Page 209 - Gobierno ivisible

Date: 4/5/2011 Page: 209 of 237

Admiral H. Arnold Karo, the director of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, stopped off to take the
census during a voyage of the survey ship Explorer.

In April, with much fanfare, it was announced in Washington that the population of Swan Island was twenty-
eight, a drop of four since 1950. In Tegucigalpa, Honduras, a group of students reacted indignantly to the claim of
sovereignty implied by the taking of the 1960 census. They announced plans to organize an expedition to plant
their country's flag on Swan Island. And in July, thirteen armed Hondurans arrived off Swan Island. The invaders
were repulsed single-handedly by John Hamilton, a Cayman Islander who was the Weather Bureau's native cook.

From their boat, the Hondurans shouted that they were coming ashore to place a marker on the beach claiming
Swan Island as their own. "Leave your guns in the boat," the intrepid cook ordered. The Hondurans meekly
complied. They came ashore, unarmed, sang the Honduran national anthem, took their own census and planted
their flag.

In Washington, the State Department announced solemnly that the government was awaiting a report from its
embassy in Tegucigalpa on the illegal landing by the Hondurans.

On Swan Island, the CIA took direct action to smooth things over. It invited the Hondurans to lunch. Horton
Heath announced that all was well.

But in October the dispute got into the United Nations. Francisco Milla Bermudez, the permanent Honduran
representative to the UN, told the General Assembly, on October 3, that the United States had occupied Swan
Island "against the right and will" of his government. "Historically, geographically and juridically," he declared,
"the Swan Islands are and always will be Honduran territory."

But the United States claim to the islands was solidly based on guano, specifically the Guano Act of 1856. Under
it, the President could issue a certificate when an American citizen discovered guano on an unclaimed island. This
gave the discoverer the right to collect and sell the guano, a valuable fertilizer rich in phosphates. The President,
at his discretion, could then designate the island as United States territory.

In 1863 such a certificate was issued for Swan Island to the New York Guano Company by Secretary of State
Seward, who acted for President Lincoln. Shortly after the turn of the century, the company abandoned the
islands. They were claimed in 1904 by Captain Alonzo Adams, an old salt who sailed out of Mobile, Alabama.

In the 1920s Honduras made several passes at the islands, but Washington warned Tegucigalpa to keep off and
sent along a copy of Seward's Guano Certificate to back up its territorial claim.

For a time the United Fruit Company harvested coconuts on the island, but the 1955 hurricane swept away all but
the three trees alluded to in the State Department travel brochure.

The CIA shared Swan Island with two other branches of the Federal Government: the Weather Bureau and the
Federal Aviation Agency. The Weather Bureau maintained a station, staffed by eight men, to take wind direction,
wind speed, temperature and humidity pressure. The FAA maintained a high-powered radio beacon as a
navigational aid to pilots."

The Weather Bureau people were rotated every three to six months, since they were not allowed to bring their
wives and children to Swan Island. A favorite pastime of gourmets among the government men was clonking
lobsters over the head with stones in the shallow water.