There is no reliable information that shows the progress of the island during the 19th Century.  Even the census figures are questioned.  A reported 432,000 total population in 1804 is evidently no more than an estimate, yet it is very likely not far from the actual.  Concerning their distribution throughout the island, and the number engaged in different occupations, there are no records.  There are no acceptable figures regarding the respective numbers of whites and blacks.  Nor is there any record of the population in 1895, the year of the war for independence.  From the definite tabulation, under American auspices, in 1899, showing 1,576,797, it has been estimated that the number in 1895, was a little less than 1,800,000, the difference being represented by the disasters of the war, by the result of reconcentration, and by departures during the disturbance.  The general result seems to be that the population was practically quadrupled.  A somewhat rough approximation would show the blacks as multiplied by three, to an 1899 total of 505,000, with the whites multiplied by four, to a total of 1,067,000.  Nor are there figures of trade that afford any proper clue to the growth of industry and commerce.  There are records of imports and exports from about 1850 onward, but before that time the matter of contraband trade introduces an element of uncertainty.  An American official pamphlet on Cuban trade carries the statement, “the ascertainment of full and exact details of the commerce of Cuba prior to the close of Spanish dominion in the island is an impossibility.  The Spanish authorities, as a rule, published no complete returns of Cuban trade, either foreign or domestic.  Except with regard to Spain and the United States, most of the existing commercial statistics of Cuba, prior to 1899, are fragmentary and merely approximative.  Spain and the United States have always kept a separate and distinct trade account with Cuba; but the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and other European countries excepting Spain, formerly merged their statistics of trade with Cuba in one general item embracing Cuba and Porto Rico, under the heading of “Spanish West Indies.”  Since 1899, however, all the Powers have kept separate accounts with Cuba, and the statistics of the Cuban Republic have been reasonably full and accurate.”

[Illustration:  IRON GRILLE GATEWAY El Vedado, Suburb of Havana]

Cuba’s recorded imports in 1894 show a total value of $90,800,000, and exports show a value of $102,000,000.  Writing about the year 1825, Humboldt says:  “It is more than probable that the imports of the whole island, licit and contraband, estimated at the actual value of the goods and the slaves, amount, at the present time, to fifteen or sixteen millions of dollars, of which barely three or four millions are re-exported.”  The same authority gives the probable exports of that time as about $12,500,000.  The trade at the beginning of the century must have been far below this.