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Tortola is the largest and most populated of the British Virgin Islands, a group of islands that form part of the archipelago of the Virgin Islands.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.bvi.gov.vg/tortola )〕 It has a total population of 23,908, with 9400 residents in Road Town. Local tradition recounts that Christopher Columbus named the island ''Tórtola'', meaning "Turtle Dove" in Spanish. In fact, Columbus named the island as ''Santa Ana''. Dutch colonists called it Ter Tholen, after a coastal island that is part of the Netherlands. When the British took over, the name evolved to Tortola. == History == On his second voyage for the Spanish Crown to the Caribbean, Christopher Columbus spotted what are now called the British and US Virgin Islands. He named the archipelago after the 11,000 virgins of the 5th-century Christian martyr St. Ursula. The Spanish made a few attempts to settle the islands, but pirates such as Blackbeard and Captain Kidd were the first permanent residents. In the late 16th century, the English, who had successfully usurped control of the area from the Dutch, established a permanent plantation colony on Tortola and the surrounding islands. Settlers developed the islands for the sugar cane industry, with large plantations dependent on the slave labor of Africans transported across the Atlantic. The majority of early settlers came in the late eighteenth century: Loyalists from the Thirteen Colonies after the American Revolutionary War were given land grants here by the Crown to encourage development. They brought their African-American slaves with them, who outnumbered the British colonists. The sugar industry dominated Tortola economic history for more than a century. In the early 19th century, after Britain abolished the international slave trade, the Royal Navy patrolled the Caribbean to intercept illegal slave ships. The colony settled liberated Africans from these ships on Tortola, in the then-unsettled Kingstown area. St. Phillip's Church was built in the early 19th century in this community as one of the earliest free black churches in the Americas. After the abolition of slavery in the British colonies in 1834, planters found it difficult to make a profit in the sugar industry based on paying and managing free labor. At this time, Cuba and some South American countries still had slave labor in the sugar industry. In addition, there were changes in the sugar industry, with sugar beets cultivated in England and the United States offering a competing product. During the downturn as sugar agriculture became less profitable, a large proportion of the white landowning population left the British Virgin Islands. In the late 1970s, the British businessman Ken Bates attempted to lease a large part of the island on a 199-year lease, but this action was blocked. Noel Lloyd, a local activist, led a protest movement forcing the local government to drop the plan.〔(Noel Lloyd story published in UK magazine ), ''BVI News,'' Japhix, 4th November 2011〕 Today, a park on Tortola is named after Noel Lloyd and features a statue in his honour.〔(The Noel Lloyd Positive Action Park ), British Virgin Islands tourism〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Tortola」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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