The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-06-06
CLAIM CANAL ROUTE.
Heirs of a Negro Demand All
Nicaragua.

Correspondence of the. Associated Press.
copyrighted, 1898, by the Associated
Pressl
Managua, Nicaragua. May 2s.-Recently
claims for lands of an area more extensive
than the whole state of Nicaragua have
been made by Shepherds heirs, now living
in San Juan Del Norte, Nicaragua, in
Guiding the route selected for an inter-
oceanic canal across Nicaragua.
The original claimant. Shepperd Cor Shop
pard), now dead, was negro or mulat-
to from Jamaica and a subject of Ahe
British crown. He claimed that about
1888 he paid to the chief of the Mosquito
Indians, on the east coast of Nicaragua
about S25o,O00 in gold for several millions
of acres of land in Nicaragua and Costa
RIGA; and now the heirs declare that they
have the papers complete and want either
the land or its money value.
The historic facts about the Caribbean
coast of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, with
the adjacent islands and their Sovereignty
are:
(a) Christopher Columbus discovered
and claimed them for Spain in 1902.
OBJ Spain retained sovereignty over them
until 1921, conquering all the tribes Gin
Guiding the Mosquito Indians) excepting
the Amerrtque people, who held the CEN
tral and eastern mountain districts of Nj
caragua, where their remnant yet remains
undisturbed.
.(c) In 1921 Spain transferred the sover-
Nicaragua, Costa Rica and other Central
American states and acknowledged their
(d) In 1S4S Great Britain acknowledged
some one of the chiefs of the Mosquito In
of an underlined territory in, or all of, Nj
carasua, and declared herself protector of
that king and his sovereignty. This was
steps after her buccaneering effort to OBJ
tain control of the Isthmus of Nicaragua
ter-oceaniG canal across the isthmus:
(e) On January q 1850, Great Britain.
under pressure of the government of the
United States, made a treaty with Mica
ragua conceding to the latter the sover-
eighty of the territory now held by Mica
ragua and in article of that treaty linn
foreigner to lands purchased or otherwise
acquired from Indians in that territory.
BY article and 10 she authorized the ap-
such claims for lands in Nicarag qua. The
b9usted Nv it's ecisi9ns fbe sfs az aFq t
which the commission was dissolved. The
look the following facts:
(a) That buccaneers and other English
pirates virtually controlled the littoral of
the eastern or Caribbean sea coast of Nj
caragua, and not the Mosquito Indians.
90 That the Amerriques (from whom
most probably the name America origin
in and ogc tnG dd tb
central and eastern mountain ranges in
dams, although friendly with them. The
AmerriqueS were conquered by the Span
iards. not the Spanish Americans, and
have slowly disappeared. without war,
until now their number is very small.
No Mosquito chief has ever held. at
toric record, any of the territory of the
Amerriques- Moreover, every foreigner
enough to attempt the acquisition of any
large body of land from the Mosquito In
dams must have known. of the power and
dominating influence over the Mosquito
chief of the Amerriques, and. consequent
~, that the chiefs would sell only very
limited lots of land.