A WEST INDIAN ISLAND OWNED BY AMERICANS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVIII, Issue 8011, 16 February 1887, Page 4

A WEST INDIAN ISLAND OWNED BY AMERICANS.

Bat few people are aware that a company of capitalists and merchants Of New York and Baltimore own Navassa Island in the West Indies, about forty-five miles from San Domingo, and about seventy-five miles from Jamaica. The island was occupied by E. KCooper, a Baltimore sea captain, in 1857, who quietly took possession of it as an American citizen, and afterward sold it for a round million dollars. The Haytien Government attempted to annex the island after they saw the Americans were going to make something out of it, but Captain Cooper's conquest held good, and the Stars and Stripes float over it to this day, NavasSa is but three milea long by one and a balf in width. It is a rock rising fifty or sixty feet out of the sea, with grasses and palms growing on its crown. It was, no doubt, discovered by Columbus. Washing* ton Irving, in bis life of Columbus, speaks of one of the lieutenants of the great discoverer landing with several companions on Navassa in 1504, on their way from Jamaica to San Domingo in canoes. The island was uninhabited when the American adventurer hoisted his flag over, but pieces of pottery ahd Stohe implements of fine finish have been found in the phosphate beds which indicate that it was inhabited in the past. The French used it for a short time as a convict settlement during their occupation of Hayti, about 1790. It wae soon abandoned, however, because of buccaneers taking the convicts off to recruit their crews.

It was a moat desirable rendezvous of pirates as a landing cannot be made except in tha most favorable weather, and no vessel could approach in the day time without being seeh in good time. Caverns from 30 to 130 feet deep furnished abundant hidingplaces for men ■ and plunder. JS o nation claimed the island, and Captain Cooper came across it while searching for guano. It is a barren rock, and valued for its phos. phate deposits, 30,000 tons of which are mined annually and sold in the United States for fertilising purposes, at an average of Sdols per ton. The Island is worth 1,000,000d015, with a plant of machinery,&o., valued at half that sum. One hundred and fifty men are worked. They are mostly colored laborers taken out Irom.Baltimore. In calm, clear weather the mountain peaks of Cuba can be traced ninety miles away. The island is rock-bound bn all sides, the landings are made in small boats, and the ascent is made by steps blasted and hewn out of the solid rock. The phosphate pro. duct is carried down to the water by tramways and then floated out to the ship in lighters.—Washington Hatchet.