Unfortunately, by the early 1600's the inhabitants of St. Kitts and its sister island, Nevis, had dwindled due to Spanish invasions, European diseases, and possibly forced labor on a disastrous Spanish pearl diving expedition.  Colonization of St. Kitts began in 1623 with the British and Sir Thomas Warner, his family, and fourteen others at Sandy Point and their settlement of Old Road Bay.  In 1625 French settlers led by Pierre Belain d'Esnambue and fleeing Spanish galleon attack joined the English.  The following year the English and French wiped out the Carib Indians in a massacre at Bloody Point.  The group then held off a Spanish attack in 1629 before focusing on colonizing the neighboring islands.  The English settled Nevis, Antigua, Barbuda, Tortuga, and Montserrat, while the French moved on to Martinique and Guadeloupe. 

By the mid 1600's St. Kitts and Nevis became increasingly prosperous and intermittent warfare between the British and French broke out as each tried to secure their position on the islands.  In 1664 the French exiled the British from St. Kitts only to lose the island back to the British 25 years later.  The French reclaimed the island in 1706 to lose it again almost immediately.  Finally, France definitively took control of St. Kitts in 1782 by laying siege to the massive British fort on Brimstone Hill where the English defended themselves heroically.  Ironically, St. Kitts was returned to British control the following year as part of the Treaty of Versailles.

Only the fortress at Brimstone Hill reminds people of the uneasy history of St. Kitts.  The island has been at peace since 1783 and the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis was established as an independent nation in British Commonwealth in September, 1983.  The island is democratically ruled with its economy based on tourism, sugarcane, and ecology.