Tomás O'Neill

Tomás O'Neill y Salmón (5 October 1764 – unknown) was a Spanish colonial governor of the western Caribbean archipelago of San Andrés, Providencia and Santa Catalina, today part of modern Colombia.

O'Neill was the son of an Irish father and Canarian mother, and bilingual in Spanish and English, which aided his later career. He became the interpreter on board the Spanish expedition sent to expel the English-speaking population of the archipelago in 1789, having arrived in the New World nine years earlier aged 16. Rather than expelling them as agreed to by the colonial powers under the Treaty of Versailles and the Convention of 1786, he was instrumental in not only helping secure the position of the English-speaking Protestant inhabitants, but becoming their governor, and having a significant impact on the islands at a pivotal time in their history.

Early life and career

Tomás Francisco O'Neill y Salmón was born in Puerto de la Orotava (today Puerto de la Cruz) in the municipality of La Orotava in Tenerife, on October 5, 1764 to Patricio O'Neill (28 April 1740 – 18 April 1768) and Catalina Salmón. His father, Patricio or Patrick, was a native of Waterford, Ireland, and was a vice consul for the British. He had married Catalina in January 1764, three years after arriving in Tenerife. Patrick had close connections with the network of Irish merchants operating from Tenerife, including the wealthy Cologan family. His mother, Catalina, was born in Tenerife, though both her parents, Thomas Salmón and Catalina (Catherine) Comerford, might have been Irish. It is likely Tomás O'Neill was named after his maternal grandfather Thomas Salmón, who had also acted as an interpreter in Tenerife.