Did You Know: How Balandra got its name?
"Balandra got its name in 1797 just after the British general Sir Ralph Abercromby seized Trinidad from Spain. Following the conquest Abercromby sent his captain of the Royal Engineers, Frederick Mallet, to sail around the island and find out as much as he could about it. There was the need to inform the British Secretary of State for the Colonies what sort of island he had captured, because the British had had little knowledge of Trinidad. The only reason they had attacked it was because the French republicans had been striking at the British in the Windward Islands and fleeing to sanctuary in Trinidad.
This infuriated the British because Spain was neutral in that war. It led to flagrant British transgressions, forcing Spain to declare hostilities. When they did, General Sir Ralph Abercromby, Chief of the British Expeditionary Forces, pounced on Trinidad and took it.
It was therefore important to the British to know what Trinidad was like and what resources it contained, if only for the fact that when the war ended Britain would have to decide whether it would keep Trinidad or return it to Spain.
Abercromby had asked Captain Mallet to draw a map of Trinidad putting in such things as what the various settlements were called and what crops were grown there, and knowing that Trinidad was recently settled by Caribbean French planters under a Spanish Cédula, he wished to know what was the population, how much granted land was there, and granted to whom.
Mallet set out going round by the north coast and he landed at every settlement he spotted. He was so meticulous that his map shows, by anchor symbols, every landing he makes, and he gives the description of every crop, takes a census of the people, and shows every block denoting land granted to the settlers, and with the names of the settlers inscribed on the map.
Maybe it was curiosity which made him slip into a deeply-indented, lush and scenic cove, nearly half-way down on the east coast, and he met a Spanish garrison there, a garrison that may not even have known that the war had ended. He asked the Spanish soldiers what was the place called and they did not know.
They said they were there simply to protect the coast. But Mallet saw some huge boats in the bay and the soldiers told him the boats came there to bring provisions from the capital, Puerto España, since there were no roads to the east coast. They were large boats and Mallet asked what type of boats were they. The answer was Balandra.
To name the place Mallet wrote on that spot on his map: “Balandra.”