Ebon Atoll
 NASA picture of Ebon Atoll | |
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| Geography | |
|---|---|
| Location | North Pacific |
| Coordinates | 04°38′00″N 168°43′00″E / 4.63333°N 168.71667°E |
| Archipelago | Ralik |
| Total islands | 22 |
| Area | 5.75 km2 (2.22 sq mi) |
| Highest elevation | 3 m (10 ft) |
| Country | |
| Demographics | |
| Population | 714 (as of 1998) |
| Ethnic groups | Marshallese |
Ebon Atoll (Marshallese: Epoon, [ɛ̯ɛbʲɛ͡ɔː͡ɛnʲ][1]) is a coral atoll of 22 islands in the Pacific Ocean, and forms a legislative district of the Ralik Chain of the Marshall Islands. Its total land area is only 5.75 square kilometres (2.22 sq mi), but it encloses a deep lagoon with an area of 104 square kilometres (40 sq mi). A passage leads to the lagoon from the southwest edge of the atoll. The winding passage is called "Ebon Channel". Ebon Atoll is located approximately 155 kilometres (96 mi) south of Jaluit, and is the southern most landmass of the Marshall Islands as it is on the southern extremity of the Ralik Chain. In documents and accounts from the 1800s, it was also known as Boston, Covell's Group, Fourteen Islands, and Linnez.[2]
History
Ebon Atoll was a center for commercial whaling in the 19th century. The schooner Glencoe had been taken and its crew massacred by Marshallese at Ebon in 1851, one of three vessels attacked in the Marshal Islands in 1851 and 1852.[3] There were several motives, and by some accounts the ship's crew had been abducting island women for sale to plantation owners in other destinations.[3] Missionaries sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in Boston began missionary activities in the Marshall Islands in 1857, establishing a mission at Ebon.[3] It was claimed by the Empire of Germany along with the rest of the Marshall Islands in 1884, and the Germans established a trading outpost. After World War I, the island came under the South Pacific Mandate of the Empire of Japan who left a very small garrison late in WW II which was removed during an Allied LVT landing. Ebon Atoll was said by a combatant to be one of the most beautiful spots on earth.
Following the end of World War II, it came under the control of the United States as part of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands until the independence of the Marshall Islands in 1986.
On January 30, 2014, castaway Jose Salvador Alvarenga, a Salvadorian national who had been working in Mexico as a fisherman, was found by locals on Ebon after having washed ashore after drifting for 13 months on a 6,700 miles (10,800 kilometers) journey across the Pacific from Costa Azul, Chiapas, Mexico.[4]
References
- ↑ Marshallese-English Dictionary - Place Name Index
- ↑ Spennemann, Dirk H.R. (ed.). "Atoll Information – Ebon Atoll (Marshall Islands)". Digital Micronesia. Charles Sturt University.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Hezel, Francis X. (1994). The First Taint of Civilization: A History of the Caroline and Marshall Islands in Pre-colonial Days, 1521-1885. University of Hawaii Press. pp. 200–202. ISBN 978-0-8248-1643-8.
- ↑ "Castaway claims he drifted 13 months in Pacific". CNN.
- Young, James Lyle. "Brig Vision at Ebon Atoll (1876)". In Spennemann, Dirk H.R. Digital Micronesia: Marshall Islands History Sources 24. Charles Sturt University.
- Marshall Islands site
- Oceandots entry for Ebon at the Wayback Machine (archived December 23, 2010)
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UNKNOWN HEROS, George W. Sciple, Williams & Company Publishers, Savannah, GA, 2003, 2006