When Malta had its own empire: The Order of Saint John’s Caribbean Venture (1651–1665)

When the Order of Saint John was forced out of Rhodes in 1522 and later offered Malta by Charles V in 1530, it did not arrive to the island alone. As part of the same grant, the Emperor also entrusted the Knights with Tripoli, a precarious North African outpost on the edge of Ottoman power. For the Hospitallers, the gift reflected both opportunity and burden: Malta promised a defensible stronghold in the central Mediterranean, while Tripoli exposed them to constant attack and financial strain. Although they would lose Tripoli to the Ottomans in 1551, the arrangement showed that the Order was already accustomed to managing far-flung territories beyond its European base. A century later, when the Knights briefly purchased islands in the Caribbean, it was not the first time that Malta held its own empire.

In May 1651, the Order of Saint John purchased four islands in the northeastern Caribbean; Saint Christopher (St. Kitts), Saint Martin, Saint Barthélemy, and Saint Croix, from the failing French Compagnie des Îles de l'Amérique. This bold move made the Knights of Malta the only non-sovereign organization to colonize parts of the Americas during the age of European expansion. The Order held these islands as a feudal proprietorship. King Louis XIV remained nominal sovereign, while the Knights obtained full jurisdiction over the islands. The Knights’ Caribbean episode lasted only about 14 years (1651–1665), but it marked a unique chapter in colonial history, intertwining the Maltese knights with the West Indies sugar trade and European power rivalries of the 17th century.

French Influence and Poincy’s Ambition

The Order of St John in the 17th century had a strong French presence in its ranks, and several Knights had been involved in French colonial enterprises from Canada to the Antilles. Philippe de Longvilliers de Poincy, a French nobleman and Knight of Malta, was the Governor of the French colony on St. Christopher since 1639. When the French chartered company that managed these islands began to collapse, Poincy sought to preserve his personal rule. In 1649 he proposed that the Order of Malta buy the islands outright, allowing him to remain in power under the Order’s authority rather than the French Crown’s direct oversight. Grand Master Giovanni Paolo Lascaris approved the idea, and the Knights formally acquired the islands in 1651 for a sum of 120,000 livres. By transferring the colonies to his religious Order, Poincy effectively insulated himself from interference by the French court.

Economic Motivations to the "Empire of Malta”

Beyond Poincy’s political gambit, economic opportunity was a key reason for the Knights’ Caribbean venture. The mid-17th century was the dawn of the sugar boom in the West Indies. Notably, around 1640 planters on St. Kitts had begun cultivating sugar cane, a far more lucrative crop than tobacco, using knowledge and equipment imported from Brazil. The Order’s purchase coincided with this “sugar revolution,” and this was no accident. Grand Master Lascaris and his council hoped the colonies would generate income for the Order’s coffers. Sugar production required a large labour force, and like other European colonizers the Knights turned to the Atlantic slave trade. At the time of the purchase, about 20% of St. Kitts’s population were enslaved Africans, but under the Knights’ tenure the number of enslaved people grew dramatically to fuel expanding sugar plantations. In short, the Knights of Malta were drawn by the promise of plantation profits, seeing these islands as new sources of wealth (sugar, rum, cotton) that could help finance the Order’s military and hospitaller activities.

Strategic and Geopolitical Factors

The acquisition also carried strategic benefits and prestige. By holding Caribbean possessions, the Order of St John joined the ranks of colonial players in the Americas, albeit in a limited way. It made the Maltese knights a participant in the balance of power between France, Spain, England, and the Netherlands in the West Indies. In fact, the Knights as lords of St. Christopher were obliged to maintain peace with a co-existing English colony on the other side of that island. The venture bolstered the Order’s profile: contemporaries recognized that even this small state in the Mediterranean could project its influence across the ocean. However, the Knights’ sovereignty was constrained. Under the 1653 agreement with France, only French members of the Order could be appointed to govern the islands, and each new French king was to receive a token tribute of a golden crown from the Order. Thus, the project was also a reflection of French patronage within the Order. Many of the Knights involved were French aristocrats, aligning the Order’s colonial experiment with France’s interests.

De Poincy’s Autocratic Rule

In practice, the Knights of Malta’s Caribbean territories were governed almost entirely by Philippe de Poincy during his lifetime. As Governor (later titled Lieutenant General for the Order) of Saint-Christophe and its dependencies, de Poincy exercised near-absolute authority, virtually running the islands as his personal fiefdom. He established his headquarters on St. Christopher (St. Kitts), where he constructed an imposing fortified manor, the Château de la Montagne, complete with gardens, barracks, workshops, and even a library. Contemporary observers marvelled at the opulence of de Poincy’s palace. It was said to make the Grand Master’s own palace in Valletta “seem like an outhouse” by comparison. De Poincy lived in luxurious splendour and maintained a large household of servants proudly wearing the eight-pointed Maltese cross livery. He devoted resources to strengthening the colony: building churches, roads, a hospital, and robust fortifications to defend against rival European powers and local threats. He also expanded French control to neighbouring islands, founding settlements on St. Barthélemy (1648) and St. Croix (1650) and fortifying them under the Order’s banner.

Plantation Economy and Society

Under the Knights’ administration, the Caribbean islands continued their transformation into plantation economies. De Poincy introduced or expanded sugar cane cultivation on St. Kitts and especially St. Croix, which he annexed in 1650 precisely for its promising land. He established sugar mills and encouraged clearing of forests to make way for plantations worked by enslaved labourers. The Order of St John, despite its religious-military character, fully embraced the prevailing colonial system of slavery and cash-crop agriculture. Even the Knights of Malta, famed for crusading against infidels and ministering to the sick “thought nothing of keeping slaves” on their Caribbean estates. During their tenure, the importation of African slaves increased substantially to meet labour demands, with enslaved people soon making up over half the population of St. Kitts and similar numbers on the other islands. The Knights’ officials (virtually all Frenchmen) treated both the enslaved Africans and the indigenous Carib people with the same harshness typical of other European colonizers – resistance was met with violence, enslavement, or expulsion. For example, on St. Barthélemy the native Carib (Kalinago) retaliated against the fledgling French settlement in 1656, killing many; de Poincy later re-populated and fortified the island with a new garrison of colonists. Similarly, when a rebellion on St. Croix toppled the Knights’ local regime in 1657, de Poincy dispatched forces to crush the revolt, rebuild forts and even establish a monastery, thereby restoring Order rule and paving the way for more plantations.

Relations with the Order and Other Powers

Although these islands were theoretically under the jurisdiction of the Grand Master in Malta, communication was slow and de Poincy largely acted on his own. He ignored or defied any authority that threatened his autonomy. Earlier he had famously repelled a royal commissioner (Noël de Thoisy) sent from France to replace him, even chaining and deporting the man. Under the Order’s ownership, de Poincy continued this independent streak. He was even suspected of embezzling funds from the Order’s European estates to fund his lavish projects, and he routinely shifted his debts onto the Order’s accounts. The Knights in Malta attempted some oversight by appointing advisors: in 1653 Charles de Montmagny (former Governor of Quebec and a Knight of Malta) was sent as “Proconsul” to supervise the colony’s finances, but Poincy promptly sidelined him and Montmagny died in exile on St. Kitts in 1657 without having effected much change.

After Poincy himself died in 1660, the Order at last gained a chance to assert direct control. Chevalier Charles de Sales, a relative of St. Francis de Sales, was appointed governor and brought a measure of stability to the islands’ administration. De Sales was respected by the colonists, and under his brief governorship (1660–1666) the economy and public order were reportedly kept on a steady course. Nonetheless, the Knights’ presence remained de facto tenuous. They had to coexist with an English colony on part of St. Christopher. In 1666, soon after the Order yielded its claims, a Franco-English war erupted on that island (in which Governor de Sales was killed in battle). Throughout the 1650s and early 1660s, de Poincy had skilfully maintained diplomatic balance with the neighbouring English and Dutch colonies and even the Spanish, avoiding major conflicts during the Order’s tenure. But ultimately, the Knights of Malta’s experiment in colonial governance depended heavily on one man’s rule; when Poincy was gone, the Order lacked the resources and resolve to maintain these far-flung possessions on its own.

The Sale of the Islands and End of Hospitaller Rule

By the early 1660s, the Caribbean venture was proving financially disappointing to the Order. Despite the flourishing sugar trade, the colonies had not yielded the profits that the Knights had hoped for. The Order still owed debt to France for the initial purchase price, and maintaining the garrisons and infrastructure had been costly. In Council meetings back in Malta, many Knights began to question whether holding onto these distant islands was worthwhile.

Meanwhile, the political climate had shifted in France: King Louis XIV’s new minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, was keen to consolidate France’s colonial empire. Colbert put pressure on the Knights to sell the islands back to French control. After lengthy negotiations, the Order of Saint John agreed in 1665 to relinquish its Caribbean territories. The islands were sold to the newly formed French West India Company (Compagnie des Indes Occidentales), as France reasserted direct authority over its West Indian colonies.

The financial terms of the sale were not especially favourable to the Knights. The agreed price was 500,000 livres (a sum considered low even then for four productive islands). Worse, the Order ultimately received only a fraction of this amount – about 100,000 livres in total settlement. In effect, the Hospitaller treasury lost money on the entire endeavour: they had paid 120,000 livres to acquire the islands and invested in their defence and development, only to recoup a paltry 100,000 at the end. A contemporary commission sent by the Grand Master had actually recommended trying to retain the islands and improve their economic exploitation. However, geopolitical reality and the Knights’ own limitations prevailed. In 1666, shortly after the formal transfer, French and English forces on St. Kitts fell into open war (part of a broader Anglo-French conflict), illustrating that these colonies would continue to be flashpoints of imperial rivalry. The Knights of Malta had neither the naval power nor the manpower to defend distant colonies in such major European wars. By 1665, the Order’s brief colonial experiment was over. They never again attempted to establish overseas colonies, focusing thereafter on their Mediterranean stronghold and traditional mission. As one historian notes, despite the fanfare of having owned St. Croix and its sister islands, the Knights’ long-term influence in the Caribbean was minimal. The Hospitallers had been proprietors rather than nation-state colonizers, and once they sold the territory, their direct involvement in American affairs ceased entirely.

Influence on Malta and Legacy

The Caribbean interlude of 1651–1665 had limited direct impact on daily life in Malta, but it did have some financial and political repercussions for the Order. The funds diverted to purchase and maintain the islands meant fewer resources for other projects in Malta and Europe. Indeed, de Poincy had drawn on the Order’s European commandery incomes to fund his lavish colonial regime, effectively taxing the Order’s treasury for his own purposes.

The venture’s failure to turn a profit became a point of concern among the Knights’ leadership in Valletta. We see evidence of internal debates in Malta about the colonies’ fate, which suggests some Knights were enthusiastic about the potential wealth and strategic value, while others saw the colonies as an expensive distraction. Ultimately the decision to sell was made in light of the Order’s core priorities: defending Malta and the Mediterranean against Ottoman threats and corsairs, and sustaining their hospitals and fortifications. In that sense, the episode reinforced a lesson for the Order, that its strength and mandate lay in the Old World, not in overseas imperialism.

After 1665, the Order of St John refocused on its Mediterranean role, and its later attempts at colonial engagement were minor. For instance, decades later a French Hospitaller, Étienne-François Turgot, attempted to settle Maltese families in French Guiana in the eighteenth century, but that plan failed.

On Maltese society at large, the direct influence of the Caribbean ownership was probably subtle. The Order did not, for example, transplant any significant number of Maltese settlers to the Caribbean (the colonists were mostly French). Nor did the islands’ products revolutionize Malta’s economy – sugar and tobacco from the New World were already reaching Europe via established trade routes, and any shipments the Order received would have been a tiny drop in the Mediterranean trade network. It is possible that sugar became a bit more accessible to the Hospitaller elite in Malta during this period, but there was no lasting economic dependency in Malta on those colonies.

Culturally and socially, most Maltese in the 1650s remained preoccupied with local concerns (like periodic Ottoman naval raids) and may have only heard faint echoes of their knights’ exploits in the “West Indies.” However, the fact that the Knights of St John briefly held American islands did enter the annals of Maltese history. It added a curious footnote to the story of a religious military order that had already fought on three continents. In Maltese historical memory, this episode is sometimes highlighted to illustrate the global reach of the Order. The Knights of Malta once flew their flag in the Caribbean. Indeed, one of the symbols of the Order, the eight-pointed Maltese Cross, still appears on the coat of arms of Saint Barthélemy, reflecting the legacy of Hospitaller rule there.

Legacy in the Caribbean

In the Caribbean itself, the Knights’ short-lived sovereignty left few tangible traces but is recognized as part of local history. On Saint Croix, historians often count the Knights of Malta among the “seven flags” that have flown over the island (alongside Spanish, Dutch, English, French, Danish, and American). Ruins of Forts and estates from the 1650s can be connected to de Poincy’s era. For example, remnants of the Château de la Montagne on St. Kitts survive as an archaeological site, a reminder of the grandeur with which a Knight of Malta governed in the tropics.

References:

Anne Brogini, Effective management of public slavery in Hospitallers’ Malta, Bulletin of the Institute  of Classical Studies, Volume 64, Issue 2, December 2021, Pages 51-59.

Freller, Thomas, and Zammit, William. Knights, Buccaneers and Sugar Cane: The Caribbean Colonies of the Order of Malta. Midsea Books, 2015.

St. Croix and the Knights of Malta - https://www.stcroixtimes.com/post/st-croix-and-the-knights-of-malta#:~:text=The%20Hospitallers%2C%20bought%20Saint,8

Allen, David F. (1990). "The Social and Religious World of a Knight of Malta in the Caribbean, c. 1632-1660"

How the Sweetness of Sugar Cane brought the Order of Malta to the Caribbean - https://museumstjohn.org.uk/how-the-sweetness-of-sugar-cane-brought-the-order-of-malta-to-the-caribbean/#:~:text=As%20a%20historian%20of%20early,to%20their%20title%20during%20the

Marie Benoit's Diary: The Order of St John’s Caribbean adventure - https://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2018-02-06/newspaper-lifestyleculture/Marie-Benoit-s-Diary-The-Order-of-St-John-s-Caribbean-adventure-6736184494