Man-eating Caribs move into the islands around the sea named after them - the Caribbean

The world's first globe is published by Martin Behaim without showing America, in the very year of Columbus' voyage

After sailing for five weeks from the Canaries, Columbus and the Pinzón brothers step ashore in the Bahamas

Columbus and his fellow explorers make landfall on the largest of the Caribbean islands, Cuba

Diego Columbus, brother of the explorer, establishes the first secure Spanish colony at Santo Domingo

The Spanish complete the conquest of Cuba and establish the town of Havana

Castaways from an English vessel reach Bermuda, which becomes the first British island in the new world

A British colony is founded in Barbados and within fifteen years has 18,000 settlers

The British, settling in Jamaica, soon turn the island into the major slave market of the West Indies

In the Treaty of Rijswijk, Spain cedes the western half of Hispaniola to France, which names its new colony Saint-Domingue

John Harrison's fourth chronometer is only five seconds out at the end of a test journey from England to Jamaica

Toussaint L'Ouverture, a former slave, joins a Spanish force invading the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti)

Toussaint L'Ouverture emerges as the leader of Saint-Domingue, ruling without French colonial control

Toussaint L'Ouverture invades the neighbouring Spanish colony of Santo Domingo, and becomes ruler of of the whole island of Hispaniola

A powerful French force arrives in Saint-Domingue and recovers control of the colony, offering generous terms to the native leaders

Toussaint L'Ouverture is treacherously arrested and sent to France, where he dies in prison

The independence of Haiti from France is proclaimed by a new black ruler calling himself the emperor Jacques I

The Spanish recover Bogotá yet again and Bolívar flees into exile in Jamaica

The other half of Hispaniola joins Haiti in declaring independence, as the Dominican Republic

Jamaican-born nurse Mary Seacole sets up her own 'British Hotel' in the Crimea to provide food and nursing for soldiers in need

An uprising against Spanish rule in Cuba sparks off a Ten Years' War

An armed uprising against Spanish rule takes place in the town of Lares in Puerto Rico, becoming known as the Grito de Lares ('Cry of Lares')

The Ten Years' War ends in Cuba, with Spain promising extensive reforms including the abolition of slavery

Ulises Heureaux becomes dictator of the Dominican Republic and retains power until assassinated in 1899

The Spanish governor in Cuba is recalled to Spain, for pioneering the concept of the concentration camp