About St. Lucia

Covering 238.23 square miles, St. Lucia is three and a half times the size of Washington, DC. The island is 27 miles long and 14 miles across at its widest point.

About 165,000 people live in St. Lucia, most around the coastal perimeter of the mountainous island. About 60,000 people live in or near Castries, the capital city on the northern part of the island.

St. Lucia is said to be named after St. Lucy of Syracuse by French sailors who were shipwrecked on the island on the Saint’s feast day of December 13th.

St. Lucia is the world’s only country named after a woman.

The French were the island’s first European settlers. They signed a treaty with the native Carib Indians in 1660.

England took control of the island from 1663 to 1667.

France and England fought over St. Lucia throughout the 17th and early 18th centuries with possession changing 14 times between the two countries. Because it switched so often between British and French control, St. Lucia was also known as the “Helen of the West Indies“.

In 1814, the British took definitive control of the island.

From 1958 to 1962, the island was a member of the Federation of the West Indies. On February 22, 1979, St. Lucia became an independent state of the Commonwealth of Nations associated with the United Kingdom.

The above background information was quoted from: https://www.un.int