Nukulau Island

Nukulau Island is a small islet belonging to Fiji. It is close to Suva, Fiji's capital, which lies about ten kilometers to the west. It is an island rich in history, which has played a pivotal role in Fiji's demographic and political development over the past 160 years.

Nukulau played a role in the ceding of Fiji to the British Crown in 1874. In 1846, John Brown Williams, the American consul, had purchased the island for a mere thirty dollars. He subsequently lived there, in the wooden two-story house he built, until 1849. On 4 July of that year, during American Independence Day celebrations, a store belonging to Williams was destroyed in a fire which started from a cannon burst, and his belongings that he had salvaged from the fire were subsequently looted by Fiji natives. A second fire in 1855 destroyed Williams' house. Williams held Cakobau, the Vunivalu (Paramount Chief) of Bau and self-proclaimed Tui Viti (King of Fiji) responsible for the looting, and, supported by the United States Navy in the First Fiji Expedition, demanded US$43,531 in compensation, to cover Williams' losses, valued at US$5000, and claims by other settlers. This was followed up by a second American expedition in 1858, in which hostages were seized. Cakobau's inability to pay the debt, coupled with fear of a U.S. invasion and annexation, led to a series of negotiations with the United Kingdom. After a failed attempt to establish a stable constitutional monarchy under the effective tutelage of the Australian Polynesia Company, the negotiations culminated in a decision to cede the islands to the United Kingdom in 1874, ushering in almost a century of British rule.

Historians now believe that the U.S. compensation claim was greatly exaggerated and largely fabricated (see Robson, A.E, Prelude to Empire, 2004, p. 84 (citing Calvert 1856 and Freemantle 1856)).

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