United Kingdom–Venezuela relations

United Kingdom–Venezuela relations are the bilateral relations between the United Kingdom and Venezuela since 1817 when so-called "British Legions" of former British soldiers fought to defend the Third Republic of Venezuela against Spanish royalists in the Venezuelan War of Independence.

United Kingdom – Venezuela relations

United Kingdom	Venezuela

Background

Simón Bolivar in 1812

Early contact with the area known today as Venezuela began in the 16th century with the limited expeditionary forces of Elizabeth I's privateers, most famously in the search for the mythical city of El Dorado. Until the early modern period British maritime activity, exploration and trade was limited to these skirmishes in the Caribbean such as the Battle of San Juan de Ulúa (1568), which would lead to the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604) and other successive Anglo-Spanish wars in the area.

Throughout colonial period, British naval vessels in times of war, occasional privateers – and in times of peace British and colonial pirates, outlaws, at risk of execution by neutral parties – harassed the wealthy Spanish authorities in Venezuela by plundering their ships, cities and ports. In times of peace private trade ships from both empires brought mutually needed goods or slaves. In Venezuela, a huge defensive system was erected at this time include circa 76 fortresses, forts, batteries, and castles. thirty-six of which are located along the extensive (2,813 km) Caribbean coast. Of the latter, twenty-one were built for the defense of the port of La Guaira. The others were scattered throughout in Araya, Cumana, Barcelona, Puerto Cabello, Coro, Maracaibo, Zapara and Margarita islands. Some of them were built to fulfill a temporary defensive function, and for this reason materials of little resistance were used in them (such as "fajina", in the case of La Guardia in Catia la Mar; tree trunks, in the case of the fort of Unare, and even earth, in the case of San Miguel de Paria).

Since 1700 the British were involved in the War of the Spanish Succession and Spain and Portugal controlled most of South America. The South Sea Company was a British joint-stock company founded in January 1711, created as a public-private partnership to consolidate and reduce the cost of the national debt contracted due the war. To generate income, in 1713 the company was granted a monopoly (the Asiento de Negros) to supply African slaves to the islands in the "South Seas" and South America.

The Treaty of Utrecht of 1713 granted Britain an Asiento de Negros lasting 30 years to supply the Spanish colonies with 4,800 slaves per year. Britain was permitted to open offices in Buenos Aires, La Guaira, Cartagena, Havana, Panama, Portobello and Vera Cruz to arrange the Atlantic slave trade. One ship of no more than 500 tons could be sent to one of these places each year (the Navío de Permiso) with general trade goods. One quarter of the profits were to be reserved for the King of Spain. There was provision for two extra sailings at the start of the contract. The Asiento was granted in the name of Queen Anne and then contracted to the company.

In 1728, the Royal Guipuzcoan Company of Caracas was founded to monopolize the commerce with the Province of Venezuela thru the harbours facilities of La Guaira and Puerto Cabello. Thanks to the profit the company generated, the Basque provinces underwent some urban reforms and improvements in the trade and manufacture of cocoa. This period of wealth and development was to last up to the end of 18th century.

By 1735 the British interests in South American continent due the trade and naval rivalries with Spain conducted the British fighting Spain over a War of Jenkins' Ear. La Guaira was the first military scene on October 22, 1739, when it was attacked by 3 ships from the Royal Navy expedition of Admiral Edward Vernon. At the orders of Captain Thomas Waterhouse bombarded the defenses and tried to take the three ships of the Royal Guipuzcoan Company, but the warned people on land launched close fire. After three hours of heavy shelling, Waterhouse ordered a withdrawal. The battered British squadron sailed to Jamaica to undertake emergency repairs. Trying later to explain his actions, Waterhouse argued that the capture of a few small Spanish vessels would not have justified the loss of his men.

In 1742 the Royal Gipuzkoan Company ships had rendered great assistance during the failed siege of Cartagena de Indias in carrying troops, arms, stores and ammunition from Spain to her colonies. In retaliation the Admiralty in London planned a severe attack to blow both to the Company infrastructure and the Spanish Government. In 1743 a Royal Navy fleet under Sir Charles Knowles was defeated at La Guaira where 600 men were killed by the defenders, among whom was the captain of HMS Burford, and many of the ships were badly damaged or lost. Knowles was therefore unable to proceed to Borburata until he had refitted at Curacao before attempting an assault on Puerto Cabello on 15 April, and again on 24 April, but both assaults were again beaten back. Knowles called off the expedition and returned to Jamaica.

The expedition ended in failure resulting in their defeat in the War of Jenkins' Ear (1739 to 1748). Apart from minor fighting in Florida, Georgia, and Havana, after 1742 the conflict was largely subsumed into the War of the Austrian Succession, which involved most of the powers of Europe, and ended with the 1748 Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Great Britain failed to achieve its territorial and economic ambitions, and Spain successfully defended its possessions in the Americas. After that the British withdrawing to focus naval efforts on their North American wars (1775–1783) and resulting in the Anglo-Spanish War in the Americas (1779–1783).

In 1777 the provinces of Venezuela were separated from the Viceroyalty of New Granada by King Charles III and assigned to the Captaincy General of Venezuela as part of the Bourbon reforms. In addition to these core areas, the territory included parts of the Viceroyalty as Guyana, Cumana, Trinidad, Margarita, Tobago, Maracaibo, southwestern Suriname, parts of northwestern Brazil. It opened Venezuelan ports to foreign commerce of cocoa, sugar, indigo and tobacco, but this recognized a fait accompli. Like no other Spanish American dependency, Venezuela had more contacts with Europe through the British, Dutch, Danish, and French islands in the Caribbean. In an almost surreptitious, though legal, manner, Caracas had become an intellectual powerhouse. From 1721, it had its own university, which taught Latin, medicine, and engineering, apart from the humanities. Its most illustrious graduate, Andrés Bello, became the greatest Spanish American polymath of his time. In Chacao, a town to the east of Caracas, there flourished a school of music whose director José Ángel Lamas produced a few but impressive compositions according with the strictest 18th-century European canons. Later on, the development of the education system is one of the reasons why distribution began to improve.

British maritime activity in the late XVIII century became more aggressive and began actively to attack territories in the Caribbean sea, to enable greater British mercantile trade in the area. In 1797 a British force led by General Sir Ralph Abercromby launched an invasion of Trinidad. His squadron sailed through the Bocas of Drago and anchored off the coast of Chaguaramas. Seriously outnumbered, the Spanish governor José María Chacón decided to capitulate to the British without fighting. Trinidad thus became a British crown colony, with a largely French-speaking population, Catholic State and Spanish laws. The colony's first British governor was Thomas Picton, however his heavy-handed approach to enforcing British authority, including the use of torture and arbitrary arrest, led to his being recalled. Afterwards, Abercromby secured possession of the settlements of Demerara and Essequibo in South America. A major assault on the port of San Juan, Puerto Rico, in April 1797 failed.

In February 1797 — the year of the Spithead and Nore mutinies — Captain Hugh Pigot took command of Hermione. Pigot was a cruel officer who meted out severe and arbitrary punishments to his crew. This treatment of the crew led to the bloodiest mutiny in British naval history in September 1797 which saw Pigot and most of the officers killed. The mutineers then handed the ship over to La Guaira harbour on 27 September 1797 and the Spanish renamed her Santa Cecilia. Her crew, which included 25 of her former crew, remained under Spanish guard. Meanwhile, the Admiral Sir Hyde Parker wrote to the governor of La Guaira, demanding the return of the ship and the surrender of the mutineers but the governor only moved the ship to Puerto Cabello.

At that time London and British West Indies being a prime choice for exiled individuals to temporarily reside in is that Britain was quite happy to support them and see the Spanish Empire weaken as the British Empire continued to grow across the world. General Francisco de Miranda a Venezuelan-born, spent fourteen years of his life as a political exile in the British capitol. Originally a member of the Spanish Navy, he made a decision to help free Latin America after witnessing the American War of Independence and French Revolution. De Miranda was a close ally of British Prime Minister William Pitt, and after several meetings between the two Pitt pledged money from the British government to help Latin America in their wars of independence.

The Gual and España conspiracy was reported on 1798 to Captain General Pedro Carbonell, who ordered a persecution against the conspirators, in which 49 Creoles and 21 Spaniards were arrested in La Guaira. Both Gual and España escaped to the neighboring British colony of Trinidad. The scholar Simon Rodriguez was forced to leave Venezuela to Jamaica. In Kingston, he changed his name to Samuel Robinson. A reward was put on their heads. Despite the reward offered for his capture, in 1799, José María España secretly returned to Venezuela, but was arrested in La Guaira and sent to Caracas, where the Royal Court sentenced him to the death penalty on 6 May. He was tortured, hanged, beheaded and dismembered on 8 May in the Plaza Mayor (current Plaza Bolívar).
Manuel Gual remained in Trinidad, from where he maintained communication with the precursor Francisco de Miranda, who was in London. On 25 October 1800 he died in San José de Oruña, Trinidad, possibly poisoned by a Spanish spy named Valecillos.

On 25 October 1799, Captain Edward Hamilton, aboard HMS Surprise, cut her out of Puerto Cabello harbour.

The men from Surprise rush aboard the Santa Cecilia in Puerto Cabello.

He and a force of some 100 soldiers and sailors in ships' boats approached the Santa Cecilia, which was heavily manned with around 400 Spanish, and lay under the guns of two shore batteries, together mounting some 200 guns. In the ensuing struggle Hamilton and his men fought their way aboard the ship, overpowered the Spanish defenders after a hard-fought battle, and sailed the Hermione out of the port. The Spanish had lost 119 killed, while 231 were taken prisoner, 97 of whom were wounded. All but three were subsequently returned to the port the next day. Another 15 Spanish escaped by jumping overboard and swimming ashore, while 20 more escaped in a launch that had been guarding the ship. By contrast the British had not lost a single man, and had just 11 wounded, four of them seriously. One of them was Hamilton himself, who had suffered a blow to the head from a musket, and cuts from sabre, pike and grapeshot. The Admiral Sir Hyde Parker had the recaptured Hermione renamed HMS Retaliation, after which the Admiralty ordered her to be renamed HMS Retribution on 31 January 1800. After that the United Kingdom furthered their interest against Dutch colonies of Batavian republic as allied of Spain and France in the War of the Second Coalition.

In 1800 the United Kingdom invaded Aruba, Curazao, and Dutch Guyana colonies of Batavian republic. The presence of a power other than the Netherlands alarmed the Spanish government given the proximity to the coast of Venezuela and the Essequibo river fact they could used as bases to launch military incursions against mainland territory.

19th century

The Treaty of Amiens temporarily ended hostilities between France, the Spanish Empire, the Batavian republic and the United Kingdom at the end of the War of the Second Coalition. It marked the end of the French Revolutionary Wars; after a short peace it set the stage for the Napoleonic Wars. The Second Coalition (Britain, Russia and Austria) failed on commnon goal of invading France, ending the Revolution and restoring the Bourbon monarchy.

Thee treat of Amiens was signed on 25 March 1802 (4 Germinal X in the French Revolutionary calendar) by Joseph Bonaparte and Charles Cornwallis, 1st Marquess Cornwallis as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace". In the Article III was established that "the Britannic majesty restores to the French republic and its allies his Catholic majesty of Spain and the Batavian republic, all the possessions and colonies which respectively belonged to them, and which have been either occupied or conquered by the British forces, during the course of the present war, with the exception of the island of Trinidad, and of the Dutch possessions on the island of Ceylon". Article IV. "His Catholic majesty of Spain cedes and guarantees, in full property and sovereignty, the island of Trinidad to his Britannic majesty".

France's unwillingness to block the cession of Trinidad to Britain was one of the things that most irritated King Charles IV. Spanish economic interests were further injured when Napoleon Bonaparte sold Louisiana to the United States, whose merchants competed with those of Spain. Following that sale, Charles wrote that he was prepared to throw off alliance with France: "neither break with France, nor break with England."

In 1804 with informal British help, Miranda presented a military plan to liberate the Captaincy General of Venezuela from Spanish rule. At the time, Britain was at war with Spain, an ally of Napoleon. Home Riggs Popham was commissioned by prime minister Pitt in 1805 to study the plans proposed by Miranda to the British Government, Popham then persuaded the authorities that, as the Spanish Colonies were discontented, it would be easier to promote a rising in Buenos Aires. Disappointed by this decision in November 1805, Miranda travelled to New York, where he rekindled his acquaintance with William S. Smith to organize an expedition to liberate Venezuela.

Miranda hired a ship of 20 gunsn, which he rechristened Leander in honor of his oldest son, and set sail to Venezuela on 2 February 1806.

Flag of Miranda used in 1806, during his expedition in Coro.

In Jacmel, Haiti, Miranda acquired two other ships, the Bee and the Bacchus, and their crews. It was in Jacmel on 12 March that Miranda made and raised on the Leander, the first Venezuelan flag, which he had personally designed. On 28 April, a botched landing attempt in Ocumare de la Costa resulted in two Spanish garda costas, Argos and Celoso, capturing the Bacchus and the Bee. Sixty men were imprisoned and put on trial in Puerto Cabello accused of piracy. Ten were sentenced to death, hanged and dismembered in quarters. One of the victims was the printer Miles L. Hall, who for that reason has been considered as the first martyr of the printing press in Venezuela.

Miranda aboard of the Leander escaped, escorted by the packet ship HMS Lilly to the British islands of Grenada, Trinidad, and Barbados, where he met with Admiral Alexander Cochrane. As Spain was then at war with Britain, Cochrane and the governor of Trinidad Sir Thomas Hislop, 1st Baronet agreed to provide some support of Royal Navy for a second attempt to invade Venezuela.

The expeditionaries captured Santa Ana de Coro, but found no support from the city residents. However, on 8 August a Spanish force of almost 2,000 men arrived. General Miranda realized that his force was too small to achieve anything further or to hold Coro for long. On 13 August, Miranda ordered his force to set sail again. HMS Lilly and her squadron then carried him and his men safely to Aruba.

Miranda spent the next year in Trinidad as host of governor Hyslop waiting for reinforcements that never came. On his return to London, he was met with better support for his plans from the British government after the failed invasions of Buenos Aires (1806–1807). In 1808 a large military force to attack Venezuela was assembled and placed under the command of Arthur Wellesley, but Napoleon's invasion of Spain suddenly transformed Spain into an ally of Britain, and the force instead went there to fight in the Peninsular War.

After Napoleonic Invasion of Spain in 1808 looking to gain independence, the Venezuelan Junta formed in Caracas by 1810 was the first Junta to engage in diplomacy to gain ties to Great Britain. In June 1810 Simon Bolivar travelled to London with Luis Lopez Mendez and Andrés Bello to explain why the Junta of Caracas broke relations with the Spanish Monarchy; to the British Foreign Office undersecretary Richard Wellesley; seeking British naval and diplomatic protection, however the Spanish ambassador on the grounds Bolivar had at the time no diplomatic capacity to demand self-rule, engaged the British Foreign Office to turn Bolivar away. Bolivar instead returned to Venezuela and his entourage stayed behind in Somers Town, London, and in the following years did not gain further in their activities due to the fluctuation and instability of the parties and states they represented. Their case was also not helped by how in-flux the first statehoods of Venezuela were also viewed by the British as being too unstable to consider offering support to.

War of Independence

Main article: Battle of Carabobo

The colonial revolts against Spanish rule in Venezuela led by General Francisco de Miranda aroused British interest, when seven of the ten provinces had declared themselves an independent republic on July 5, 1811, starting the Venezuelan War of Independence. The Venezuelan revolutionary had been feted in London society during his recent visit, and may have met MacGregor.

On 10 December 1812 while on a commerce raiding cruise, the American schooner Saratoga, of 16 guns and 140 men under Captain Charles Whiting Wooster anchored off La Guaira. After Wooster arrived the American consul warned Wooster that if he remained in port, the Spanish garrison would sink his ship with their shore batteries. The Americans withdrew out of range but remained off the city. That same day Saratoga captured a British schooner and sent her as a prize back to the United States.

By 1814, the United Provinces of New Granada and Venezuela sent José Maria del Real as an envoy to London for British support against Spanish military intervention, but as part of a long delay tactics on Britains part due to the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo and the return of Fernando VII's restoration, Britain did not immediately recognise the new states representatives, denying requests for British assistance against Spanish attack led by the General Pablo Morillo in 1815. Cartagena de Indias, under siege of Spanish fleet, even declared itself a British dominion, but was denied the request eventually falling back under Spanish control by 1816. However Bolivar, exiled in Jamaica in 1815, wrote from Kingston to Richard Wellesley, asking for military support against Spain, yet this was ignored based on the foreign policy of the British Foreign secretary Viscount Castlereagh who was aiming to keep the peace amongst the French, Spanish and European powers following a fine tightrope which British foreign policy makers walked in regards to South America after the close of the Napoleonic wars, culminating in the 1814–1815 Grand Alliance at Congress of Vienna, under which France supported Spain keeping its American colonies, and thus Britain supporting Spanish rule in the Americas.

Around New Year 1816, Bolivar made his way to Port-au-Prince (today Haiti), to raise a new army with the aid of the president Alexandre Petion. Bolívar received the British officers Gregor MacGregor and Charles Chamberlain and included in the expeditionary force that left Aux Cayes (now Les Cayes) on 30 April 1816. MacGregor took part in the capture of the port town of Carúpano as second-in-command of Manuel Piar's column. After the Spanish were driven from many central Venezuelan towns, MacGregor was sent to the coast west of Caracas to recruit native tribesmen in July 1816. On 18 July, 1816 the numerically superior royalists broke Bolívar's main force at La Cabrera and fled to Haiti. MacGregor at command of the rests of the army resolved to retreat hundreds of miles east to Barcelona. Two pursuing royalist armies harried MacGregor constantly as he retreated across country, but failed to break his rearguard. MacGregor's party was helped the rest of the way east to Barcelona by elements of the main revolutionary army. They arrived on 20 August 1816, after 34 days' march. With Bolívar back in Aux Cayes, overall command of the republican armies in Venezuela had been given to Piar. On 26 September, Piar and MacGregor defeated the Spanish army commanded by Francisco Tomás Morales at El Juncal.

The British Government on paper however were still in support of Spain in official channels, apart from a number of liberal politicians, but British public favour went with Colombian and Venezuelan patriots and favored pressuring government to open new trade markets with these newly formed Spanish American countries in 1817 and 1818 as United Provinces of River Plate and Chile. However around this time Lopez Mendez had begun recruiting what became the British Legions, over 7,000 ex-military Irish and Englishmen who had been dismissed after the Napoleonic wars ended; who went on to fight for Venezuelan and Colombian Independence from Spanish rule.

Arthur Sandes

The British Legion took part in the campaign of the Venezuelan Llanos in 1818 and fought at the battles of El Sombrero, Ortiz, Rincón Pde los Toros, La Puerta, and Calabozo.Despite de heavy defeat of La Puerta, these first recruits from Britain made a good impression on Bolivar who was anxious to secure the services of more British volunteers. In March 1819, Bolivar combined most of his foreign volunteers into a brigade of 250 men named the British Legions, with James Rooke as commander. George Elsom, who had formerly been an ensign with a militia regiment near London and who had sailed with Hippisley's expedition, returned to London to recruit. Amongst his recruits were some 110 Hanoverians, who were commanded by John Uslar who saw action at Waterloo with the King's German Legion.

The British Legions joined Bolivar's army on the Plains of Apure towards the end of 1818. They would soon become an important part of Bolívar's army to liberate the Viceroyalty of New Granada. They had to endure the secretive and brutal crossing of the Andes from May to June 1819 during which the Patriot army suffered greatly including the British.

They played a pivotal role however in the Battle of Vargas Swamp on July 25 by the time the firing stopped, James Rooke and his second-in-command, Arthur Sandes, were seriously wounded. Losing his shattered left arm to amputation, Rooke died a few days later. In the Battle of Boyacá on August 7, 1819, colonel Sandes' Rifles Battalion led a bayonet charge on the royalist artillery which turned the tide of the battle. After the triumphal entry into Santa Fe de Bogota Bolivar credited them with the victory saying "those soldier-liberators are the men who deserve these laurels" They were awarded with the 'Order of the Liberator' one of the rare occasions during the war when this decoration was bestowed onto an entire unit. The Foreign Enlistment Act 1819 was passed to uphold British neutrality in the Spanish American wars of independence and made it a crime punishable by fines and imprisonment for British subjects to serve in foreign militaries. The 1819 act was almost never enforced.

In December 17, !819 the Gran Colombia was proclaimed through the Fundamental Law of the Republic of Colombia, issued in January 1819 during the Congress of Angostura. Since Gran Colombia's territory corresponded more or less to the original jurisdiction of the former Viceroyalty of New Granada, it also claimed the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua, the Mosquito Coast, as well as most of Esequibo river. But did not come into being until the Congress of Cúcuta (1821) promulgated the Constitution of Cúcuta.

At the victory of Carabobo (June 24, 1821) the British legion troops fought as part of the 1st Division, led by General Jose Antonio Paez.

Of Bolívar's force in the Battle of Carabobo, of 6,500 or 8,000, between 340 or 350 were men of the British Rangers battalion, the great majority of them of Irish origin, commanded by Colonel Thomas Ilderton Ferrier and including many former members of the King's German Legion. Though greatly outnumbered and low on supplies, the legion soldiers managed to maintain control of tactically critical hills. By the battle's end, the legionary force had suffered 119 deaths, of which 11 were officers. Col. Ferrier was among the dead. Bolívar later praised the Legion troops and called them the "Saviors of my Fatherland", noting that they had distinguished themselves among other armies. In October 1821, Francisco Antonio Zea was appointed by Bolivar as special diplomatic agent of Colombia to Europe and United States. In London he negotiated loans of financial creditors Herring & Richardson and gained recognition of his new country only from the United States. A year later he ambassador Zea dies in Bath, and a large amount of British private investment is made in the new state of Colombia. Jose Rafael Revenga as substitute of Zea as Minister Plenipotentiary of Colombia in London, negotiated Great Britain's recognition of Colombia as an independent country. With the independence of several Spanish colonies such as Mexico and Peru between 1817 – 1821 by 1822 at the Congress of Verona, the Foreign Secretary Castlereagh shifted position to favour Colombian independence, after the accession of British interest to the Western Question, due to the fluctuating relations with regards to the French Empire and its interests and power relations with the Spanish Empire.

Canning by Richard Evans, circa 1825

In August 1822, Castlereagh committed suicide. Instead of going to India, George Canning succeeded him as both Foreign Secretary and Leader of the House of Commons. He continued many of Castlereagh's foreign policies, such as the view that the powers of Europe should not be allowed to meddle in the affairs of other states. He also prevented the United States from opening trade with the British West Indies.

In his second term of office, he sought to prevent South America from coming into the French sphere of influence, and in this he was successful. He helped guarantee the independence of Brazil and the Spanish colonies, thereby acting in support of the Monroe Doctrine.

The Latin Americans received a certain amount of unofficial aid – arms and volunteers – from outside, but no outside official help at any stage from Britain or any other power. Britain refused to aid Spain and opposed any outside intervention on behalf of Spain by other powers. Royal Navy veterans were a decisive factor in the struggle for independence of certain Latin American countries.

Black Christmas of 1822 is an episode of the Colombian war of independence, in which the city of Pasto and its inhabitants received reprisals for remaining loyal to the royalists; General Antonio José de Sucre had direct instructions from Simón Bolívar to attack the civilian population without any consideration. The Rifles Battalion and Colonel Arthur Sandes, its commander, have been identified as the direct perpetrators of the crimes against the civilian population on December 24, 25 and 26, 1822.

Formal diplomatic relations

After he success of Bolivarian diplomacy with the signing of the United States-Colombia Trade agreement in 1822 formal relations were established with the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between Colombia and the United Kingdom. The two countries established diplomatic relations in March 1823 and John Potter Hamilton ESP was appointed as Secretary of Legation in Santafe de Bogota. In September the Bolivar army invaded Peru at request of Lima authorities to defeat the rests of the Spanish forces located in the Andean mountains under Viceroy Laserna. Thomas Edward Rowcroft the first British diplomatic representative in Peru arrived in Lima as consul general in 1824, At this time, Lima was temporarily in the hands of the royalists after the order of evacuation dictated by Bolivar who fled to North. Conditions in the city were awful. However, shortly after Rowcroft's arrival, Bolívar returned to Lima from the interior after the Battle of Junin and the Spanish retreated to Castle of Real Felipe under siege of Bolivar army. Rowcroft decided to go to Callao, the port of Lima, to deliver letters to HMS Cambridge under Captain Thomas James Maling and arranged for a safe pass through the royalist lines. On the return from his visit he handed in his safe pass but, as his coach left the outpost, it was struck by a hail of bullets. Rowcroft was wounded in the hand and the torso and died on 7 December 1824 at the home of a British merchant. There is now little doubt that Rowcroft was accidentally shot by the Independents under Simon Bolivar. It is said that the royalist officer who gave him the safe pass had, unbeknownst to Rowcroft, written a death sentence on it.

In the battle of Corpahuaico the rearguard of the patriots force formed by the Rifles battalion commanded by Colonel Arthur Sandes, were caught, losing in combat a third of their force, and another of their commanders was killed, Major Thomas Duchbury second in command, and ended up dispersed. The royalist companies of Cazadores had managed to climb almost to the crest and also disperse the Vargas Battalion, but General Guillermo Miller managed to rally the Vargas and made it protect the cavalry when it crossed the Chonta valley, supporting the royalist attack until achieving the retreat.

After the victory of General Sucre at battle of Ayacucho on 9 December 1824, the Gran Colombia was recognised formally by United Kingdom in 1 of January 1825 when Jose Rafael Revenga the first minister from a Latin American state, Colombia, was officially received in London. "Spanish America is free," Canning declared, "and if we do not mismanage our affairs she is English ... the New World established and if we do not throw it away, ours." In 1825 the London stock market crashes the reinstatement of the gold standard entailed a contraction of the money supply and a tightening of bank lending which made it difficult for merchants to raise capital. Bankruptcies increased significantly during the remainder of 1825 and nearly doubled in 1826. reducing the already small number of private brokers willing to invest in what is now considered as a risky financial investment.

By granting recognition to Argentina, Colombia, Mexico and Brazil Canning brought these new states into the European system of trade and diplomacy, while blocking further colonization. Recognition was greeted with enthusiasm throughout Latin America. Canning was the first British Foreign Secretary to devote a large proportion of his time and energies to the affairs of Latin America (as well as to those of Spain and Portugal) and to foresee the important political and economic role the Latin American states would one day play in the world.

Congress of Panama

The Congress of Panama (also referred to as the Amphictyonic Congress, in homage to the Amphictyonic League of Ancient Greece) was organized by Simón Bolívar in 1826 with the goal of bringing together the new republics of Latin America and the United States, to develop a unified policy towards the repudiated mother country Spain. Held in Panama City from 22 June to 15 July, it proposed creating a league of American republics, with a common military, a mutual defense pact, and a supranational parliamentary assembly.

Simón Bolívar agreed to invite the United Kingdom and Netherlands as observers, because of the commercial interests they had in Latin America. The invitation to the British government sought to stimulate assistance from Argentina and Chile, which had their main trading partner in that country. The United Kingdom accepted the proposal and sent an observer, Edward James Dawkins, but with precise orders from Minister George Canning: limit themselves to seeking trade agreements and dissuade Greater Colombia and Mexico from supporting expeditions to the islands of Cuba or Puerto Rico to make them independent of Spain.

The grandly titled "Treaty of Union, League, and Perpetual Confederation" that emerged from the congress was ultimately ratified only by Gran Colombia, and Bolívar's dream soon foundered irretrievably with civil war in that nation, the disintegration of Central America, and the emergence of nationalism.

In 1826 Robert Ker Porter was appointed as British consul in Caracas, Venezuela, a position he held for fifteen years. He continued to paint during this period, his works including several large religious pieces, and a portrait of Simón Bolívar.José Fernández Madrid was named ambassador to the United Kingdom by Bolívar on November 23, 1826 He was still in Paris when the government urged him to move to London as fast as possible. On 12 December 1826, in the House of Commons, Canning was given an opportunity to defend the policies he had adopted towards France, Spain and Spanish America, and declared: "I resolved that if France had Spain it should not be Spain with the Indies. I called the New World into existence to redress the balance of the Old." The ambassador Fernández Madrid arrived on April 30, 1827.

Assassination attempt

Simón Bolívar, target of the September Conspiracy attack.

On the night of September 25, 1827 in Santafe about twelve civilians and twenty-five soldiers led by Pedro Carujo broke into the Presidential Palace (Palacio de San Carlos) and killed the guards. They then searched for the president Bolívar's room. Manuela Sáenz, who was with Bolívar that night, woke him up. Upon learning of the attack, Bolívar grabbed his pistol and sword and tried to open the door, but Manuela convinced him to escape through the window.

Bolívar sent to find out the situation in the barracks while he was under a bridge all night. Bolívar managed to jump out of the window while Manuela entertained and engaged the conspirators. The result of this conspiracy was the death of Colonel William Ferguson, an Irish aide-de-camp of Bolivar army, the injury of young Andrés Ibarra, and a concussion from a blow to the forehead received by the rescuer of the illustrious Caracas native. The freed slave José Palacios carried the newly saved from death to a safe place. Vargas's battalion led by Colonel Whittle contributed to the failure of the conspiracy. Finally, it was up to General Rafael Urdaneta to put an end to the plot, control the situation in the capital and imprison those involved in this sinister attack. The Irish General Daniel Florence O'Leary was commissioned by Bolivar to render the general José María Córdova. The ensuing battle took place near El Santuario, Antioquia, where Córdova died by the hand of the Irish Commander Rupert Hand, on the 17th of October, 1829.

Gran Colombia dissolution

In 1831 the Gran Colombia was dissolved due to the political differences that existed between supporters of federalism and centralism, as well as regional tensions among the peoples that made up the republic. It broke into the successor states of New Granada (actual Colombia), Ecuador, and Venezuela. The Republic of Venezuela began to outline a foreign policy favouring relations with Britain, which became one of the main buyers of Venezuela raw materials and one of the major sources of investment in the country. By mid century, London bankers were sending in capital, to invest in railways, docks, cattle farms, mines and utilities. London sent in 800 agents to handle shipping, insurance, and banking. In 1830, economic ties between Britain and Venezuela increased substantially. Britain's textile exports to Venezuela grew by 9.4% yearly between 1817 and 1874. Nearly 8 percent of Britain's capital outflows between 1865 and 1914 went to Venezuela; this was similar to the British capital outflow to India.

Copper mines of Aroa

In 1824 Bolivar leased his copper mines of Aroa to British entrepreneurs. According to some sources his aim was to help finance the struggle for independence from Spain. Captain Joseph Malachy sailed from Plymouth in March 1825 to take up his position as agent and resident director of the Bolivar Mining Association at the Aroa copper mines. Malachy was given the huge salary of £1,200, compared to the typical salary of about £300 for a mine manager in Cornwall. The British employed about 1,200 workers in the mines, including British and Venezuelans. They used the Aroa River to carry the ore by barge to the coast, where it was loaded onto ships.

In 1832 Bolivar's sisters Juana and Maria Antonia sold the mines to Robert Dent, an Englishman who owned the Bolívar Mining Association. In the 1830s Cornishmen in the reduction department of the Aroa mines made significant advances in methods of calcinating the copper ore. However, the company closed the mines in 1836 due to high mortality among the European workers and tensions with the native workers. The Bolívar Mining Association was succeeded by companies such as the Quebrada Land Mining Company, Quebrada Railway Land and Copper Company Limited, Aroa Mines Limited and Bolívar Railway Company Limited.

Attempts of Annex territory to British Empire

See also: Guyana–Venezuela territorial dispute

In 1837 sponsored by the Royal Geographical Society the German researcher Robert Hermann Schomburgk (1804-1865) investigated the river Essequibo and followed its course to the south-west, while Sipu River flows to a westerly direction. He specified the coordinates of the source at 0°41`northern latitude, while not giving a longitude.

In 1841, Venezuela denounced an incursion by the Royal Navy into its territory. In the same year, Schoumburgk returned to Guiana, this time as a British Government official to survey the colony and fix its eastern and western boundaries. The result was the provisional boundary between British Guiana and Venezuela, known as the "Schomburgk Line", and the boundary with the Dutch colony of Surinam.

In October 1846, information arrived that the British Empire intended to annex Cumaná and Barcelona provinces and form a Republic with the Island of Trinidad and British Guiana.

In 1859 the United Kingdom began a claim on the island of Patos that Venezuela rejected arguing that it was not mentioned in the capitulation of 1797 nor in the Treaty of Amiens of 1802. Despite this in 1902 the United Kingdom raised its flag on the island which provoked a strong protest from the Venezuelan government. In 1904 Venezuela included it as part of the federal territory Colón

Wait and Quit Law affair

The president José Tadeo Monagas modified the Wait and Quit Law, affecting foreign investments in Venezuela. In 1850, warships from the British West Indies fleet arrived in the country, accompanied by a Dutch frigate demanding that the damage caused to their countrymen be repaired as a result of the law, under the threat of blocking the ports of La Guaira and Puerto Cabello if said grievances were not paid. After 6 months of naval blockade, the government agreed to sign an agreement where the State agreed to assume responsibility for the debts.

The Urrutia Protocol Crisis

The Urrutia Protocol was an official document signed on March 26, 1858 at the Government House of Venezuela, located in the city of Caracas. It was signed by the Secretary of Foreign Affairs of Venezuela Wenceslao Urrutia and the diplomatic representatives to the Venezuelan government of United Kingdom, France, United States, Brazil, the Netherlands and Spain, in order to agree on measures for the peaceful departure from the country of the overthrown president José Tadeo Monagas , who was asylum in the French Legation and requested to be exiled, but feared for his life. The signing of the document meant the beginning of serious diplomatic conflicts between the signatory countries, especially France and the United Kingdom that threatened to carry out a naval blockade on the Venezuelan coasts until the stipulations were fulfilled. Fermín Toro, who occupied the position left by Urrutia, was in charge of ensuring that the agreement was fulfilled. The conflict generated with the signing of that agreement is also known as the Urrutia Protocol.

El Callao gold rush

The gold mine at El Callao started in 1871 located at West of the Essequibo River, was for a time one of the richest in the world, and the goldfields as a whole saw over a million ounces exported between 1860 and 1883. The gold mining was dominated by immigrants from the British Isles and the British West Indies, giving an appearance of almost creating an English colony on Venezuelan territory. The real number of inhabitants may be five times higher than the official one, which is around 25.000. This is due to gold mines in the area and diamonds in nearby rivers. Guasipati was decreed capital of the newly formed Federal Territory of Yuruary, and during the 30 years that followed the discovery of the gold veins of El Callao, the area of waterlogged gold prospectors that came to Guayana to request the granting of solid rock concessions.

One of the most outstanding facts was that in 1876, this population prepared and witnessed the first soccer game in Venezuela. El Callao and some neighboring towns such as Guasipati, Tumeremo, El Dorado, Kavanayen and Santa Elena de Uairen are the areas with more foreign languages in Venezuela, due to the great migration of foreigners who settled in search of gold. The strongest established languages were the English, the French and the Portuguese, with the lowest influence being Dutch.

Asphalt in Trinidad and Venezuela

Asphalt is a mixture of heavy oils that's left over after the lighter components of crude oil evaporate. It's formed when oil seeps from deep underground deposits and concentrates over time.

Both Trinidad island and Venezuela have natural asphalt deposits, including Pitch Lake in Trinidad and Lake Guanoco in Venezuela that lies few miles each other in the Gulf of Paria. Pitch Lake located in southwest Trinidad, is the world's largest natural asphalt deposit. It is a solid, 100-acre lake that's 250 feet deep and contains an estimated 10 million tons of asphalt. Since 1885 Pitch Lake was mined for asphalt by Lake Asphalt of Trinidad and Tobago, and the asphalt is a major export for the country. Lake Guanoco also known as Lake Bermudez, is the world's second largest natural tar pit and is located in Eastern Venezuela. It covers more than 1,100 acres and contains an estimated 6 million tons of asphalt. In 1890 the Guanoco Lake was granted to the New York and Bermudez Company, a subsidiary of General Asphalt as mining concession to commerce asphalt. The mining labors attracted numerous immigrants from Trinidad, Barbados and British Guyana.

Venezuelan Essequibo crisis of 1895

Main article: Venezuelan crisis of 1895

1887 Diario de Caracas cartoon on the British advance on the Barima, Amacuro, Cuyuni and Yuruani rivers, after diplomatic relations between Venezuela and the United Kingdom were severed.

Following the establishment of Gran Colombia in 1819, territorial disputes at west or Essequibo river began between Gran Colombia, later Venezuela, and the British. In 1822 José Rafael Revenga, Minister Plenipotentiary of Gran Colombia to Britain, complained to the British government at the direction of Simón Bolívar about the presence of British settlers in territory claimed by Venezuela: "The colonists of Demerara and Berbice have usurped a large portion of land, which according to recent treaties between Spain and Holland, belongs to our country at the west of Essequibo River. It is absolutely essential that these settlers be put under the jurisdiction and obedience to our laws, or be withdrawn to their former possessions."

In 1825 the Colombian ambassador José Manuel Hurtado in London officially presented to the British government a claim to the border at the Essequibo River, which was not objected to by Britain. However, the British government continued to promote colonisation of territory west of the Essequibo River in succeeding years. In 1831, Britain merged the former Dutch territories of Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo into a single colony, British Guiana.

During the late 19th century, Britain refused to include in the proposed international arbitration the disputed territory with Venezuela east of the "Schomburgk Line", which a surveyor had drawn half-a-century earlier as a boundary between Venezuela and the former Dutch territory of British Guiana. In October 1886, Britain declared the line to be the provisional frontier of British Guiana, and in February 1887 Venezuela severed diplomatic relations. Proposals for a renewal of relations and settlement of the dispute failed repeatedly, and by summer 1894, diplomatic relations had been severed for seven years. In addition, both sides had established police or military stations at key points in the area, partly to defend claims to the Caratal and Omai goldfields of the region's Yuruani river basin, which was within Venezuelan territory but claimed by the British. The mine at El Callao, started in 1871, was dominated by immigrants from the British Isles and the British West Indies, giving an appearance of almost creating a British colony on Venezuelan territory. The dispute ultimately saw Britain accept the United States mediation to force arbitration of the entire dispute territory, and tacitly accept the US right to intervene under the Monroe Doctrine. A tribunal convened in Paris in 1898 to decide the matter, and in 1899 awarded the bulk of the disputed territory to British Guiana.

Restorative Liberal Revolution

In 1899 Cipriano Castro had come to power after winning another civil war, the Restorative Liberal Revolution, in which he overthrew the constitutional president Ignacio Andrade, establishing a government called the Restaurador. Since then, the new government dedicated itself to initiating a centralist project, canceling the external debt, modernizing the armed forces and allied itself with the most influential caudillos in the country, but thereby weakening many others. To do this, he used the system of alliances created by Antonio Guzmán Blanco to impose central government officials in each of the country's regions. Given this, many caudillos found themselves in the dilemma of, on the one hand, supporting the uprising or risking being isolated and without power for these reforms.

20th century

The Asphalt war

The Liberating Revolution was a civil war in Venezuela between 1901 and 1903 in which a coalition of regional caudillos led by the banker Manuel Antonio Matos tried to overthrow the government of president Cipriano Castro.

The revolutionaries were financed by Caracas bankers such as the Matos, Boulton, Lobo and Velutini who had been harassed by President Castro, who forced them under threat of imprisonment to lend money to the government. Previously in 1899 the government had put higher taxes on the asphalt revenues by exports of the New York & Bermudez Company; in response the company supported politically the opposing side under Matos Revolution. Throughout 1901 Castro managed to put down insurrections produced in the states of Bermúdez and Bolívar led by Pablo Guzmán, Horacio and Alejandro Dúcharne, Zoilo Vidal and others. The political crisis escalated and culminated in the "Asphalt War" as called by the press in the world. The conflict becomes internationalized with the invasion of Táchira state by a Colombian offensive in San Cristóbal led by Venezuelan General Carlos Rangel Garbiras, in retaliation for Castro's support for the liberal rebels of Rafael Uribe Uribe in the context of the War of the Thousand Days.

In October 1901 the General Rafael Montilla (El Tigre de Guaitó) rebels in Lara State, but it will finally be in December that the armed revolution breaks out throughout the country. First, it is the veteran Liberal General Luciano Mendoza who raises Aragua and Carabobo baptizing the movement as the Liberating Revolution that was formed by the various regional caudillos, each with the ability to mobilize and arm masses of peasants in montoneras. Castro reacted immediately and increased the number of troops of the so-called Active Army, also buying modern weapons and a large number of warships and transport.

Cipriano Castro and his presidential cabinet

The main leader of the uprising, the banker Manuel Antonio Matos, planned and directed the initial operations from Port Of Spain capital of the island of Trinidad under British rule, managing to convince several local warlords dissatisfied with the government to join the fight. In addition, several foreign-owned companies operating in Venezuela were dissatisfied and had been engaged in litigation with different governments dating back almost to the beginning of their activities in Venezuela. The French Cable Company, the German Rail, the British Rail, the New York & Bermúdez Company, and the Orinoco Shipping, among others, had given Matos $150,000 to buy the ship Ban Righ in London. In December 1901, the international intrigue against President Castro had begun when the German Chancellor Theodor Von Holleben sent a completed report to the US Secretary of State, John Hay, detailing a debt of Venezuela with the bank "Disconto Gesellschaft" for 33 million bolívares, which the Venezuelan government refuses to recognize. For his part, Matos had armed the ship "Ban Righ" in London, which he renamed "The Libertador", as well bought weapons and ammunition. Finally, in January 1902, he set sail from the Port of Spain (Trinidad) and, circumventing the surveillance of the national army, Matos landed near Coro, at which time the civil war spread throughout the country.

Matos also had a large, heavily armed rebel army with which he was able to seize large territories. By July 1902, only the Miranda, Aragua, and Carabobo states in the center of the country remained in the power of the Castro government; and those of Trujillo, Zulia, Mérida and Táchira in the west. Many battles were fought, the most important was the siege of La Victoria in November 1902, Castro with 9,500 men tried to stop the advance of 14,000 of the revolutionaries who tried to take Caracas by force. Despite the disadvantage, Castro had extremely important military resources, Mauser repeating rifles and rapid-fire Krupp cannons, the first in the country, with which his men obtained greater firepower to break the siege. After a month of combat, the rebels defeated by Castro divided due to internal differences, which in the long run were the cause of their failure because the Castro government took advantage of their division to defeat each caudillo separately, reconquering the territory they had won. Even so, some active rebel pockets remained, mainly General Nicolás Rolando in central and eastern Venezuela. The remaining rebel forces were hunted down and progressively dismantled by Juan Vicente Gómez, disarming the revolution.

Naval blockade of the Venezuelan ports 1902–1903

See also: Venezuelan crisis of 1902–1903

With the defeat of the Revolution in La Victoria, international capital decided to move from opposing operations to direct intervention, and in this way they began to strangle the national economy. The culminating point was the naval blockade of the Venezuelan ports, on 9 December 1902., by German, English and Italian warships, under the pretext of forcing the government to fulfill debt commitments, especially that contracted for the construction of the railway network by German and British companies. Faced with the violence of the military actions that plunged the country into a serious international crisis, the rebels took advantage of the precarious situation of the government and on 29 December 1902, Amábilis Solagnie and Luciano Mendoza attacked the government positions in Caja de Agua, near Barquisimeto, where they expelled the troops of Leopoldo Baptista and González Pacheco. President Castro requests the intervention of President Roosevelt of the United States as a mediator in compliance with the Monroe Doctrine forcing the withdrawal of European warships according to the Washington Protocol signed on 13 February 1903.

Britain was involved in the Venezuelan crisis on 7 December 1902, both London and Berlin issued ultimatums to Venezuelan government of Cipriano Castro, even though there was still disagreement about whether to impose a pacific blockade (as the Germans wanted) or a war blockade (as the British wanted). Germany ultimately agreed to a war blockade, and after receiving no reply to their ultimatums, an unofficial naval blockade was imposed on 9 December with SMS Panther, SMS Falke, SMS Gazelle and SMS Vineta as major Kaiserliche Marine warships in Caribbean Sea. On 11 December, Italy offered its own ultimatum, which Venezuela also rejected. Venezuela maintained that its national laws were final,and said "the so-named foreign debt ought not to be and never had been a matter of discussion beyond the legal guaranties found in the law of Venezuela on the public debt". The German naval contingent followed the Royal Navy lead in operational terms with eight warships to block the Venezuelan coast. The British ships of the Particular Service Squadron under Commodore Robert Montgomerie included the sloop HMS Alert and the protected cruiser HMS Charybdis. An Italian naval contingent arrived in support of the blockade on 16 December. On 21 January the German cruiser SMS Vineta bombarded the fort San Carlos de La Barra, destroying it with the death of 25 civilians in the nearby town]. The action had not been approved by the British commander, who had been told by Admiralty after the incident of 13 December not to engage in such action without consulting London; the message was not passed to the German commander, who had been told previously to follow the British commander's lead. The incident caused "considerable negative reaction in the United States against Germany"; the Germans said that the Venezuelans fired first, which the British concurred with but declared the bombardment "unfortunate and inopportune" nonetheless.

After agreeing to arbitration under pressure of US Navy and Roosevelt administration, Britain, Germany, and Italy reached a settlement with Venezuela on 13 February 1903 resulting in the Washington Protocols. Venezuela was represented by the U.S. Ambassador to Caracas Herbert W. Bowen. Venezuela's debts had been very large relative to its income. The agreement reduced the outstanding claims by Bs150m, and created a payment plan taking into account the country's income. However, the blockading nations argued for preferential treatment for their claims, which Venezuela rejected, and on 7 May 1903 a total of ten powers with grievances against Venezuela, including the United States, signed protocols referring the issue to the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague.

The Asphat War epilogue

In March 1903, President Castro sent a strong naval and land contingent under the command of the Vicepresident Juan Vicente Gómez to subdue Rolando's forces entrenched in Ciudad Bolívar on the right bank of the Orinoco River. After a long naval siege that led to the landing of troops and the bloody battle of Ciudad Bolívar, General Rolando surrendered along with his staff on 21 July 1903. signaling the official end of the civil war. With most of the caudillos defeated and his revolution practically extinct, Matos decided to go abroad, leaving for Curaçao, establishing himself in Paris.

The defeat of the Liberating Revolution marked the end of the Venezuelan XIX century characterized by political instability and fights between caudillos, where the method of coming to power was through armed rebellion, and the end of the time of the great Venezuelan civil wars, giving way to a stage of consolidation of the central government under the hegemony of the Andeans, but not before confronting, as never before a Venezuelan president had done, with modern foreign powers.

The Hague International Court held on 22 February 1904 that the blockading powers of Venezuela were entitled to preferential treatment in the payment of their claims. The Theodore Roosevelt administration disagreed with the decision in principle,and feared it would encourage future European intervention to gain such advantage.

The crisis produced the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, described in president Roosevelt's 1904 message to Congress.The Corollary asserted a right of the United States to intervene to "stabilize" the economic affairs of small states in the Caribbean and Central America if they were unable to pay their international debts, in order to preclude European intervention to do so. The Venezuela crisis, and in particular the arbitral award, were key in the development of the Corollary.

In 1908, accusing the opposition to his regime, General Castro expelled to Trinidad the Corsican producers and traders established in and around Carúpano.

The Castro administration severed the relations with the United States in 1908, after the expropriation of the New York & Bermudez Company.

The so-called Liberal Restoration Army was institutionalized, becoming an effective and professional National Army in charge of the security of the entire Venezuelan territory. The Navy, so devastated by the naval blockade of 1902, began a long process of modernization and incorporation of units into the fleet.

Venezuela oil boom

Despite the knowledge of the existence of oil reserves in Venezuela for centuries, the first oil wells of significance were not drilled until the early 1910s. In 1908, Juan Vicente Gómez replaced his ailing predecessor, Cipriano Castro, as the president of Venezuela. Over the next few years, Gómez granted several concessions to explore, produce, and refine oil. Most of these oil concessions were granted to his closest friends, and they in turn passed them on to foreign oil companies that could actually develop them. One such concession was granted to Rafael Max Valladares who hired Caribbean Petroleum Company (later acquired by Royal Dutch Shell) to carry out his oil exploration project. On 15 April 1914, upon the completion of the Zumaque-I (now called MG-I) oil well, the first Venezuelan oilfield of importance, Mene Grande, was discovered by Caribbean Petroleum in the Maracaibo Basin. This major discovery encouraged a massive wave of foreign oil companies to Venezuela in an attempt to gain a foothold in the burgeoning market.

From 1914 to 1917, several more oil fields were discovered across the country including the emblematic Bolivar Coastal Field; however World War I slowed significant development of the industry. Due to the difficulty in purchasing and transporting the necessary tools and machinery, some oil companies were forced to forego drilling until after the war. In 1917, the first refining operations began at the San Lorenzo refinery to process the Mene Grande field production, and the first significant exports of Venezuelan oil by Caribbean Petroleum left from the San Lorenzo terminal. At end of 1918, petroleum appeared for the first time on the Venezuelan export statistics at 21,194 metric tons. By the time the excellent harbor of Willemstad and stable Dutch government on Curaçao were deciding factors for Royal Dutch Shell to construct an Oil refinery compared to the shallow harbor of Maracaibo and notorious unstable government of Venezuela.

It was the blowout of the Barroso No. 2 well drilled by Venezuela Oil Concessions in Cabimas in 1922 that marked the beginning of Venezuela's modern history as a major producer. This discovery captured the attention of the nation and the world. Soon dozens of foreign companies acquired vast tracts of territory in the hope of striking it rich as British Controlled Oil Fields, Colon Development Company, Equatorial Fields and the Americans Standard Oil, Mobil, Texaco, Gulf, Sinclair, Richmond and others. In 1927, Royal Dutch Shell started the construction of a Refinery near Oranjestad, in the island of Aruba. This development would ultimately have a significant influence on the construction of a Refinery by Standard Oil at Sint Nicolas town.

Isaac Wagemaker, lieutenant governor (1930)

By 1928 with the blowout of the Moneb No. 1 well, oil exploitation began and the Eastern Venezuela. The Town of Caripito achieved an important boost in its urban development due to the arrival of migrant labor, particularly from the West Indies. Venezuela became the world's leading oil exporter and the second producer after United States. Oil ended Venezuela's relative anonymity in the eyes of world powers, making it a linchpin of an ever-expanding international oil industry and a new consideration in global policymaking.

On 8 June 1929 Curazao was raided and captured by rebel Rafael Simón Urbina together with 250 Venezuelan employees of Shell Refinery of Willemstad . They plundered weapons, ammunition and the treasury of Fort Amsterdam. They also managed to capture the Dutch governor, Leonardus Albertus Fruytier, and hauled him off to Venezuela on the stolen American ship Maracaibo but failed to overthrown the Gomez dictatorship. After the failed Falke expedition in Cumana, the captain purchased coal in Grenada. The crew forced him to sail to Port of Spain, which she entered on August 14, 1929. The English authorities questioned the crew and confiscated the Falke, because the Venezuelan government had branded her a pirate in an official communication to the British governor of Trinidad. 1930 the tanker Creole Bueno left the port of Caripito with 20 thousand barrels of oil bound for Refinery Pointe-à-Pierre of Trinidad. During the 1934-1939 labor riots in Trinidad, Barbados, Grenada, British Guyana the discontent population was part of the early West Indies migration to Venezuela, where employment opportunities were expanding in the oil industry with the blow up of Oficina N 1 well at El Tigre. By the end of the 1930s, Venezuela had become the third-leading oil producer in the world, behind the United States and the Soviet Union, as well as the leading exporter.

Second World War

During the Second World War, Venezuela remained neutral but played an important role in the supply of fuel for the Allied forces. In 1940, before the invasion of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany, the British occupied Curaçao and the French Aruba. The presence of powers other than the Netherlands alarmed the Venezuelan government given the proximity of these islands at the entrance to the Gulf of Venezuela and the fact they'd historically been used as bases to launch incursions against Venezuelan territory. In 1941 the demand for aviation gasoline further increased and considerable expansion was done at the Aruba refineries. With this expansion, San Nicolaas Lago of Aruba became one of the largest refineries in the world, only bested by Royal Dutch Shell refinery on Curaçao, and a major producer of petroleum products for the Allied war efforts.After the Attack on Pearl Harbor Venezuela changed its position to reflect that of other Latin American nations and severed diplomatic relations with the Axis powers (which included Japan) in 31 December 1941. Soon after the United States entered the war in Febraury of 1942, US troops occupied Aruba, Curazao and Trinidad islands and built military airports. The main purpose was this deployment was to fight against expected future attacks by Axis submarines and potentially long-distance Nazi bombers. America was also concerned over the potential threat of a German invasion of the continental US launched with the aid of German settlers in South America.

The importance of the Aruba refineries was well known to the German High Command and on February 16, 1942 the Lago refinery was attacked by the German submarine U-156. Due to mistakes by the German deck gunner the refinery was not damaged but three of the Lago tankers were torpedoed in San Nicolaas harbour. On the night six oil tankers were torpedoed the Pedernales, Arkansas, Oranjestad, Tia Juana, San Nicholas, and Monagas. Five were sank and the Pedernales, was beached with her mid-section destroyed.

On 26 February 1942, an agreements were formalized in Caracas. and the Patos island became part of Venezuela in exchange for Soldado Rock to Trinidad and Tobago The island was put under the administration of the Ministerio del Interior y de Justicia (Ministry of Interior and Justice) as part of the Dependencias Federales.

In 1945, the Venezuelan government authorized Creole Petroleum Corporation and Royal Dutch Shell to build two oil refineries near Punto Fijo (Falcon State) , which was decisive for the rise of this city. The Cardón Refinery of Shell started operations in 1949 with capacity to refine 30 thousand barrels per day (4,800 m³/d). It currently handles 305 thousand barrels per day (48,500 m³/d). The Amuay Refinery was established by Creole Petroleum in 1950. It started having a capacity of 60 thousand barrels per day (9,500 m³/d) and nowadays it can refine 645 thousand barrels per day (102,500 m³/d). The Bajo Grande Refinery, built in 1956 by Richmond (now Chevron), has the capacity to refine 16 thousand barrels per day (2,500 m³/d).

Following the oil finds in earlier decades in Point Fortin, Parrylands, Penal and Siparia, there were discoveries in the Gulf of Pariaas Ortoire and Soldado Field which reversed the decline in production. Further drills led to oil finds at Balata East, Cat’s Hill and Inniss, the latter being the last onshore find. The first offshore well was drilled in 1954 at Soldado.

Soldado Field, 14 miles offshore, west of Point Fortin, became a major produce in 1956. 

Venezuela as mayor oil producer was pivotal in the foundation of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) an organization enabling the co-operation of leading oil-producing and oil-dependent countries in order to collectively influence the global oil market and maximize profit. It was founded on 14 September 1960 in Baghdad by the first five members (Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela). In a series of steps OPEC restructured the global system of oil production in favor of oil-producing states and away from an oligopoly of dominant Anglo-American oil firms (the "Seven Sisters").

In 1976, amid the oil boom, President Carlos Andrés Pérez nationalized the oil industry, creating state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) to oversee all exploring, producing, refining, and exporting of oil. All foreign oil companies that once did business in Venezuela were replaced by Venezuelan companies, such as Lagoven (Standard Oil), Maraven (Shell), Meneven (Gulf) and Llanoven (Mobil). Pérez allowed PDVSA to partner with foreign oil companies as long as it held 60 percent equity in joint ventures and, critically, structured the company to run as a business with minimal government regulation.

In 1985, Royal Dutch Shell sold the refinery of Willemstad to the government of Curaçao for a symbolic single dollar. Although Curaçao now owned the refinery, it lacked the skilled personnel to maintain it and inherited responsibility for the facility's environmental problems. The solution was Venezuela's state-owned oil company, PDVSA, which was contracted to be the facility operator with a 35-year lease.

The lost archive Colombeia of Francisco de Miranda

The archive Colombeia of the general Francisco de Miranda, thought to be lost since 1812, was located in 1926 in Cirencester, England by Dr. Alberto Adriani, who lived in London and made all the arrangements for the Venezuelan government to acquire it. Dr. Caracciolo Parra Pérez, who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs and was a friend and countryman of Adriani, accepted the proposal and claimed responsibility for the discovery.

In 2007, the National Academy of History of Venezuela, requested the inclusion of the Miranda Archive in the UNESCO Memory of the World Program. That same year, UNESCO accepted the inclusion in the Program

Geneva Agreement of 1966

The status of the Essequibo territory became subject to the Geneva Agreement, which was signed by the United Kingdom, Venezuela and British Guiana on 17 February 1966. This treaty stipulates that the parties will agree to find a practical, peaceful and satisfactory solution to the dispute. Disputes over the territory have continued since, even after Guyana was granted independence the same year.

Falklands War

Although in the 20th century both countries were mostly on good terms, Venezuela expressed its support to Argentina over the Falklands Islands dispute that eventually led to the Falklands War between the United Kingdom and Argentina in 1982.

Homages

• The house where the general Francisco de Miranda and Andres Bello lived in London, 27 Grafton Street (now 58 Grafton Way), Bloomsbury, has two blue plaques that bears their names, and functions today as the Consulate of Venezuela in the United Kingdom.

• A raised bust was erected in Bello's honour at St Antony's College, Oxford, with an inscription that reads: 'Poet, Jurist, Philosopher, Philologist, Educator: Born Caracas 1781. Died Santiago de Chile 1865. From 1810 to 1829 he served the cause of South American Independence'.

• The Simón Bolívar Chair in Latin American Studies a visiting professorship at Cambridge University, was founded by the Venezuelan government in 1968. It is awarded to a distinguished Latin American scholar or other intellectual. The position is associated with Cambridge's Centre for Latin American Studies.

• The statue the Liberator Simon Bolivar was unveiled in Belgrave Square of London by the ex president Rafael Caldera and James Callaghan, then Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, later Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, in 1974. On the plinth are the words: I am convinced that England alone is capable of protecting the world's rights as she is great, glorious and wise. The names of countries liberated by Bolívar are inscribed on the base.

• A bust and plaque honouring the general Daniel Florence O'Leary were presented by the Venezuelan Government to the people of Cork and unveiled on 12 May 2010 by the Venezuelan Ambassador to Ireland, Samuel Moncada.

21st century

Venezuelan presidential crisis

See also: Venezuelan presidential crisis

As of August 2017, the British Government advised against 'all but essential travel' to Venezuela, and withdrew dependents of British Embassy staff, due to the 'ongoing unrest and instability', citing the protests and crime in the country.

In January 2019 during a visit to the United States, UK Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt stated that "Nicolás Maduro is not the legitimate leader of Venezuela" and Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó should become President of Venezuela. On 4 February 2019, Hunt stated that the UK officially recognised Guaidó as president. However the United Kingdom continued to maintain consular and diplomatic relations with the Maduro controlled government, suggesting some ambiguity. This policy is a partial exception to the UK's long held policy of recognising states rather than specific governments.

In Autumn 2019 the Foreign and Commonwealth Office created the 'Venezuela Reconstruction Unit' led by John Saville, formerly UK ambassador to Venezuela, to coordinate a UK effort to support Venezuela. After this became public in May 2020, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza summoned the UK's Chargé d'Affaires "to present a formal protest and demand explanations", and in a Twitter post wrote "We demand that the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland withdraw from Washington's coup plans and from any destabilizing initiative". Venezuela characterised the Venezuela Reconstruction Unit as an attempt to give future preferred status to British companies in Venezuela.

Control of gold in London

Since 2018, the Bank of England has delayed releasing 31 tonnes of Venezuelan gold to the Maduro government. UK foreign office minister Alan Duncan said in January 2019 that while the disposition of the gold was a Bank of England decision, "they will take into account there are now a large number of countries across the world questioning the legitimacy of Nicolás Maduro and recognising that of Juan Guaidó.".

On 14 May 2020, the Central Bank of Venezuela filed a legal action against the Bank of England, to force Britain to release the €930m worth of gold to the United Nations Development Programme to buy healthcare equipment, medicine, and food for the COVID-19 pandemic in Venezuela. Guaidó has appointed a parallel Venezuelan central bank board of directors, so the court will have to decide which board of directors legally controls the gold. In July 2020 the High Court ruled that Guaidó was interim president, but the Court of Appeal ruled in October 2020 that the British Foreign Secretary's statement on recognition was ambiguous, clarified the legal importance of the distinction between de jure president and de facto president, and returned the case to the High Court for reconsideration.

Resident diplomatic missions

• United Kingdom has an embassy in Caracas.
• Venezuela has an embassy and a consulate-general in London.

• 
  Embassy of Venezuela in London
• 
  Consulate-General of Venezuela in London

See also

• Venezuela crisis of 1895, a border conflict about sovereignty of Venezuelan territory of Esequibo which the UK claimed as part of British Guiana.
• Venezuela crisis of 1902–1903, in which the UK was involved in a military blockade to enforce payment of Venezuelan debts
• Latin America-United Kingdom relations
• Venezuelans in the United Kingdom

Sources

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