Library Guides: Manuscripts of Colonial and Revolutionary America: The Caribbean

Records--The Caribbean

What follows is a list of Colonial and Revolutionary era records and record groups originating in the Caribbean Basin, dating wholly or primarily from the years before 1788. Materials originating in the Spanish colonies in the region are excluded; these may be found among the Spanish and Spanish Colonial collections.

William Cussens Memorandum, 1767
1 document. A memorandum signed, and perhaps written, by William Cussens, master of the sloop Elizabeth, protesting damages that might be incurred from the loss of horses and cattle on a voyage from Maine to St. Croix. MSN/COL 7900-1.
Comte de Langeron Reports, 1762-1763
2 gatherings, 32 cm., 22 and 4 leaves, with 52 pages of manuscript in various hands. 1 additional sheet. Most of this group consists of retained copies of official reports written from the French colony of Saint-Domingue by Alexandre-Claude-Nicolas, comte de Langeron (b. 1732), colonel of the régiment Royal-Barrois. Langeron and the regiment had arrived on Saint-Domingue, which occupied the western end of the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean, in December 1761. The regiment was stationed at Cap François (now Cap Haitien), on the north coast. A folio-sized gathering of 42 pages contains copies, some apparently in Langeron's hand, of around 47 official letters and memoranda written from January 1762 to March 1763, towards the end of the Seven Years War. Most of these are directed to either the duc de Choiseul (the French minister for foreign affairs) or Philippe François Bart (governor of Saint-Domingue). Much of the content relates to the organization, pay, and living conditions of the regiment, and to the promotion of officers. There is also discussion of the colony in general, and some intelligence regarding the British. A second gathering of eight pages contains a clear copy of a 14-point memorandum written by Langeron, with point-by-point responses written by Bart and Jean Étienne Bernard Clugny de Nuits, Intendant at Saint-Domingue (January 1762). There is also a single sheet in Langeron's hand, listing official and personal letters sent to Europe. MSN/COL 7901-1 to MSN/COL 7901-3. [Finding Aid]