft. St. George Cay already receives significant tourist visitation from Provo even without any formal signage or enhancement of the experience. It is reasonable to expect that, after completing the necessary studies, finding, identifying, making accessible the most impressive structures and installing appropriate signage, day trips to Ft. St. George could be upgraded to a high-value experience, especially if such trips included snorkeling and diving on submerged parts of the site or shipwrecks in the anchorage.

The open book

Ft. St. George Cay is not just another uninhabited piece of Crown land. The cay and its fort are unique. It is a national park, a monument to the soldiers who died defending the Caicos Islands civilian population, a rich, unexplored archaeological site, and possibly a cemetery. It is an as- yet unopened book that we can take the trouble to read and understand, or simply toss aside without ever knowing what we missed. The National Trust and the National Museum want to read that book, share with everyone the story within it, and keep it safely on the shelf for the edification and enjoyment of future generations, but at this point its fate is far from certain.

If recent news reports are accurate, the TCI Government believes that it is in the best interest of the people to develop Ft. St. George Cay as a theme park. Unless the people feel that other options such as the ones listed above should be explored-and make those feelings known to government-Fort George’s final battle will be lost, the book will never be read, and yet another important part of the history and environment of the Turks & Caicos will be irretrievably lost.