The influence about Columbus arrived in the Caribbean

I’m a native people in the Caribbean, and we have lived in the Caribbean for many years since my grandfather. My grandfather told me that when he was young, the people in the Caribbean lived a really peaceful life. They lived in the small village, grew cassava, kept animals, and sought for food by hunting, fishing. They also made ships by wood.[1]

However, a Spanish sailor named Columbus reached the Caribbean in 1492. The arrival of Columbus meant a lot for both the European and us. For the European, it was a great discovery and helped the European know more about the outer world; but for the native people lived in the Caribbean like us, it was really a horrible memory.

When Columbus had reached the Caribbean, he killed lots of people here that we could not live the peaceful life any more. As Las Casas, a Spanish historian, said, “They cut off the people’s hand, but still left the hands hanging by the skin.”[2] Many people were afraid of Columbus and hid themselves in the mountains because of the cruel treatment. Columbus caught the local people as slaves and sent them to other areas by ships. Because of Columbus’s ignorance of the people’s health, there were a lot of diseases speared quickly, and people died in the plague.[3]

Columbus had destroyed a lot in the Caribbean, and even today it was still the worst memory in our lives.



[1] “ the Caribbean” Wikipedia last modified Nov. 16th , 2012. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caribbean
[2] Las Casas, An Account Much Abbreviated, of the Destruction of the Indies” Written in 1495
[3] Henry Dobyns, There Number Became Thinned, Native American Population Dynamics in Eastern South America.” University of Tennessee, pressed in 1983.