of Florida, and it was here that Dominic de Gourgues landed when he made his expedition against the Spanish at San Mateo in 1568. An Indian mission was established by Spanish priests later in the same century, but it was not successful. When Georgia was founded, General James Oglethorpe placed a military guard on Amelia Island to prevent sudden attack upon his colony by the Spanish, and the first blood shed in the petty warfare between Georgia and Florida was the murder of two unarmed members of the guard by a troop of Spanish soldiers and Indians in 1739. The first permanent settlement was made by the Spanish in 1808, at what is now the village of Old Fernandina, about 1 m. from the city. The island was a centre for smuggling during the period of the embargo and non-importation acts preceding the war of 1812. This was the pretext for General George Matthews (1738–1812) to gather a band of adventurers at St Mary’s, Georgia, invade the island, and capture Fernandina in 1812. In the following year the American forces were withdrawn. In 1817 Gregor MacGregor, a filibuster who had aided the Spanish provinces of South America in their revolt against Spain, fitted out an expedition in Baltimore and seized Fernandina, but departed soon after. Later in the same year Louis Aury, another adventurer, appeared with a small force from Texas, and took possession of the place in the name of the Republic of Mexico. In the following year Aury was expelled by United States troops, who held Fernandina in trust for Spain until Florida was finally ceded to the United States in 1821. Fernandina was first incorporated in 1859. In 1861 Fort Clinch was seized by the Confederates, and Fernandina harbour was a centre of blockade running in the first two years of the Civil War. In 1862 the place was captured by a Federal naval force from Port Royal, South Carolina, commanded by Commodore S. F. Du Pont.
FERNANDO DE NORONHA [Fernão de N.], an island in the South Atlantic, 125 m. from the coast of Brazil, to which country it belongs, in 3° 50′ S., 32° 25′ W. It is about 7 m. long and 112 wide, and some other islets lie adjacent to it. Its surface is rugged, and it contains a number of rocky hills from 500 to 700 ft. high, and one peak towering to the height of 1089 ft. It is formed of basalt, trachyte and phonolite, and the soil is very fertile. The climate is healthy. It is defended by forts, and serves as a place of banishment for criminals from Brazil. The next largest island of the group is about a mile in circumference, and the others are small barren rocks. The population is about 2000, all males, including some 1400 criminals, and a garrison of 150. Communication is maintained by steamer with Pernambuco. The island takes name from its Portuguese discoverer (1503), the count of Noronha.
FERNANDO PO, or Fernando Póo, a Spanish island on the west coast of Africa, in the Bight of Biafra, about 20 m. from the mainland, in 3° 12′ N. and 8° 48′ E. It is of volcanic origin, related to the Cameroon system of the adjacent mainland, is the largest island in the Gulf of Guinea, is 44 m. long from N.N.E. to S.S.W., about 20 m. broad, and has an area of about 780 sq. m. Fernando Po is noted for its beautiful aspect, seeming from a short distance to be a single mountain rising from the sea, its sides covered with luxuriant vegetation. The shores are steep and rocky and the coast plain narrow. This plain is succeeded by the slopes of the mountains which occupy the rest of the island and culminate in the magnificent cone of Clarence Peak or Pico de Santa Isabel (native name Owassa). Clarence Peak, about 10,000 ft. high,[1] is in the north-central part of the island. In the south Musolo Mt. attains a height of 7400 ft. There are numerous other peaks between 4000 and 6000 ft. high. The
mountains contain craters and crater lakes, and are covered, most of them to their summits, with forests. Down the narrow intervening valleys rush torrential streams which have cut deep beds through the coast plains. The trees most characteristic of the forest are oil palms and tree ferns, but there are many varieties, including ebony, mahogany and the African oak. The undergrowth is very dense; it includes the sugar-cane and cotton and indigo plants. The fauna includes antelopes, monkeys, lemurs, the civet cat, porcupine, pythons and green tree-snakes, crocodiles and turtles. The climate is very unhealthy in the lower districts, where malarial fever is common. The mean temperature on the coast is 78° Fahr. and varies little, but in the higher altitudes there is considerable daily variation. The
rainfall is very heavy except during November-January, which is considered the dry season.
The inhabitants number about 25,000. In addition to about 500 Europeans, mostly Spaniards and Cubans, they are of two classes, the Bubis or Bube (formerly also called Ediya), who occupy the interior, and the coast dwellers, a mixed Negro race, largely descended from slave ancestors with an admixture of Portuguese and Spanish blood, and known to the Bubis as “Portos”—a corruption of Portuguese. The Bubis are of Bantu stock and early immigrants from the mainland. Physically they are a finely developed race, extremely jealous of their independence and unwilling to take service of any kind with Europeans. They go unclothed, smearing their bodies with a kind of pomatum. They stick pieces of wood in the lobes of their ears, wear numerous armlets made of ivory, beads or grass, and always wear hats, generally made of palm leaves. Their weapons are mainly of wood; stone axes and knives were in use as late as 1858. They have no knowledge of working iron. Their villages are built in the densest parts of the forest, and care is taken to conceal the approach to them. The Bubis are sportsmen and fishermen rather than agriculturists. The staple foods of the islanders generally are millet, rice, yams and bananas. Alcohol is distilled from the sugar-cane. The natives possess numbers of sheep, goats and fowls.
The principal settlement is Port Clarence (pop. 1500), called by the Spaniards Santa Isabel, a safe and commodious harbour on the north coast. In its graveyard are buried Richard Lander and several other explorers of West Africa. Port Clarence is unhealthy, and the seat of government has been removed to Basile, a small town 5 m. from Port Clarence and over 1000 ft. above the sea. On the west coast are the bay and port of San Carlos, on the east coast Concepcion Bay and town. The chief industry until the close of the 19th century was the collection of palm-oil, but the Spaniards have since developed plantations of cocoa, coffee, sugar, tobacco, vanilla and other tropical plants. The kola nut is also cultivated. The cocoa plantations are of most importance. The amount of cocoa exported in 1905 was 1800 tons, being 370 tons above the average export for the preceding five years. The total value of the trade of the island (1900–1905) was about £250,000 a year.
History.—The island was discovered towards the close of the 15th century by a Portuguese navigator called Fernão do Po, who, struck by its beauty, named it Formosa, but it soon came to be called by the name of its discoverer.[2] A Portuguese colony was established in the island, which together with Annobon was ceded to Spain in 1778. The first attempts of Spain to develop the island ended disastrously, and in 1827, with the consent of Spain, the administration of the island was taken over by Great Britain, the British “superintendent” having a Spanish commission as governor. By the British Fernando Po was used as a naval station for the ships engaged in the suppression of the slave trade. The British headquarters were named Port Clarence and the adjacent promontory Cape William, in honour of the duke of Clarence (William IV.). In 1844 the Spaniards reclaimed the island, refusing to sell their rights to Great Britain. They did no more at that time, however, than hoist the Spanish flag, appointing a British resident, John Beecroft, governor. Beecroft, who was made British consul in 1849, died in 1854. During the British occupation a considerable number of Sierra Leonians, West Indians and freed slaves settled in the island, and English became and remains the common speech of the coast peoples. In 1858 a Spanish governor was sent out, and the Baptist missionaries who had laboured in the island since 1843 were compelled to withdraw. They settled in Ambas Bay on the
