History on Britain’s side in Falklands
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, president of Argentina, has taken out an advertisement in British newspapers that offers a New Year history lesson on an old theme: She asserts that on January 3, 1833, the British Navy expelled Argentinian citizens from the Falklands Islands and began 180 years of illegal rule.
‘‘Argentina was forcibly stripped of the Malvinas Islands,’’ she says, ‘‘in a blatant exercise of 19thcentury colonialism.’’
In Argentina, this is the accepted view of the history of the islands, but it requires modification. No force was used in 1833 and, far from kicking the settlers out, the British tried to persuade them to stay.
Like everything surrounding the Falklands, the historical waters have been muddied. Britain has an equally simplistic take on the islands’ past, insisting that this is a one-dimensional case of British sovereignty under threat. In fact, the islands’ history is both more complex and more interesting than the aggressive assertions of either side would suggest.
A Dutch sea captain, Sebald de Weert, was possibly the first to note the islands, but there was noone there in 1690 when the Englishman John Strong came ashore and in an act of spectacular toadying named them after the Secretary of the Treasury, Viscount Falkland.
One of the first settlements was French – the name Malvinas derives from Les Malouines, after the French town of Saint-Malo. Small groups of British, Spanish and other settlers followed.
The lines of dispute between Britain and what would become Argentina only start to come into focus with the arrival of Luis Vernet, a trader whose role in the Falklands-Malvinas dispute is often forgotten. In 1823, the United Provinces granted Vernet land on East Falkland in settlement of a debt.
In Buenos Aires, this was seen as a political move, since he was also appointed governor of the islands. When the British objected, Vernet reassured them that he was only out to make money from the seal trade. He sought the permission of the British Consulate before establishing his little settlement, and agreed to provide the British Government with regular reports. Vernet’s motives appear to have been a mixture of political and commercial. If his own role and his own allegiances had been clearer, the Falklands dispute would never have happened.
When three American ships were intercepted harvesting seals in Falklands waters, Vernet arrested them. In response, the Americans sent the USS Lexington to destroy his arms store. At this stage, Buenos Aires could hardly claim a long and tranquil occupation of the islands — an attempt to set up a penal colony there ended in 1832 when the soldiers murdered their own commander.
It was at this murky juncture that Britain reasserted its claim with exquisite good manners. John Onslow, captain of HMS Clio, sailed from Rio de Janeiro and informed the commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Jose Maria Pinedo: ‘‘It is my intention to hoist tomorrow the national flag of Great Britain on shore, when I request you will be pleased to haul down your flag on shore and withdraw your force.’’ Colonel Pinedo was indeed pleased to do so, not least because many of his soldiers were British mercenaries who might have turned their guns on him had he resisted.
Far from expelling Vernet’s settlers, Onslow urged them to stay. He paid for stores in silver, encouraged the gauchos to continue to harvest the island’s feral cattle and told the settlers they were free to remain or leave. As acts of colonialism go, this was not so much ‘‘blatant’’ as laid-back, courteous and entirely bloodless.
Of the 33 settlers, only four decided to depart, and these were probably not genuine residents, but new arrivals. This suggests that in the first, informal test of public opinion on the Falklands, almost 90 per cent voted for British sovereignty in the most emphatic way possible – by staying put.
Captain Onslow then sailed away, leaving behind the British storeman, William Dixon, with a new flag and instructions to raise it if anyone came calling.