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the most extensively exploited of the guano island. On July 26, 1879, 
the American schooner Jos. Woolley, under CapL Benj. Hempstead, 
“took all the men and material on board’’ and sailed in tuns to Baker 
and Howland, where the guano works on these islands likewise were 
closed up. * 
On June 3, 1889, the island was annexed by Great Britain. In 1906 
it was leased to the Pacific Phosphate Company of London and Mel¬ 
bourne; but very little, if any, digging was done. 
On August 30, 1913, the barkentine Amaranth of San Francisco, 
C. W. Nielson, master, with a cargo of coal from Newcastle, N.S.W., 
for San Francisco, stranded on the south shore of Jarvis. The crew 
made their way safely in two boats, one reaching Pago Pago, September 
11; the other making Apia. The wreck of the Amaranth is scattered 
along the south shore, -and rounded fragments of coal still are to be 
found. 
In 1924 a scientific party from B. P. Bishop Museum visited Jarvis 
on the U.S.S. Whippoorwill, and made a biological survey of the island. 
On March 26, 1935, the American flag again was raised on Jarvis 
by a party of colonists, landed from the U. S. Coast Guard Cutter Itasca. 
This party 7 was in charge of William T. Miller, of the U. S. Department 
of Air Commerce, in whose honor the settlement has been called Millers* 
ville. 
Millersville steadily has been improved. Its tents were replaced by 
shacks, much of them built from wreckage from the Amaranth. These 
in turn were replaced by substantial houses of wood and stone, equipped 
with refrigeration and powerful radio. Weather observations, which 
have been made carefully and regularly, should be of great value to 
trans-Pacific fliers of the future. 
136 
i " m; ' .u.^gp^ i ppiy tr , 
Original camp on Jarvis Island, March 26, 1935 
Typical vegetation in a fresh water seep, Nassau Island, 1924. 
