The history of these islands is intimately tied to the Anglo-French struggle over St Vincent and Grenada both of which, in 1783, became definitively English. The islands were primarily of strategic value because their small land area and lack of water meant they were hard to cultivate. That said, they attracted several families of French and British colonists who made the largest islands fertile using slave labour. After slavery was abolished the islands were left to go back to nature and the population turned to fishing and smallholding. Other than some mixed race people, there’s now little trace of the old European presence.

For some time the government of St Vincent has been encouraging private (and foreign) initiatives aimed at developing the islands under its authority. The result is a pretty spectacular explosion of tourism and development related to water sports, despite the difficulties of getting labour and materials to islands in the middle of nowhere. Bequia, the closest to St Vincent, and Union, close to the glorious Tobago Cays, are, thanks to their geographical situation and their airports, the two focal points of the N part of the archipelago.
The Grenadan dependencies of Carriacou and Petite Martinique, on the other hand, have stayed relatively untouched by the intense growth in tourism and as a result have a rather more authentic feel, if at the cost of facilities.