First settled by the Maya people, Spain was the first European country to attempt to form a settlement on the land that would become British Honduras; these attempts proved unsuccessful as the Maya drove the Spanish out. When settlers did start to colonize the land in the 1600s, they did so unofficially; officially Spain still possessed the colonization rights to the country, having made the prior claim of ownership. The unofficial settlers were British privateers and pirates whose presence would remain a cause for contention between Britain and Spain throughout the 18th century.British Honduras was used by the British as a logging colony to supply wood to the Empire. The last recorded slave rebellion in the country was the New River Revolt led by two slaves, Will and Sharper, in 1820. When martial law was declared and the militia was sent to quell the rebellion, the leader of the militia found that that the slaves 'had certainly good grounds for complaint' due to being 'treated with very unnecessary harshness by their Owner'. Will, Sharper and the rebel slaves were spared the lethal penalty which was the norm for rebelling slaves; Will and Sharper later disappeared. The slaves on British Honduras were freed in 1838, following 4 years of apprenticeship.British Honduras would be renamed Belize in 1973; however, tensions between Britain and Guatemala over who owned Belize continued to forestall its independence. As negotiations over ownership stalled, the colonized state appealed to the Non-Aligned Movement (of nations which are not part of any political bloc of countries) and the United Nations, for the right to self-determination. Belize won its Independence in 1981, yet it would take in excess of a decade before the threat of a Guatemalan invasion would be deemed to have passed and British troops would leave Belize.