Spain, previously an ally of Great Britain, had been defeated in the War of the Pyrenees against France in 1795 and forced to sign the Peace of Basel.

An alliance convention between France and Spain had been signed the following year in 1796.

British forces in the Caribbean in 1796 have already taken French colonies such as Saint Lucia and later Dutch colonies in South America; Demerara and Essequibo.

With the Spanish now at war with Great Britain, the general Ralph Abercromby thinks it is right to necessarily render Spain's colonies an immediate object of attack.

His first target is the Spanish island of Trinidad, which being close proximity to Tobago which had been captured early in the war.

The island has been Spanish since the third voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1498 and since 1777 has a province of the Captaincy General of Venezuela.

On February 18, 1797, a fleet of eighteen warships under Abercromby's command of nvade and take the island.

Within a few days the last Spanish Governor, Don José María Chacón, peacefully surrenders the colony of Trinidad to Abercromby, without an effort at defense and without any casualties.