Imperial translators: Hiberno-Spaniards, the Bourbon reforms and political economy

ABSTRACT

This article explains how 18th century Irish exiles in the Spanish Empire utilised a skill at imperial translation to promote the emulation of capitalistic British imperial policies. Focusing on the proyectista Bernardo Ward, the First Ministry of Ricardo Wall, and the slaving practices of Hiberno-Spaniards in Cuba, it argues that diasporic Irish played a key role in the Spanish Empire’s embrace of capitalism during the Bourbon Reforms.

KEYWORDS:

• Political economy
• trade
• slavery
• empire
• diaspora

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The phrase “imperial translation” is reminiscent of Sophus Reinert’s title, Translating Empire: Emulation and the Origins of Political Economy. In contrast to Reinert’s excellent work, my usage of imperial translation is meant to signify more than literal translation. Rather, it is meant to convey the “translation” of a wider array of behaviours, deportment, ideas, and speech in addition to acts of literal translation. Moreover, my study is of a diaspora and the political activity and consequences of this diaspora rather than solely on literal translation. See: Sophus Reinert, Translating Empire.

2. Lynch, Bourbon Spain; Weber, Bárbaros: Spaniards and Their Savages in the Age of Enlightenment; Paquette, Enlightenment, Governance, and Reform in Spain and its Empire, 1759–1808; Kuethe and Andrien, The Spanish Atlantic World in the Eighteenth Century; Stein and Stein, Silver, Trade, and War.

3. Lynch, Bourbon Spain, 46–52.

4. On the 200,000 estimate and for the most recent attempt at synthesis, see: Canny, “How the Local Can Be Global and the Global Local.” On the Irish in the Spanish Empire and limpieza de sangre: Morales, Ireland and the Spanish Empire. Bailey, The First Irish Diaspora in the Age of the Bourbon Reforms. Martinez, Genealogical Fictions. On sliocht and “race” in early modern Ireland: Kane and Smuts, “The Politics of Race in England, Scotland, and Ireland.” On Irish imperial networks: Crosby, Irish Imperial Networks.

5. Ward is mentioned in a few works on the Bourbon Reforms but his proposals are never explained or contextualised. He is almost entirely absent from extant literature with the exception of brief mention in Alarcia, El ministerio Wall and Paquette, Enlightenment, Governance, and Reform in Spain and its Empire.. No extant source I am familiar with evinces an extended analysis of the Proyecto or connects how his proposals mirrored Spanish policy after 1763. Among others, David Brading suggests that Ward’s Proyecto is a near copy of Jose del Campillo y Cosio’s Nuevo Sistema de gobierno economico para la America (1743). There are some similarities and it is likely Ward was familiar with Campillo’s writings, but these texts are fundamentally different and Ward explicitly based his arguments on the writings of British political economists – indeed, he boasted of his superior command of their writings to bolster his arguments. Brading, Miners and Merchants in Bourbon Mexico 1763–1800.

6. Ward, Proyecto Económico, 3–7.

7. Ward, Obra pía.

8. See note 6 above.

9. References to various nations that Ward travelled to are scattered throughout the manuscript. For example, one section on the importance of trees for agriculture, building, and naval construction makes brief mention of observations on woodlands near Moscow. Ward, Proyecto económico, 82.

10. Herr, Rural change and royal finances in Spain, 1–36; García, Compañías privilegiadas de comercio con América y cambio político, 66–7.

11. Ward, Proyecto económico, XIII.

12. Ibid., XVIII.

13. Ibid., VVIII, XXV.

14. Ibid., 31–2.

15. Petty, Political Arithmetick. For more on Petty and the evolution of political economy: McCormick, William Petty; Yamamoto, Taming Capitalism Before its Triumph; and Deringer, Calculated Values.

16. McCormick, William Petty, 8–9, 135–47, 169, 175–85. See also: Keller, Knowledge and the Public Interest, esp. 1–32, 167–98, 235–45.

17. Petty, The political anatomy of Ireland.

18. Cary, An essay on the state of England/For more on Cary: Yamamoto, Taming Capitalism. Reinert, Translating Empire. It is worth noting one major difference between the two authors, Cary and Ward: Cary was an avid promoted of the transatlantic slave trade, Ward opposed enslavement. On mercantilism and political economy more generally: Stern and Wennerlind, Mercantilism Reimagined, 8–17. An older but useful overview is presented in: Ingram, A History of Political Economy, 49–52, 81–158 For a comparative perspective see: Vardi, The Physiocrats and the World of the Physiocrats. Hont, Jealousy of Trade. Cheney, Revolutionary Commerce.

19. Ward, Proyecto económico, 5, 73, 75–6, 79, 88.

20. Wood, The Origin of Capitalism. 50–70, 81. On the rapid growth of the Irish population and economy in the eighteenth-century, see: Dickson, The First Irish Cities.

21. Ward, Proyecto económico, 58–94.

22. Livesey, “The Dublin Society in Eighteenth-Century Irish Political Thought,” 615–40.

23. Ward, Proyecto económico, 27–30.

24. Crawford, “The Evolution of the Linen Trade in Ulster Before Industrialization,” 32–53.

25. Ward, Proyecto económico, quotes 27–30. See also: 35–8, 58–94.

26. Ward, Proyecto económico, 92–4.

27. Ibid., 104.

28. Ward, Proyecto económico, 33–57, 130–46. For more on the centrality of infrastructural or public “improvements” in the genealogy of English political economy: Yamamoto, Taming Capitalism.

29. Ward, Proyecto económico, 105, 108, 114–5.

30. Sawers, “The Navigation Acts Revisited,” 262–3.

31. Ward, Proyecto económico, 119–121, 135, 191–3.

32. Ibid., 41–2, 231.

33. Ibid., 228.

34. Ibid., 271.

35. Ibid., 247–256, 261–3.

36. Andrien, “Corruption, Inefficiency, and Imperial Decline,” The Americas, 1–20.

37. Ward, Proyecto económico, 278–84.

38. Bailey, The First Irish Diaspora in the Age of the Bourbon Reforms, 72–132.

39. Shafer, The Economic Societies in the Spanish World, 10.

40. Voekel, “Peeing on the Palace: Bodily Resistance to Bourbon Reforms in Mexico City,” 183–208.

41. Brewer, The Sinews of Power. This perspective is echoed in the more pugnacious work of Steve Pincus, see: Pincus, 1688: The First Modern Revolution. More recent and more compelling, see: Deringer, Calculated Values for more on the rise of the “Quantitative Age” in British statecraft after 1688. It is worth noting that other scholars emphasise the longer-term processes. Among others, see: Macinnes, eds., The British Revolution, 1629–1660; Wood, The Origin of Capitalism; Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire; and Hower, Tudor Empire.

42. Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century; Brown, Tacky’s Revolt: The Story of an Atlantic Slave War; Burnard and Garrigus, The Plantation Machine; and Blackburn, The Making of New World Slavery.

43. Corredera, The Diplomatic Enlightenment, 1–28. Corredera pushes back against this narrative; I contribute to this perspective of an 18th century Spanish resurgence against the telos of decline. On decline: Stein and. Stein, Silver, Trade, and War; Grafe, Distant Tyranny; Israel, “The Decline of Spain: A Historical Myth?” 170–80; and Kame, “The Decline of Spain: A Historical Myth?” 24–50.

44. Alarcia, El Ministerio Wall. In the first chapter of his biography of Ricardo Wall, Alarcia suggests that Wall’s ministry has been overlooked for reasons of Spanish nationalism.

45. Gallwey, The Wall Family in Ireland 1170 to 1970, esp. 188–191; and Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 44–7. For more on Irish Jacobitism: Ó Ciardha, Ireland and the Jacobite Cause.

46. Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 44–7; Harcourt-Smith, Cardinal of Spain, 23–35, 39; Corredera, The Diplomatic Enlightenment: Spain, Europe, and the Age of Speculation, 26–30; and Scelle, La Traite Negriere aux Indies de Castille, 114–40, 455–83.

47. Harcourt-Smith, Cardinal of Spain, 76–107.

48. Lynch, Bourbon Spain, 22–60; Finucane, The Temptations of Trade; Stein and Stein, Silver, Trade, and War, 57–144; and Stein and Stein offer a longue durée approach to Spain’s unequal commercial treaties that underlines Spanish trading weaknesses from the peace of Westphalia (1645) to the peace of Utrecht (1713).

49. Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 44–7; Harcourt-Smith, Cardinal of Spain, 51, 136–40, 150–160, 210–237; and Lynch, Bourbon Spain, 76–80.

50. Stuart, Diario del viaje a Moscovia del duque de Liria y Xerica. 11, 19, 63–4, 121–25, 200–1, 221, 400.

51. I prefer the Spanish title for the war given that this study presents a Spanish viewpoint. Additionally, the Spanish name for the war more honestly and directly identifies the cause and stakes of the war: economic competition and the transatlantic slave trade.

52. Alarcia, “La Misión Secreta de D. Ricardo Wall en Londres (1747–1748),” 49–71.

53. Keene a Fox, 5 de Octubre de 1756, TNA, State Papers, 94/153. In Alarcia, El Ministerio Wall, 85.

54. Paquette, Enlightenment, Governance, and Reform in Spain and its Empire, 1759—1808, 6–9, 70–78. Quote 6.

55. Alarcia, El Ministerio Wall, 231–3.

56. Paquette, Enlightenment, Governance, and Reform in Spain and its Empire, 1759—1808, 6.

57. Wall to Tanucci, 22 March 1763, AGS, Estado, 6.094 quoted in Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 210. Wall to Tanucci, 23 August 1763. AGS, Estado, 6.094 quoted in Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 201.

58. Ward, Proyecto económico, 149.

59. Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 218–9.

60. Francisco de Craywinckel, Utilidad que podría sacar Espana … , op. cit., AHN, Estado, 2.927 quoted in Alarcia, El Ministerio Wall, 211–12; and Ward, Obra pía. Ward, Proyecto económico.

61. Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 226–31. For unclear reasons that are not elaborated upon, extant Spanish historiography gives Campomanes full credit for these reforms, often without mention of Nangle, Ward, or Wall.

62. Nangle to Wall, 14 December 1754, Archivo Historico Nacional (AHN), Estado (E) 3.188, 396 quoted in Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 220–1. The first Spanish trading companies were the Caracas Company (1728) and Havana Company (1740). Which is to say, Hiberno-Spaniards did not introduce these ideas but rather were influential supporters who made important contributions to the liberalisation of Spanish American trade. It is also worth noting that though Nangle supported the Company he was, like Ward, in favour of totally free trade. See: García, Compañías privilegiadas de comercio con América y cambio político (1706–1765), 66–7; Barrado, Compañías privilegiadas y excepcionalidad canaria el proyecto de Juan Bautista Savinon. 1990–2002.

63. Herr, Rural Change and Royal Finances in Spain at the end of the Old Regime, 9–34.

64. Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 202.

65. Quote in Alarcia, El ministerio Wall, 75.

66. Kuethe and Andrien, The Spanish Atlantic World in the Eighteenth Century, 236–43.

67. Ramírez, Alejandro O’Reilly en las Indias.

68. Conde de Ricla to Marques de Esquilache. December 14, 1763. AGS, Cuba, leg. 2342. Alejandro O’Reilly to Arriaga, Apr. 1, 1764, Archivo General de Simancas, Hacienda, 2342, fol. 330 r. Conde de Ricla to Marques de Esquilache. Havana, 14 December 1763. AGS, Papeles de Cuba (Cuba), Leg. 2342. No. 7 “Contiene copia de consulta al señor [illegible] con presupuesto de lo que puede producir a la Real Hacienda, comprando los azúcares de cuenta de Su Majestad con ventaja a los amos de los ingenios que van nominados y a los de España.” 1763. AGS, Cuba, Leg. 2342. Conde de Ricla to the Marques de Esquilache on 14 December, 1763. “Documentación sobre la expulsión de las jesuítas y la administración de sus bienes,” 1767–1768, AGI, Cuba, 1098. See also: Kuethe and Inglis, “Absolutism and Enlightened Reform: Charles III, the Establishment of the Alcabala, and Commercial Reorganization in Cuba,” Past & Present, 124. Schneider, The Occupation of Havana: War, Trade, and Slavery in the Atlantic World. Johnson, The Social Transformation of Eighteenth-Century Cuba. On Hiberno-Spanish slavers: Bailey, “Imperial Translators & The Bourbon Reforms: Hiberno-Spaniards and Spanish Slavery in the Greater Gulf Coast Borderland, 1713–1804,” Texas Gulf Historical and Biographical Record, 7–36.

69. Ward, Proyecto económico, 247–56, 261–3.

70. Don Alejandro O’Reilly to the Marques de Esquilache. December 8, 1763. AGS, Secretaría y Superintendencia de Hacienda (SSH), leg. 2342.

71. Alejandro O’Reilly to Don Julian de Arriaga. April 1, 1764. AGS, SSH, leg. 2342.

72. On Saint-Domingue, Haiti, and plantation capitalism: Burnard and Garrigus, The Plantation Machine.

73. See note 71 above.

74. Burnard and Garrigus, The Plantation Machine; Brown, Tacky’s Revolt, esp. 44–84.

75. McGrath, “Imperial barrack-building in eighteenth-century Ireland and Jamaica,”; and O’Kane and O’Neill, eds., Ireland, Slavery, and the Caribbean, 240–55.

76. See note 71 above.

77. Royal Cedula and instruction, and royal order. San Lorenzo, October 17, 1765. AGI, Santo Domingo, leg. 2188. Kuethe, Cuba, 1758–1815, 71–4; and Schneider, The Occupation of Havana. Ferrer, Freedom’s Mirror.

78. Defoe, An Essay Upon Projects.

79. Tutino, Making A New World, 3.

80. Ward, Proyecto económico, 87–8, 92–3.

81. Rodriguez, “The Spanish Riots of 1766,” 117–46.

82. Ibid.

83. Quote: “Discurso histórico sobre al alboroto acaecido en Madrid el domingo de Ramos, 23 de Marzo de 1766,” B.N., MS. 18090. Quoted in Rodriguez, “The Spanish Riots of 1766.” For an elaboration on the theory that the Motín was essentially a response to a subsistence crisis see: Vilar, “El Motín de Esquilache y las crisis del antiguo régimen” Revista de Occidente, 199–249.

84. Lynch, Bourbon Spain, 261–70.

85. Morales, Alejandro O’Reilly Inspector General, 133–41. Quote: “Alejandro O’Reilly to the Marquis de Grimaldi,” March 25, 1766. Archivo General de Simancas, GM, Suplemento, leg. 578. Quoted in Morales, Alejandro O’Reilly Inspector General, 139.

86. See note 81 above.

87. Thompson, “The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century,” 76–136. Dale Edward Williams, “Morals, Markets and the English Crowd in 1766,” 56–73. On Ireland: Kelly, Food Rioting in Ireland in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.

88. Rodriguez, “The Spanish Riots of 1766,” 117–146. See also: Ortiz, Carlos III y la España de la Ilustración, 104–58.

89. “Documentación sobre la expulsión de las jesuitas y la administración de sus bienes,” 1767–1768, AGI, Cuba, 1098. For more on the expulsion of the Jesuits and its longer historical antecedents and context, see: Van Kley, Reform Catholicism and the International Suppression of the Jesuits in Enlightenment Europe, 165–95.

90. Knight, “Origins of Wealth and The Sugar Revolution in Cuba, 1750–1850,” 237.

91. Bailey, The First Irish Diaspora in the Age of the Bourbon Reforms.