Caroline Islands

 

archipelago, c.830 sq mi (2,150 sq km), W Pacific, just north of the equator. The largest islands are Palau (Belau), Yap, Chuuk (Truk), Pohnpei (Ponape), and Kosrae. The islands are fertile and rich in minerals. There are deposits of phosphate, guano, bauxite, and iron; coconuts, sugarcane, and tapioca are produced. The chief exports are dried bonito, copra, and tapioca. Most of the inhabitants are Micronesian, but in the eastern islands there are some Polynesians. There is evidence of Chinese contact with the western islands in the 7th cent. A.D. The first Europeans to visit the Carolines were the Spanish in 1526, but the islands did not come under Spain's control until 1886. After the Spanish-American War the islands were sold (1899) to Germany. They were occupied in 1914 by the Japanese, who in 1920 were given a League of Nations mandate over them. Annexed to Japan in 1935, the islands were heavily bombed prior to American occupation during World War II. The Carolines were placed under U.S. administration by the United Nations in 1947, becoming part of the U.S. Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. The islands are now divided between two separate political entities: the Federated States of Micronesia, which became independent in 1986, and Palau, which became independent in 1994; both nations have compacts of free association with the United States.

Not to be confused with Caroline Island, part of Kiribati (Southern Line Islands), also in the central Pacific Ocean.

The Caroline Islands form a large archipelago of widely scattered islands in the western Pacific Ocean, northeast of New Guinea. Politically they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end. Historically, this area was also called Nuevas Filipinas or New Philippines.

Description

The group consists of about 500 small coral islands, east of the Philippines, in the Pacific Ocean; the distance from Manila to Yap, one of the larger islands of the group, is 1200 miles.

Most of the islands comprise low, flat coral atolls, but some rise high above sea level.

People and culture

The native inhabitants speak a variety of Micronesian languages including Yapese, Pohnpeian, Chuukese, and Kosraean, as well as the Western Malayo-Polynesian language Palauan. Other significant populations would include Filipinos and Japanese.

The natives live mainly by horticulture and fishing, also supplementing their diet with many different varieties of bananas and taro, either of the "swamp" or "purple" varieties. On some islands housing continues to be built with local materials including coconut thatch. The language spoken in commerce is English, but there are several indigenous dialects. They traditionally believe in a Supreme Being (Yalafar) and in a bad spirit (Can), yet they have hardly any religious rites. Due to extensive missionary work, Christianity is the primary religion practiced in this region of Micronesia.

History

Discovered to the occidentals in 1526, by the Spanish Toribio Alonso de Salazar, he called them "Carolinas" after the emperor Carlos I of Spain, and Charles V of Holy Roman Empire. The Portuguese Diego da Rocha, explorer of the Carolines, also named them the Sequeira Islands in 1527. Though early Spanish navigators in the area (from 1543) called them the Nuevas Filipinas ("New Philippines"), Admiral Francisco Lazeano named them the Carolinas after the Spanish King Charles II in 1686.

Some few Western travellers subsequently visited the islands, but an early visit of missionaries (1732) resulted in one of several murderous attacks on the newcomers; and only in 1875 did Spain, claiming the group, make some attempt to assert her rights. The Caroline Islands were subsequently placed under the Spanish East Indies, administered from the Philippines. Germany, which had occupied Yap, disputed the Spanish claim, and the matter went to the arbitration of Pope Leo XIII in 1885. He decided in favor of Spain, but gave Germany free trading rights. The Spanish did not occupy any island formally until 1886.

Then on 1 June, 1899, after the Spanish-American War of 1898, Spain sold the islands to Germany for 25,000,000 pesetas (nearly 1,000,000 pounds sterling), which administered them as Karolinen, administratively associated with German New Guinea.

Japan occupied the islands in 1914 and received a League of Nations mandate over them in 1920, but after World War II the islands became trust territories of the United States, eventually gaining independence (1986 / 1994).

Colonial governors or officers

District officers (from 1889, styled Bezirksamtmann):

In the western Caroline islands (Yap and Palau [and from 1907 Saipan])-

• 29 June 1886 - 18.. Manuel de Elisa
• .... - .... ....
• before November 1897 - after November 1898 S. Cortes
• 1899 - 1909 Arno Senfft (b. 1864 - d. 1909)
• 1909 Rudolf Karlowa
• 1909 - 1910 Georg Fritz
• 1910 - 1911 Hermann Kersting
• 1911 - 1914 Baumert

In the Eastern Caroline islands (Ponape [and from 1911 Marshall Islands])-

• June 1886 - 1887 Capriles
• 14 March 1887 - 1887 Isidro Posadillo (d. 1887)
• October 1887 - January 1891 Luis Cadarso y Rey (d. 1898)
• c.1894 Concha
• before November 1897 - after November 1898 J. Fernandez de Cordoba
• 12 October 1899 - August? 1901 Albert Hahl (b. 1868 - d. 1945)
• 1 September 1901 - 30 April 1907 Victor Berg (b. 1861 - d. 1907)
• 1907 - 1908? Girschner (acting)
• 1908 - 1909 Georg Fritz
• 1909 - 18 October 1910 Gustav Boeder (d. 1910)
• 191. - 7 October 1914 August Überhorst

Ecclesiastical history

Two Jesuits, John Anthony Cantova and Victor Walter, attempted missionary work there in 1731; the former was soon murdered, the latter obliged to flee. Two other Jesuits were killed later. In 1767 the Jesuits were suppressed in the Spanish dominions, and during the next 120 years there is no trace of a missionary.

The controversy between Germany and Spain concerning the possession of the Carolines having been settled by Pope Leo XIII in favour of Spain, the king directed Spanish Capuchins to the islands, 15 March, 1886, and the Propaganda Fide officially established that mission, 15 May, 1886, dividing it into two sections, named West and East Carolines respectively. Until then the islands had belonged ecclesiastically to the Vicariate Apostolic of Micronesia. The Spanish Capuchins had a catechism and prayer book printed in the Ponape dialect, and Father Anthony of Valentia wrote a small grammar and dictionary of the Yap dialect in 1890.

When the Spanish Fathers had laid the foundations of the mission, these islands passed by purchase into the hands of Germany in 1899. Spain had contributed more than $5000 a year towards the mission; Germany granted no support. Spain had compelled the aborigines to send their children to school; Germany gave full liberty in this regard, and the people consequently began to neglect school as well as church. The mission thereby suffered greatly, and the Propaganda finally deemed it advisable to replace the Spanish Capuchins with others of German nationality (7 November 1904) and to erect one Apostolic prefecture instead of the two separate missions (18 December 1905). The Very Reverend Father Venantius of Prechthal was appointed first prefect Apostolic.

In 1906 twelve fathers and twelve brothers were working in thirteen stations, and several Sisters of St. Francis left Luxembourg to take charge of the ten schools, in which were 262 children. Ninety adult converts were the harvest of that year, and the Catholic population is given as 1900 among 11,600 heathens and a few Protestants. The United States Government sent, 1 July, 1905, a Jesuit from the observatory at Manila to erect a meteorological station on the island of Yap, of which station the Capuchin Father Callistus was appointed director. The origin of the East-Asiatic typhoons had been traced to these regions, and twice a day observations are made, and notice is frequently given to Manila by cable.

Postage stamps

In their first year as a German Schutzgebiet, the Carolines used postage stamps of Germany overprinted "Karolinen". Few examples of these survive today, especially in cancelled condition. In 1901, Germany issued its "Yacht" series with a common design for all of Germany's colonies, featuring the Kaiser's yacht Hohenzollern. The issues for the Carolines featured the inscription "KAROLINEN", all with mark and pfennig denominations. Many unused copies of the low values still exist today, left over after the Japanese occupation, but as one might expect from the short period of German rule and the very small numbers of letter-writers living in the Carolines, genuinely used stamps are both uncommon and prized.

Sources and references

(incomplete)

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913.
• WorldStatesmen- Micronesia (not yet properly exploited)

List of former German colonies and protectorates

Colonies Africa Wituland · German East Africa (Tanganyika • Rwanda • Burundi) · German South-West Africa (Namibia) · German West Africa (Kamerun  • Neukamerun  • Togoland) Pacific German Samoa · German New Guinea (German Solomon Islands · German Marshall Islands · Caroline Islands · Mariana Islands · Nauru · Palau) Concessions China Kiaochow (Kiautschou) · Tsingtao      Unrecognised Antarctica New Swabia

Coordinates: 6°03′N, 147°05′E

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