St. John History

St. John today is known for it's beautiful white sand beaches, campgrounds and lots of space to explore in it's national park. Read below to learn more about this beautiful island paradise’s history.

St. John has been known to Indians and buccaneers before the Danish acquired the island, deforested the hills and dried up the natural springs. Rendezvous bay was named for being a pirate meeting place, as was Privateer bay.  There are petroglyphs around the island, but no one has definitely proven which of the groups is responsible for them.  The first indigenous group were the peaceful Arawaks, who were driven out (or consumed) by the cannibalistic Carib Indians.

After Columbus discovered St. John he in turn drove out all the Caribs. St. John was later settled by the Danes.  St. John was made up of a few white planters and mostly Africans slaves shipped in to run the cane sugar mills.  At one time St. John seemed to have the best future ahead because of it was judged to have the finest harbor in the Lesser Antilles, better soil and more rainfall. However those hopes were dashed following the infamous slave revolt in 1733 that decimated the island. The Africans outnumbered the whites five to one and the slaves that had been imported into St. John were from a fierce tribe named the Elminas who believed toiling soil was woman's work and an insult to a manly warrior.  Others near Coral Bay called the Akvambos, were also just as rebellious.  There were also many escaped slaves still on the island who were part of the islands takeover.  The Africans succeeded in holding St. John for six months until out of food and ammunition, they held a ceremonial celebration, and then are said to have thrown themselves over a precipice at Anna Berg rather than be captured.

Upon St. John's next economic recovery it was again crushed by the abolition of slave labor and the arrival of beet sugar, which brought to an end St. John’s golden era.  By 1880 there were only 944 people living on St. John.  By 1900 there was only one plantation still under cultivation.  St. John's future was however rescued in 1956 by Lawrence Rockefeller who had just happened to visit St. John and he decided to buy up the 5 thousand acres necessary to establish a National Park.  Which currently makes most of St. John today a United States National Park.*

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