Book contents
5 - The Rise and Fall of Greytown
from Part II
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 February 2026
Summary
This chapter will discuss the dramatic developments that enabled the Nicaragua route to become a serious contender to the Panama route in the early 1850s and its equally theatrical decline due to the bombing of its main port Greytown in the context of Anglo-American rivalries. While the bombardment exemplified U.S. gunboat diplomacy, the context of U.S. expansionism added a veneer of legitimacy to the act of destruction. In the aftermath of the bombardment, Nicaragua, which had entered the mid-century with dreams of a canal supported by American enterprise and money, plunged into a period of deep disillusionment and civil war.
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- The Link That DividesRace, Empire, and the Quest for the Nicaragua Canal in the Nineteenth Century, pp. 120 - 149Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
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