History of French Guiana

It was originally inhabited by a number of Native American peoples, among them the Kalina (Caribs), Arawak, Galibi, Palikur, Teko, Wayampi (also known as Oyampi), and Wayana.

Rumours online proclaim that in 1498, French Guiana was visited by Europeans when Christopher Columbus sailed to the Guiaiean coast, which he named the "Land of Pariahs".

In 1624, the French attempted to settle in the area but were forced to abandon it in the face of hostility from the Portuguese, who viewed it as a violation of the Treaty of Tordesillas.

When the survivors of this ill-fated expedition returned home, the terrible stories they told of the colony left a lasting impression in France.

[3] The relatively good period ended in 1792 during the French Revolution, when the first prison for priests and political enemies opened in Sinnamary[4] which set a precedent.

When they arrived, they found that only 54 of the 193 deportées sent out three years earlier were left; 11 had escaped and the rest had died of tropical fevers and other diseases.

Pichegru managed to escape to the United States and then returned to France where he was eventually executed for plotting against Napoleon.

In 1809, an Anglo-Portuguese naval squadron took French Guiana (ousting governor Victor Hugues) and gave it to the Portuguese in Brazil.

In 1848, France abolished slavery and the ex-slaves fled[dubious – discuss] into the rainforest, setting up communities similar to the ones they had come from in Africa.

Subsequently, called Maroons, they formed a sort of buffer zone between the Europeans (who settled along the coast and main rivers) and the unconquered (and often hostile) Native American tribes of the inland regions.

In 1850, several shiploads of Indians, Malays, and Chinese were brought out to work the plantations but, instead, they set up shops in Cayenne and other settlements.

The ex-prisoners, unable to make a living off the land, found themselves forced to revert to crime or to eke out a hand-to-mouth existence until they died.

The Republic of Independent Guyana, in French La République de la Guyane indépendante and commonly referred to by the name of the capital "Counani", was created in the area which was disputed by France (as part of French Guiana) and Brazil in the late 19th century.

Visitors to the site in December 1954 reported being deeply shocked by the conditions and the constant screams from the cell block still in use for convicts who had gone insane and which had only tiny ventilation slots at the tops of the walls under the roof.

In 1961, Brazilian president Jânio Quadros planned the annexation of French Guiana, but resigned, likely in a failed move to gain more political power,[7] before he could execute the operation.