Nothing Reigns but Confusion and Anarchy: Disease and Military Discipline in the Late-Eighteenth-Century Caribbean

This article relates how tropical disease ravaged the British army in the late-eighteenth-century Caribbean, using the San Juan expedition of 1780 as a case study. Based on eighteenth-century European understandings of epidemiology, martial and medicinal officials of the San Juan expedition believed that the outbreak of pestilence within the British army reflected a failure in discipline, properly provisioning troops, as well as overall leadership and planning. Thus, despite natural agents playing a significant role in stalling Britain's advance in Nicaragua, eighteenth-century military and medical authorities dictated that difficulties caused by disease and the environment could be overcome by human might. While the British ultimately could not overcome the devastating effects that tropical diseases had on the army, human agency also led to the expedition's failure. The British did not maintain good relations with their Indigenous allies, the Miskito, which resulted in their abandonment of the campaign. Consequently, they were left without crucial soldiers, guides, and labourers who were necessary to continue the invasion of Central America. Moreover, the Spaniards’ stout defence of their territory also hindered the British expeditionary force, stalling their advance at the Castillo de la Inmaculada Concepción. As a result, both natural and human agency dictated the outcome of the San Juan expedition.