Before the Battle: By Emory King

ABOVE: The Tenth of September parade in downtown Belize City.

On the 10th of September, 1798, the people of Belize, black and white, slave and free, won the Battle of St. George's Caye. This ended Spain's attempts to dislodge them from what is now our country and allowed them to expand Belize.

However, not many people know that the Battle of St. George's Caye almost never happened.

Back in 1796, almost two years before the famous battle, Spanish ships from Mexico captured three Belize ships near Lighthouse Reef and took them back to Yucatan. It was then that the Baymen learned that Spain and Britain had gone to war again.

Almost immediately a group of men in Belize Town said the best solution was to evacuate the Settlement and go to the Mosquito Shore. Another group said the best solution was to prepare for war and defend Belize.

The debate came to a head on June 1st 1797 at the largest Public Meeting ever held in the Settlement up to that time.

Did you ever hear of William Flowers, Caesar Flowers, Joseph Toney, Adam Flowers, William Scott, William Pinder, George Grant, James Hercules, William Crofts, David Dawson, John Dawson or Joseph Smith?

Probably not, but you should have heard of them.

These twelve men were the first Black Heroes of Belize to have their names recorded in the Public Records of the Settlement. (See Public Meetings, June 1, 1797 in the Belize Archives, Belmopan.)

On that day, these dozen Black men, together with two White men, George Raybon and Thomas Robertson, voted down a resolution to Evacuate the Settlement before the Spanish Army came to invade. (They cast the last 14 votes at the Public Meeting in Belize Town.)

The vote that day against Evacuation, (65 to 51 with 11 abstentions), set the stage for the Battle of St. George's Caye the following year. Had the vote gone the other way the Settlement would have abandoned and lost forever to Spain and then Mexico or Guatemala. (They found out, after the Battle, that the Spanish had an Occupation Army waiting in Bacalar, just across the border in Mexico, to march on Belize as soon as the invasion was successful.)

The argument over Evacuation had been going on for almost a year. One group, led by Colonel James Pitt Lawrie and others, wanted to leave Belize and move to the Mosquito Shore, as the Baymen had always done in the past when the Spanish invaded.

A second group, led by Thomas Paslow and Marshall Bennett, was determined to stay and defend Belize.

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