Exuma

The Exumas are a chain of islands and cays in the clear, shallow waters of the Bahamas. Great Exuma and Little Exuma form the larger southern part of the chain, while many smaller cays stretch northwestward. The Lucayans lived here before Spanish slaving carried away the islanders in the sixteenth century.

After the American Revolutionary War, loyalists came to Exuma with enslaved Africans and established cotton plantations. Cotton growing brought a new population and a plantation economy to islands that had long been largely uninhabited. Salt production also became important, using the shallow ponds of the islands to supply a valuable commodity for preserving food. The low limestone islands, their sheltered channels and surrounding banks gave the settlers a markedly maritime setting.