A boy’s silhouetted figure walks along a pier as volcanic mountains rise against a mauve-colored sky in St. Anne, Martinique. A French overseas department, this 425-square-mile (1,100-square-kilometer) Caribbean island boasts ruggedly beautiful landscapes and a legacy of Carib indigenous warriors so fierce that 16th-century Spanish conquistadores decided against trying to colonize it.

(Text adapted from and photograph shot on assignment for, but not published in, “The Caribbean: Sun, Sea, and Seething,” February 1980, National Geographic magazine)