Bahamas Jun 2026

On October 12, 1492, three Spanish ships under Christopher Columbus sighted land. Historians debate the exact island, but tradition points to San Salvador (then called Guanahani by the Lucayans). Columbus, believing he had reached the outskirts of Asia, claimed the island for Spain. He noted the friendly, handsome, and generous Lucayans, who traded parrots and spears for glass beads and hawks' bells. "They should be good servants," Columbus wrote in his journal.

This chaos ended in 1718 when Britain appointed Captain Woodes Rogers as royal governor. Rogers, a former privateer himself, famously declared, "Piracy expelled, commerce restored." He hunted down the pirates, hanged nine of them in a single day, and restored British rule. He rebuilt Nassau's fort, Fort Nassau, and established the rule of law. Bahamas