“Life was great back then,” remembers Mr. Austin nostalgically. “My first memory is of playing maypole and playing baseball on the same spot where the baseball field now is.”
Little Austin received little basic education on Utila and as a teenager he was sent to a high school run by Jamaicans in San Francisco ‘Frisco,’ Colón. The mainland school had an island flair as it employed teachers from Roatan and Bonacca. Mr. Austin graduated with a diploma and soon was offered a job at the United Fruit Company.

He was there for four years, graduated with a degree and was soon working as a “timekeeper” for United Fruit Company in La Lima, Cortés. His boss was the infamous Walter Turnbull, of the United Fruit Company. Mr. Austin decided to increase the pay rate of the workers from 19 to 20 Lempiras, he said Turnbull was furious. “He shouted: “Boys you cannot do that,” says Mr. Austin.

He lasted two years until the general strikes of 1954. The civil disorder began when President Juan Manuel Gálvez proposed a national eight hour workday and extra pay for work on holidays. The workers labor strike first began in Tela in April of 1954 then spread to the docks of Puerto Cortés. The protests eventually halted 25,000 of the company’s workers in Honduras and 15,000 workers from Standard Fruit. After 69 days the strike was resolved with increased pay and recognition of labor unions.

Mr. Austin eventually married Jane Bodden, an Utilan, but was hardly home. The absentee marriage never really worked, and Mrs. Jane moved to Miami.

He landed a passage on a boat heading to the US from Tela. Mr. Austin started working on “five hatcher ship” running passengers and cargo between Florida and Brazil, Buenos Aires and Tierra del Fuego. “I had 22 birthdays in Tierra del Fuego,” says Mr. Austin. He worked on the ship as AB (able seaman) sailor until 1976.

In 1959 his ship was docked in Havana harbor when the Cuban Revolution broke out. Castros “Barberos” were entering Havana and Mr. Austin found himself in a middle of a shootout. “There were bullets flying everywhere,” remembers Mr. Austin. “We hid under the bed of the hotel than sneak out back to the ship.” To give him a better chance at reaching safety Mr. Austin dressed up in woman’s shawl.

I am most proud of my children.

When he finally returned to Honduras, he found work at a cattle farm in Limoncito, Colón. After two years he arrived with 62 heads of cattle on Utila. He married and ended up having nine children.
“The bible says honor your father and your mother,” says Mr. Austin pensively. He has a wrinkled, white skin and deeply set-in eyes. “I am most proud of my children,” says Mr. Austin. “I have nothing to regret.”

The pirate became infuriated when he discovered that the two Spanish boats anchored in the bay, which he presumed to be loaded with valuable indigo, were in fact empty. The cruel Van Hoorn murdered the entire garrison of the fort, as well as most of the Trujillo’s population. He didn’t stop there and burned Trujillo to the ground.

After this latest outrage, the Spanish deemed the town indefensible against foreign attacks and abandoned it. The northeast coast of Honduras became virtually abandoned by the Spanish crown. The Spanish would not return to this part of Honduras for almost a hundred years.

Without troublesome Spanish interference, the British, Dutch, and French , solidified their settlements and trading posts on the Bay Islands and along the Miskito shore all the way to what is today Costa Rica. The British took advantage and established two fully equipped military forts. One was at Roatan’s Old Port Royal, improved by stones taken from fort in Trujillo. The other one was built at a prosperous sugar cane and mahogany logging town known as the Black River Settlement, 80 miles east of Trujillo.

The soldiers had little to do except to go hunting and fishing, as can be evinced from a menu from the 3rd Buff’s regimental dinner in Black River in 1770. On the menu were: calipash (a turtle delicacy), warree or wild pig steaks, broiled Indian rabbit, armadillo curry, barbaqued monkey; turtle soup, roasted antelope, giant mullet, smoked peccary, parrot, and stewed hicatee (a type of river turtle).

Soon the pirate’s idyllic lifestyle would come to an end. In 1779, with the American war of independence raging and all available British troops sent to fight in that campaign, the Spanish decided that the weakened British were worth attacking. They set out to expel the pirates from the Bay Islands and Miskito bases once and for all.

An army of 1600 men, including 200 battle hardened storm troopers assembled in Guatemala City under the command of the governor of Guatemala and Honduras, 57 year old Matias de Galvez. On December 17,1782 the expeditionary force began their long march to Trujillo.

British, Dutch, and French , solidified their settlements and trading posts on the Bay Islands

They reached Olanchito by February the following year and took the old Indian trail known as La Culebrina- the little snake, over the mountains. Reaching the Bay of Trujillo, they spent three days resting up in a place still known as Campamento, before attacking the town. Trujillo was empty as the small British army contingent there had prudently fled to Roatan upon hearing of the Spaniards approach.

The British sailed north and joined the small garrison of sixty soldiers under the command of Colonel Dalrymple at Old Port Royal. Here they awaited the Spanish attack.

It was not long in coming. The Spanish formally reoccupied Trujillo for the first time in 99 years. They secured the town’s defenses by manning the fort with 1,000 men. The remaining 600 men set sail for Roatan on March 15,1783 in three frigates: Santa Matilde, Antiope and Santa Cecilla.

Despite being outnumbered by eight men to one, Dalrymple initially vowed to fight to the death. However after a two day cannon bombardment that had reduced his fort to rubble and knocked out his only cannons, he was given the ultimatum of Deguello (no quarter) by Galvez and Dalrymple surrendered on March 18. The Spaniards spread out all over Roatan capturing runaway slaves, destroying farms, crops and torching any homes they found. In total some 500 dwellings were raised to the ground.

On March 21, 1783 the 81 surviving British soldiers and 135 settlers, were transported to Havana, Cuba as prisoners of war. Their boats, livestock, weapons, tools and furniture were shipped back to Trujillo as prizes of war. The 300 captured slaves were auctioned off in Havana.

The total cost of the invasion of Roatan was minimal. The Spanish had two men killed and four wounded, and the British suffered two dead and two wounded.

Galvez next turned his attention to “the tiny thorn in the foot of the Spanish empire,” the Black River settlement. That would prove to be a much harder nut to crack.