The
West Indies Federation, also known as the
Federation of the West Indies, was a short-lived
Caribbean federation that existed from January 3, 1958 to May 31, 1962. It consisted of several Caribbean
colonies of the
United Kingdom. The expressed intention of the Federation was to create a political unit that would become
independent from Britain as a single state—possibly similar to the
Canadian Confederation, or
Australian Federation; however, before that could happen, the Federation collapsed due to internal political conflicts.
The total population of the West Indies Federation was between 3 and 4 million people, with the majority being of African descent. Minorities included Indians from the subcontinent (called East Indians), Europeans, Chinese, and Caribs. There was also a large population of mixed descent (mainly mulattos, but also Afro-Indian, Euro-Indian and mixed-Chinese). In terms of religion, most of the population was Protestant, with significant numbers of Catholics and some Hindus and Muslims (both almost exclusively from the East Indian population).
The West Indies Federation (or just West Indies) consisted of around 24 main inhabited islands and approximately 220-230 minor offshore islands, islets and cays (some inhabited, some uninhabited). The largest island was Jamaica, located in the far northwest of the Federation. To the southeast lay the second largest island, Trinidad, followed by Barbados, located at the eastern extremity of the Federation.
The Federation spanned across all the island groupings in the Caribbean
