This is a list of governors of the Bahamas . The first English settlement in the Bahamas was on Eleuthera. In 1670, the king granted the Bahamas to the lords proprietors of the Province of Carolina, but the islands were left to themselves. The local pirates proclaimed a 'Privateers' Republic' with Edward Teach (Blackbeard) as chief magistrate in 1703. In 1717, the Bahamas became a British crown colony, and the pirates were driven out.
During the American War of Independence, the Bahamas were briefly occupied by both American and Spanish forces. In 1964, the Bahamas achieved self-governance, and, in 1973, full independence.
History of the Bahamas |
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Pre-Columbian Bahamas |
Lucayan people Columbus' voyage to Guanahani |
Spanish Bahamas |
Eleutheran Adventurers |
British Bahamas |
Raid on Charles Town Raid on Nassau Republic of Pirates Battle of Nassau Raid of Nassau 1782 Capture of the Bahamas |
Spanish Bahamas |
1783 Capture of the Bahamas |
British Bahamas |
1783 Peace of Paris Abaco Slave Revolt Slavery Abolition Act 1833 Creole case American Civil War |
Independent Bahamas |
Abaco Independence Movement Hurricane Dorian COVID-19 pandemic |
Caribbeanportal |
Image | Governor | From | To |
---|---|---|---|
Governors of Eleuthera (1648–1657): | |||
William Sayle | 1648 | 1657 | |
Proprietary governors of the Bahama Islands (1670–1706): | |||
Hugh Wentworth | 1671 | December 1671 | |
John Wentworth | December 1671 | 1676 | |
Charles Chillingworth | 1676 | 1677 | |
Robert Clarke | 1677 | 1682 | |
Richard Lilburne | 1682 | 1684 | |
British rule temporarily disrupted due to joint Spanish and French raid on Charlestown | |||
Thomas Bridges | 1686 | 1690 | |
Cadwallader Jones | 1690 | 1694 | |
Nicholas Trott | 1694 | 1697 | |
Nicholas Webb | 1697 | 1699 | |
Read Elding (acting) | 1699 | 1701 | |
Elias Haskett | 1701 | 1701 | |
Ellis Lightfoot | 1701 | 1703 | |
Edward Birch | 1704 | 1704 | |
Privateer's Republic (1706–1718) | |||
Royal governors of the Bahama Islands (1718–1776) | |||
Woodes Rogers | 26 July 1718 | 1721 | |
George Phenney | 1721 | 1728 | |
Woodes Rogers | August 1729 | 16 July 1732 | |
Richard Fitzwilliam (acting) | 1734 | 1738 | |
John Tinker | 1741 | 1758 [1] | |
John Gambier (acting) | 1758 | 1760 | |
William Shirley | 1760 [2] | 1775 | |
Montfort Browne | 1775 | 3 March 1776 | |
Commandant of the Bahama Islands (during American occupation, 1776) | |||
Samuel Nicholas | 3 March 1776 | 17 March 1776 | |
Royal governors of the Bahama Islands (1776–1782) | |||
John Gambier (acting) | 1776 | 1778 | |
John Robert Maxwell | 1780 | 8 May 1782 | |
Governors of Louisiana (during Spanish occupation) | |||
Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez | 8 May 1782 | 19 April 1783 | |
Royal governors of the Bahama Islands (1783–1969) | |||
Andrew de Vau (acting) | 1783 | 1783 | |
John Robert Maxwell | 1783 | 1784 | |
James Edward Powell (Lieutenant-governor) | 1784 | 1786 | |
John Brown (acting) | 1786 | 1787 | |
The 4th Earl of Dunmore | 1787 | 1796 | |
Robert Hunt (acting) | 1796 | 14 February 1797 | |
John Forbes (Lieutenant-governor) | 14 February 1797 | June 1797 | |
Lieutenant-General William Dowdeswell | 20 November 1797 | 1801 | |
John Halkett | 1801 | 1804 | |
Charles Cameron | 8 May 1804 | 1820 | |
Lewis Grant | 1821 | 1829 | |
Sir James Carmichael Smyth, 1st Baronet | 1829 | 1833 | |
Blayney Townley Balfour | 1833 | 1835 | |
William MacBean George Colebrooke | 1835 | 1837 | |
Sir Francis Cockburn | 1837 | 1844 | |
George Mathew | 1844 | 1849 | |
John Gregory | 1849 | 1854 | |
Sir Alexander Bannerman | 1854 | 1857 | |
Charles John Bayley | 1857 | 1864 | |
Rawson William Rawson | 1864 | 1869 | |
Sir James Walker | 1869 | 1871 | |
Sir George Cumine Strahan KCMG | 1871 | 1873 | |
Sir John Pope Hennessy KCMG | 1873 | 1874 | |
Sir William Robinson | 1874 | 1880 | |
Jeremiah Thomas Fitzgerald Callaghan CMG | 1880 | 1881 | |
Sir Charles Cameron Lees KCMG | 1882 | January 1884 | |
Sir Henry Arthur Blake GCMG, DL | 4 January 1884 | 1887 | |
Sir Ambrose Shea KCMG | 1887 | 1895 | |
Sir William Frederick Haynes Smith | 1895 | 1898 | |
Sir Gilbert Thomas Carter | 1898 | 1904 | |
Sir William Grey-Wilson | 29 November 1904 | 1912 | |
Sir George Basil Haddon-Smith | 29 October 1912 | 1914 | |
Sir William Lamond Allardyce KCMG | 15 June 1914 | 1920 | |
Sir Harry Edward Spiller Cordeaux KCMG, CB | 8 December 1920 | 1926 | |
Sir Charles William James Orr | 15 March 1927 | January 1932 | |
Sir Bede Edmund Hugh Clifford | 10 January 1932 | 1937 | |
Sir Charles Cecil Farquharson Dundas | 1937 | 1940 | |
The Duke of Windsor | 18 August 1940 | 16 March 1945 | |
Sir William Lindsay Murphy | 28 July 1945 | 1950 | |
Sir George Ritchie Sandford | 5 January 1950 | December 1950 | |
Sir Robert Arthur Ross Neville | 7 December 1950 | 1953 | |
The Earl of Ranfurly | 21 December 1953 | 1956 | |
Sir Oswald Raynor Arthur | 1 April 1957 | 1960 | |
Sir Robert Stapledon | 18 July 1960 | 1964 | |
Sir Ralph Grey, GCMG, GCVO, OBE, GCSt.J. P.C | 3 June 1964 | 1968 | |
Sir Francis Hovell-Thurlow-Cumming-Bruce, KCMG | 1 November 1968 | 1969 | |
Governors of the Commonwealth of the Bahama Islands (1969–1973) | |||
Sir Francis Hovell-Thurlow-Cumming-Bruce (The Lord Thurlow from 1971), KCMG | 1969 | 1972 | |
Sir John Warburton Paul GCMG, OBE, MC | 14 May 1972 | 10 July 1973 | |
On 10 July 1973 the Bahamas gained full independence from the United Kingdom and the viceroy became the Governor-General of the Bahamian Monarch. |
The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to 88% of the archipelago's population. The archipelagic state consists of more than 3,000 islands, cays, and islets in the Atlantic Ocean, and is located north of Cuba and northwest of the island of Hispaniola and the Turks and Caicos Islands, southeast of the U.S. state of Florida, and east of the Florida Keys. The capital is Nassau on the island of New Providence. The Royal Bahamas Defence Force describes The Bahamas' territory as encompassing 470,000 km2 (180,000 sq mi) of ocean space.
Nassau is the capital and largest city of The Bahamas. It is located on the island of New Providence, which had a population of 246,329 in 2010, or just over 70% of the entire population of The Bahamas. As of April 2023, the preliminary results of the 2022 census of the Bahamas reported a population of 296,522 for New Providence, 74.26% of the country's population. Nassau is commonly defined as a primate city, dwarfing all other towns in the country. It is the centre of commerce, education, law, administration, and media of the country.
The earliest arrival of people in the islands now known as The Bahamas was in the first millennium AD. The first inhabitants of the islands were the Lucayans, an Arawakan language-speaking Taino people, who arrived between about 500 and 800 AD from other islands of the Caribbean.
John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore was a Scottish peer, military officer, and colonial administrator in the Thirteen Colonies and The Bahamas. He was the last royal governor of Virginia. Dunmore was named governor of New York in 1770. He succeeded to the same position in the colony of Virginia the following year after the death of Norborne Berkeley, 4th Baron Botetourt. As Virginia's governor, Dunmore directed a series of campaigns against the trans-Appalachian Indians, known as Lord Dunmore's War. He is noted for issuing a 1775 document, Dunmore's Proclamation, offering freedom to any enslaved person who fought for the British Crown against Patriot rebels in Virginia. However, Dunmore was an enslaver himself and never freed the people he enslaved. Dunmore fled to New York after the burning of Norfolk in 1776 and later returned to Britain. He was Governor of the Bahamas from 1787 to 1796.
Captain William Hobson was a British Royal Navy officer who served as the first Governor of New Zealand. He was a co-author of the Treaty of Waitangi.
Guy Carleton, 1st Baron Dorchester, known between 1776 and 1786 as Sir Guy Carleton, was a British Army officer, peer and colonial administrator. He twice served as Governor of the Province of Quebec, from 1768 to 1778, concurrently serving as Governor General of British North America in that time, and again from 1785 to 1795. The title Baron Dorchester was created on 21 August 1786.
The British West Indies (BWI) were colonised British territories in the West Indies: Anguilla, the Cayman Islands, Turks and Caicos Islands, Montserrat, the British Virgin Islands, Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, British Guiana and Trinidad and Tobago. Other territories include Bermuda, and the former British Honduras.
New Providence is the most populous island in the Bahamas, containing more than 70% of the total population. It is the location of the national capital city of Nassau, whose boundaries are coincident with the island; it had a population of 246,329 at the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (2016) is 274,400.
John Rackham, commonly known as Calico Jack, was an English pirate captain operating in the Bahamas and in Cuba during the early 18th century. His nickname was derived from the calico clothing that he wore, while Jack is a nickname for "John".
Before European colonization, the Turks and Caicos Islands were inhabited by Taíno and Lucayan peoples. The first recorded European sighting of the islands now known as the Turks and Caicos occurred in 1512. In the subsequent centuries, the islands were claimed by several European powers with the British Empire eventually gaining control. For many years the islands were governed indirectly through Bermuda, the Bahamas, and Jamaica. When the Bahamas gained independence in 1973, the islands received their own governor, and have remained a separate autonomous British Overseas Territory since. In August 2009, the United Kingdom suspended the Turks and Caicos Islands' self-government following allegations of ministerial corruption. Home rule was restored in the islands after the November 2012 elections.
Woodes Rogers was an English sea captain, privateer, slave trader and, from 1718, the first Royal Governor of the Bahamas. He is known as the captain of the vessel that rescued marooned Alexander Selkirk, whose plight is generally believed to have inspired Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe.
The office of Commander-in-Chief, North America was a military position of the British Army. Established in 1755 in the early years of the Seven Years' War, holders of the post were generally responsible for land-based military personnel and activities in and around those parts of North America that Great Britain either controlled or contested. The post continued to exist until 1775, when Lieutenant-General Thomas Gage, the last holder of the post, was replaced early in the American War of Independence. The post's responsibilities were then divided: Major-General William Howe became Commander-in-Chief, America, responsible for British troops from West Florida to Newfoundland, and General Guy Carleton became Commander-in-Chief, Quebec, responsible for the defence of the Province of Quebec.
The term British West Indies refers to the former English and British colonies and the present-day overseas territories of the United Kingdom in the Caribbean.
Charles Vane was an English pirate who operated in the Bahamas during the end of the Golden Age of Piracy.
John Tinker may refer to:
Fort Montagu is a small fort of four cannon on the eastern shore of New Providence Island (Nassau) Bahamas. Peter Henry Bruce oversaw the construction of the fort that began in 1741 to defend the British possession from Spanish invaders.
Sir Thomas Shirley, 1st Baronet was a British colonial governor and military officer. The son of William Shirley, a politically well-connected colonial administrator who served for many years as governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, Shirley entered the military, serving in the Louisbourg expedition his father organised in 1745. During the Seven Years' War he served on Menorca and in the 1761 Capture of Belle Île.
The Republic of Pirates was the base and stronghold of a loose confederacy run by privateers-turned-pirates in Nassau on New Providence island in the Bahamas during the Golden Age of Piracy for about twelve years from 1706 until 1718. While it was not a republic in a formal sense, it was governed by an informal pirate code, which dictated that the crews of the Republic would vote on the leadership of their ships and treat other pirate crews with civility. The term comes from Colin Woodard's book of the same name.
John Tinker 1700–1758 was an early Colonial official who served the Royal African Company on the Gold Coast, was an Agent for the South Sea Company in Portobello, and was Royal Governor of the Bahama Islands from 1741–1758.