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American Tropics
Flows, Migrations, and Exchanges
Mart A. Stewart and Harriet Ritvo, editors

The Flows, Migrations, and Exchanges series publishes new works of

environmental history that explore the cross-­border movements of organisms
and materials that have ­shaped the modern world, as well as the varied ­human
attempts to understand, regulate, and manage ­these movements.
Mega n R a by

American Tropics
The Ca­rib­bean Roots of Biodiversity Science

The University of North Carolina Press Chapel Hill

This book was published with the assistance of the Wells Fargo Fund for
Excellence of the University of North Carolina Press.
© 2017 The University of North Carolina Press
All rights reserved
Set in Arno Pro by Westchester Publishing Ser­vices
Manufactured in the United States of Amer­i­ca

The University of North Carolina Press has been a member of the

Green Press Initiative since 2003.

Library of Congress Cataloging-­in-­Publication Data

Names: Raby, Megan, author.
Title: American tropics : the Ca­rib­bean roots of biodiversity science / Megan Raby.
Other titles: Flows, migrations, and exchanges.
Description: Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, [2017] | Series: Flows,
migrations, and exchanges | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017009456| ISBN 9781469635590 (cloth : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9781469635606 (pbk : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781469635613 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Biodiversity—­United States—­History—­20th ­century. |
Biology—­Fieldwork—­Caribbean Area—­History—­20th ­century. |
Biology—­Fieldwork—­Political aspects—­Caribbean Area. |
Biology—­Fieldwork—­United States—­History—­20th ­century. |
United States—­Foreign relations—­1897–1901. | United States—­
Foreign Relations—­20th ­century.
Classification: LCC QH541.15.B56 R33 2017 | DDC 333.95—­dc23
LC rec­ord available at https://­lccn​.­loc​.­gov​/­2017009456

Cover illustration: Scientists at the Canal Zone Biological Area, Barro Colorado
Island, Panama, pose at the foot of Bombacopsis fendleni, a.k.a. the “spiny cedar”
(Smithsonian Institution Archives, Image SIA2011-0102).
Portions of this book ­were previously published in a dif­fer­ent form. Chapter 1 includes
material from “A Laboratory for Tropical Ecol­ogy: Colonial Models and American
Science at Cinchona, Jamaica,” in Spatializing the History of Ecol­ogy: Sites, Journeys,
Mappings, ed. Raf de Bont and Jens Lachmund (New York: Routledge, 2017), 56–78.
Chapters 2 and 3 include material from “Ark and Archive: Making a Place for Long-­term
Research on Barro Colorado Island, Panama,” Isis (2015): 798–824. Used ­here
with permission.
Contents

Acknowl­edgments ix
Abbreviations in the Text xiii
Introduction: From Tropicality to Biodiversity 1
Ch a p te r On e
An American Tropical Laboratory 21
Ch a p te r T wo
Making Biology Tropical 58
Ch a p te r Thr ee
Jungle Island 97
Ch a p te r Four
The Question of Diversity 131
Ch a p te r Fi ve
A Global Resource 172
Epilogue: Postcolonial Ecol­ogy 206
Notes 219
Bibliography 267
Index 311
This page intentionally left blank
Illustrations, Maps, and ­Table

Il lu str ations
BioDiversity cover 3
Map showing Cinchona, Jamaica 38
Cinchona, 1903 40
Jamaican field assistant 48
Research at Cinchona 50
Thomas Barbour at Soledad, Cuba 61
Map of Harvard’s station at Soledad 69
Laboratory at Soledad 74
William Beebe in British Guiana 75
Beebe and the Roo­se­velts at Kalacoon, British Guiana 76
­Women in the field in British Guiana 82
Map of Kalacoon 84
Barro Colorado Island, circa 1930 98
Men on Barro Colorado Island 105
Laborer’s haircut on Barro Colorado Island 113
Nemesia Rodriguez, cook at Barro Colorado Island 116
Camera trap photo­graph 121
Barro Colorado Island trail system 124
Ecologists on Barro Colorado Island 129
A rainforest profile diagram 145
Irradiating El Verde, Puerto Rico 157
Energy diagram of El Verde 158
Graph of species diversity 168
Edward O. Wilson at Soledad 174
Cartoon depicting Harvard’s station at Soledad 178
viii Illustrations, Maps, and ­Table

Logo of the Organ­ization for Tropical Studies 190

An agreement for scientific collaboration 211
Map of Organ­ization for Tropical Studies sites, Costa Rica 212
Teleconference on BioDiversity, 1986 215

Maps
U.S. biological stations in the circum-­Caribbean, 1899–1969 10
Barro Colorado Island, Panama Canal Zone 99

­T a bl e
4.1. Species diversity t­ able 147
Acknowl­edgments

This book is a product of the time for research and writing generously pro-
vided by fellowships at the Smithsonian Institution Archives and National
Museum of American History and the Institute for Historical Studies, Uni-
versity of Texas at Austin. Travel for research and sharing ideas was also sup-
ported by JSTOR Global Plants and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; the
National Science Foundation CHANGE-­IGERT, Nelson Institute for Envi-
ronmental Studies, University of Wisconsin Madison; and the College of
Liberal Arts, University of Texas at Austin.
Although it sometimes feels like it, no book is a solitary endeavor. Histori-
cal research is pos­si­ble only ­because of the dedicated work of archivists and
librarians. I have many to thank, but my time at the Smithsonian Institution
Archives was certainly the foundation of this proj­ect. This is not only ­because
of the tremendous resources available t­ here but also ­because of Pamela Hen-
son’s invaluable mentorship from the very beginning of my ­career as a histo-
rian. Thank you also to Courtney Bellizzi, Ellen Alers, Tad Bennicoff, and the
­whole archives staff. I have been fortunate in finding enthusiastic and skilled
guidance at ­every collection I consulted—­indeed, several individuals went far
beyond the call of duty in helping me. My sincerest thanks go to Mai Reit-
meyer and Colin Woodward at the American Museum of Natu­ral History
Research Library; Mary LeCroy of the American Museum of Natu­ral His-
tory, Department of Ornithology; Lizeth Zepeda at the Arizona Historical
Society; Sheila Connor, Lisa Pearson, and Larissa Glasser at the Arnold Ar-
boretum Archives of Harvard University; Amy McDonald at the Duke Uni-
versity David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library; Nancy
Korber at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden Special Collections; the staff
of the Harvard University Archives; Jim Stimpert at the Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity Ferdinand Hamburger Archives; Andrew Colligan at the Missouri Bo-
tanical Garden Archives; Janice Goldblum at the National Academies
Archives; Chris Killillay and Tim Nenninger at the National Archives and
Rec­ords Administration; the staff of the New York Botanical Garden Mertz
Library Archive; the Organ­ization for Tropical Studies fiftieth anniversary
oral history proj­ect; the staff of Prince­ton University Library’s Manuscripts
Division; Tom Rosenbaum at the Rocke­fel­ler Archive Center; Vielka Chang-­Yau,
x Acknowl­edgments

Angel S. Aguirre, Marialuz Calderon, Ron Herzig, and Alvin Hutchinson at

the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute Earl S. Tupper Tropical Sciences
Library; and Kerry Prendergast and Sana Masood at the Wildlife Conserva-
tion Society Library and Archives. I also thank the staff of the University of
Wisconsin Libraries, University of Texas Libraries, and interlibrary loan
librarians everywhere.
Many p­ eople have contributed conversation, camaraderie, or other forms
of key assistance or insight at just the right moment. It is a ­great plea­sure to
thank Anabelle Arroyo, Mitch Aso, Robert Beattie, Erika Bsumek, Guillermo
Castro Herrera, Catherine Christen, John Christy, Thomas Croat, Fritz Davis,
Raf de Bont, Peter Del Tredici, Carmela Diosana, Laura Flack, Arturo Flores,
Seth Garfield, Fred Gibbs, Lawrence Gilbert, Allen Herre, Dr. Jones, Rachel
Koroloff, Jens Lachmund, Matthew Larsen, Marixa Lasso, Egbert Leigh, Dan
Liu, Jonathan Losos, Scott Mangan, Alberto Martinez, Katherine McLeod,
Courtney Meador, Samantha Muka, Rachel Page, Germán Palacio, Steven
Paton, Pedro Pruna, Lynnette Regouby, Ann Saudek, Tony Saudek, Robin
Scheffler, David Singerman, Jeffrey Stine, Jenna Tonn, Greg Urwin, Sonja
Walch, William Wcislo, Edward O. Wilson, Mike Wise, Anna Zeide, and
Katie Zimmerman. My deepest apologies to t­ hose I have accidentally neglected
to include.
As this proj­ect has developed, I have also benefited greatly from the ques-
tions asked and suggestions made by participants at a variety of conferences
and workshops, including the Arizona State University–Marine Biological
Laboratory History of Biology Seminar; History and Philosophy of Science
Colloquium, University of Texas at Austin; History of Science Colloquium,
University of Wisconsin–­Madison; and Spaces of Ecological Knowledge
Workshop, Faculty for Arts and Culture, Maastricht University; as well as
events sponsored by the American Historical Association; American Society
for Environmental History; Center for Culture, History, and Environment,
University of Wisconsin–­Madison; Ciudad del Saber, Panamá; Columbia
History of Science Group; Ecological Society of Amer­i­ca; History of Science
Society; Institute for Historical Studies, University of Texas at Austin; Smith-
sonian Tropical Research Institute; Sociedad Latinoamericana y Caribeña de
Historia Ambiental; and Southern Historical Association. I have also been
im­mensely privileged to be a member of the History Department of the Uni-
versity of Texas at Austin as I completed this book and to enjoy the support
of this amazing community of scholars.
I am most deeply indebted to ­those individuals who read vari­ous parts, it-
erations, and offshoots of this proj­ect. This first of all includes the mentors
 Acknowl­edgments xi

who have s­ haped my thinking about the history of science and the environ-
ment. Thank you Gregg Mitman, Lynn Nyhart, and Bill Cronon. I would not
be in this field without the encouragement of Michael Reidy. This would also
be a much poorer book without critical feedback from Ashley Carse, Andrew
Case, Brent Crossen, Lina Del Castillo, Jennifer Holland, Charles Hughes,
Christine Keiner, Doug Kiel, Christine Manganaro (who also deserves spe-
cial thanks for reminding me to breathe), Stuart McCook, Meridith Beck
Mink, Crystal Marie Moten, Abena Osseo-­Asare, Franco Scarano, Blake
Scott, Andrew Stuhl, Paul Sutter, Libby Tronnes, Jeremy Vetter, Sam Vong,
Emily Wakild, Don Waller, Robert-­Jan Wille, Amrys Williams, and Kristin
Wintersteen. For their generosity in providing thoughtful, detailed com-
ments on the entire book manuscript, I am forever grateful to Elizabeth Hen-
nessy, Bruce Hunt, Jerry Jessee, and the anonymous reviewers. My thanks
also go to Brandon Proia, the series editors Mart Stewart and Harriet Ritvo,
and every­one at UNC Press for making the publication of this book such a
pleasant experience.
My f­ amily has had to put up with many years apart and many years of my
working through holidays. Thank you for your love and patience, Stephen
and Nancy Raby. Kristy and Terry Williams, thank you also for your son.
Without Eric Williams I would never have been able to complete this
book. He has kept me fed, clothed, and proofread. You mean the world to me,
Eric. Thank you for being my partner in this and all ­things.
This page intentionally left blank
Abbreviations in the Text

AEC Atomic Energy Commission

ATB Association for Tropical Biology
BCI Barro Colorado Island
CZBA Canal Zone Biological Area
ESA Ecological Society of Amer­ic­ a
IBP International Biological Program
IRTA Institute for Research in Tropical Amer­i­ca
MCZ Museum of Comparative Zoology (Harvard)
NRC National Research Council
NSF National Science Foundation
NYBG New York Botanical Garden
NYZS New York Zoological Society
OTS Organ­ization for Tropical Studies
STRI Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
UNAM Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
USDA U.S. Department of Agriculture
This page intentionally left blank
American Tropics
This page intentionally left blank
Introduction

From Tropicality to Biodiversity

The prob­lems of h­ uman beings in the tropics are primarily biological in origin:
overpopulation, habitat destruction, soil deterioration, malnutrition, disease, and
even, for hundreds of millions, the uncertainty of food and shelter from one day
to the next. T
­ hese prob­lems can be solved in part by making biological diversity a
source of economic wealth.
—­Edward O. Wilson, 1988

In September 1986, sixty scientists and policy makers convened for the “Na-
tional Forum on BioDiversity” in Washington, DC. The conference, or­ga­
nized ­under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution and the National
Academies of Science, included some of the biggest names in the U.S. sci-
ence and conservation communities, Edward O. Wilson, Thomas Lovejoy,
Paul Ehrlich, Peter Raven, Stephen Jay Gould, and Michael Soulé among
them. Although it was a U.S. “national” forum, its ambitions ­were decidedly
global. As each speaker came to the podium, a picture of a worldwide extinc-
tion crisis emerged. Together, they made a forceful, and very public, case for
the need for more scientific research in support of conservation around
the globe. Species ­were being lost, they warned, before they could even be
discovered.1
To articulate their cause, the conference organizers coined the term biodi­
versity, which quickly became the rallying cry of the emerging field of conser-
vation biology. As the forum was telecast and participants interviewed by
news agencies nationwide, it even became a h­ ouse­hold word. In a narrow
sense, biodiversity refers to the number and variety of species in a given area.
Although most definitions also include variation within species (ge­ne­tic di-
versity) and at the level of ecosystems, the term is often used as a synonym
for species diversity—­the number and relative abundance of species in an area.
As a scientific mea­sure, biodiversity offered an impor­tant tool for making
conservation priorities. The discourse surrounding the term biodiversity,
however, also helped reinforce the global nature of the conservation prob­lem
at hand. At stake, conservationists argued, was not just par­tic­u­lar wild places
or even individual endangered species; the threat was to the diversity of life
on Earth itself.2
2 Introduction

Nevertheless, one global region dominated the dire stories and statistics
that the participants cited: the tropics. A w ­ hole session of the forum (the
only one delimited geo­graph­ic­ ally) focused on tropical prob­lems. Many of
the organizers and participants ­were specialists in tropical biology, and the
institutions hosting the forum w ­ ere among the country’s most impor­tant
supporters of tropical research. Tropical imagery dominated even the poster
that loomed onstage beside each speaker, and that afterward became the
cover of the forum’s proceedings. On it, w ­ ater droplets cling to a lush back-
ground of greenery, each reflecting images that represent Earth’s diverse bi-
omes; the largest drop contains a rainforest whose colorful animal inhabitants
peer out at the viewer. This tropical emphasis was not accidental. Wilson re-
minded his audience that, although tropical rainforests “cover only 7% of the
Earth’s land surface, they contain more than half the species in the entire
world biota.”3 It was also the region most in peril, as deforestation and popu-
lation growth ran rampant “especially in tropical countries.”4 For this reason,
Wilson argued, “rain forests serve as the ideal paradigm of the larger global
crisis.”5 The biodiversity crisis might be global, but it was both centered on
and symbolized by the tropics, particularly tropical forests.
Significantly, Wilson and the other participants cast tropical diversity
not only as threatened nature but also as a natu­ral resource. The uncata­
logued species of the world, the vast majority of which lay in the tropics, fig-
ured as humanity’s most irreplaceable and untapped asset. Tropical nature, they
suggested, could be transformed into a source of salvation rather than suffer-
ing, thus addressing some of the world’s most pressing social and economic
prob­lems at their root. With biologists’ expertise, the diversity of life could be
recognized and valued as “a source of economic wealth,” thus effecting devel-
opment in harmony with conservation at a global scale.6 This move linked
a need for basic research in tropical biology—­long an obscure and under-
funded field—­to some of the most po­liti­cally significant issues of the day. But
how had scientists come to connect the abstract and technical concept of
species diversity to the prob­lems of international development? And why did
a group of biologists from the north temperate zone insist on moving the
tropics to the center of global debates at this historical moment?
The suddenness with which biodiversity landed on the lips of policy mak-
ers and “Save the Rainforest” appeared on bumper stickers belies a deeper
intellectual and po­liti­cal history. Consciousness of tropical biodiversity ex-
ploded onto the scene in the mid-1980s, but it was not a new concept to biol-
ogists. U.S. scientists’ engagement with life in the tropics already stretched
back a ­century. During this time, scientists had strug­gled with questions of
 From Tropicality to Biodiversity 3

Cover of the proceedings of the 1986 National Forum on

BioDiversity. Reprinted with permission from BioDiversity,
copyright 1988, National Acad­emy of Sciences, courtesy of the
National Academies Press, Washington, DC.

the biological differences of the tropics—­especially its richness in species—­

and at the same time entangled themselves in U.S. corporate and government
efforts to exploit tropical resources. This book argues that both the key scien-
tific concepts and the values embedded in the modern biodiversity discourse
had significant pre­ce­dents in biologists’ involvement in U.S. encounters with
the tropical world over the course of the twentieth c­ entury, centered on the
circum-­Caribbean region. From the era of the Spanish-­American War and
the construction of the Panama Canal through the revolutionary 1960s and
4 Introduction

1970s, U.S. biologists sought ongoing access to research sites in the tropics.
They found it through a complex set of partnerships and the intertwining of
intellectual and economic agendas. American Tropics argues that the ideas, at-
titudes, and institutions forged at field sites in the colonies and neocolonies of
the circum-­Caribbean are crucial for understanding the emergence of this new
paradigm in biology and conservation at the end of the c­ entury. Long before
the 1986 BioDiversity Forum extended such ideas to the globe, U.S. biologists
had begun both to articulate fundamental biological questions raised by the
diversity of tropical life and to argue for its potential as a r­ esource.

Biology, Diversity, and the Tropics

Although the word biodiversity was new when it appeared in the title and
throughout the speeches of the 1986 forum, its organizers did not feel they
­were ­doing anything radical by contracting a conventional phrase. Biological
diversity was already in use, not to mention long-­standing formulations like
organic diversity, or the host of specialized quantifications of species richness
and species diversity.7 Historians and phi­los­o­phers of biology have refer-
enced such precursors, but their primary focus has been on the use of the term
biodiversity in conservation circles since the 1980s.8 In fact, the con­temporary
conception of biodiversity emerged from much longer-­standing scientific ef-
forts to understand the numbers and distribution of species on Earth, and
particularly in the tropics. In part, this book argues that tropical biologists
played a much more central role in shaping this intellectual history through
the twentieth ­century than scholars have previously acknowledged.
To understand why tropical biology was central to formulating modern
concepts of biodiversity, however, we must first understand what constitutes
this field of study. What is tropical biology? In one sense, it is simply the study of
living ­things in the tropics—­the global region surrounding the equator between
23° 26′ 16″ north and south latitudes. Geo­graph­i­cally, the tropics are marked
by a near-­constant day length throughout the year and climates f­ree from
frost (except at high elevations). The nature of biological adaptations to such
environmental ­factors is among the prob­lems that interest tropical biologists.
But if tropical biology is a regional specialization, it is also an interdisciplin-
ary field. The biologists who publish in journals like Biotropica, Tropical Ecol­
ogy, or Revista de Biologia Tropical, who attend the meetings of the Association
of Tropical Biology and Conservation or the International Society for Tropi-
cal Ecol­ogy, or who work at organ­izations like the Smithsonian Tropical Re-
search Institute or the Organ­ization for Tropical Studies come from the full
 From Tropicality to Biodiversity 5

range of subdisciplines within biology. They may study par­tic­ul­ar groups of

organisms or focus on biological pro­cesses. Their approach may emphasize
taxonomy, be­hav­ior, physiology, evolution, or ecology—­although ecol­ogy
becomes the touchstone when confronting the complexity of many tropical
ecosystems.9 Tropical biologists are driven by a range of motivations, includ-
ing curiosity about the puzzles of theoretical biology, a love of fieldwork, or
concerns about conservation and resource use. The work that tropical biolo-
gists do is nearly as diverse as the ecosystems they study.
Tropical biology is more than a geographic pigeonhole, however. Why are
­there scientific journals, professional associations, and research institutions
devoted to tropical biology while “temperate biology” remains an unmarked
category? Historically, the field of tropical biology was demarcated by outsid-
ers. From the Eu­ro­pean voyages of exploration of the sixteenth ­century to the
overland expeditions of nineteenth-­century naturalists, northern visitors to
the equatorial regions tended to set the plants, animals, and p­ eople they en-
countered ­there in comparison with t­ hose of their temperate homelands. Dur-
ing the same period, tropical countries developed their own local scientific
communities, but ­whether t­ hese chose to designate their research as specifi-
cally “tropical” varied. An outsider’s perspective thus left its mark on the
kinds of questions the emerging community of tropical biologists asked:
How does tropical life compare with life elsewhere? Does life in the tropics
share qualities that make it unique? Conversely, might the study of living
­things in the tropics reveal something fundamental about the phenomena of
life everywhere?10
­These are questions with roots that extend far beyond the scientific com-
munity. The tropics are loaded with power­ful meanings and imagery for out-
siders. In the imaginations of Eu­ro­pe­ans and North Americans, the equatorial
regions have figured as an earthly paradise or a green hell. This discourse of
tropicality, as identified by cultural geographers and historians, has pictured
the tropics as an exotic Other—­a place both attractive and dangerous, a realm
of unbounded abundance and riotous growth as well as disease and decay.11
Like Orientalist discourses, this exoticized imaginary geography of the equa-
torial regions has functioned to justify the colonization and exploitation of its
­people and environments.12 In it, tropical ­people appear backward and lazy,
spoiled by the abundance offered by tropical nature, and unable to efficiently
develop the resources of their own lands. In popu­lar imaginings, the tropics
­were—­and largely remain—­a region of untapped potential. Thus, while tropi­
cal biology may be defined as “biology in the tropics,” the complex, contested
cultural meanings of the tropics make this far from a ­simple declaration.
6 Introduction

Scientists’ views of the tropics have run in tandem with ­these broader cul-
tural understandings. The narratives of naturalists and explorers like Alexan-
der von Humboldt, Henry Walter Bates, Richard Spruce, Thomas B ­ elt, and
Alfred Russel Wallace worked alongside ­those of other foreign travelers to
construct and reproduce the familiar tropes of the tropical. Traveling natural-
ists saw with “imperial eyes,” carry­ing with them on their journeys prejudices
and assumptions ­shaped by generations of previous visitors.13 Working
within the naturalist tradition, however, they sought to systematize and ex-
plain the phenomena they confronted—­in ways that often reinforced but
sometimes challenged their own preconceptions. Encounters with nature in
the tropics sparked some of the most impor­tant biological syntheses of the
nineteenth ­century, from Humboldt’s plant geography to Darwin and Wal-
lace’s theory of evolution by natu­ral se­lection. To varying degrees, some natu-
ralists ­were aware of the ways their expectations about life in the tropics w ­ ere
­shaped by forerunners’ accounts. Darwin acknowledged how Humboldt’s
descriptions loomed in his mind when he “first saw a Tropical forest in all its
sublime grandeur.”14 For o­ thers, heightened anticipation of superabundant
life led to disappointment when lush vegetation appeared “monotonous” and
parrots failed to adorn e­ very tree.15
This heavy burden of prior writing led Wallace to open his influential 1878
essay Tropical Nature with the admonition, “The luxuriance and beauty of
Tropical Nature is a well-­worn theme, and t­ here is ­little new to say about it.”
What was sorely lacking, he argued, was a serious effort to “give a general
view of the phenomena which are essentially tropical, [and] to determine the
­causes and conditions of ­those phenomena.”16 To replace the “many errone-
ous ideas” in circulation, Wallace synthesized his own extensive field obser-
vations in Malaysia and the Amazon with other reports. As evolutionary
theories increasingly provided a framework for such analyses from the late
nineteenth c­ entury on, this essay became a new starting point for investigations
into tropical difference. The basic patterns Wallace described in Tropical Na­
ture are still recognized and studied by tropical biologists t­oday; thus, they
provide a con­ve­nient introduction to the phenomena that would continue to
populate the conceptual space of the tropics for biologists during the following
­century.
First among the general features of tropical vegetation that Wallace recog-
nized was its lushness of growth—­in modern terms, the sheer biomass of
plant life. In contrast, animal life was inconspicuous and widely dispersed.
For both animals and plants in the tropics, however, the “best distinguishing
features are the variety of forms and species.”17 He noted the prevalence of
 From Tropicality to Biodiversity 7

certain types of plant adaptations, including climbing, epiphytic, and para-

sitic habits; the division of mature forests into layers of canopy and under-
growth forms; and a variety of trunk structures, such as buttressing, that w ­ ere
highly unusual outside of the tropics. Among animals, Wallace found “such a
diversity of forms, structures, and habits, as to render any typical characteri-
sation of them impossible,” but he did note, for example, some particularly
close interrelationships of plants and insects.18
Wallace not only enumerated t­ hese “peculiar” features of plant and animal
adaptation but also described certain broad patterns in the distribution of
species at local and global scales that have remained among the central puz-
zles of tropical biology.19 Within tropical forests, Wallace contrasted the high
number of species with the low abundance of individuals of any one species.
This was in no case more evident than among trees: “If the traveller notices a
par­tic­u­lar species and wishes to find more like it, he may often turn his eyes in
vain in ­every direction. Trees of varied forms, dimensions, and colours are
around him, but he rarely sees any one of them repeated. Time a­ fter time he
goes ­towards a tree which looks like the one he seeks, but a closer examina-
tion proves it to be distinct. He may at length, perhaps, meet with a second
specimen half a mile off, or may fail altogether, till on another occasion he
stumbles on one by accident.”20 While temperate forests are dominated by
one or a few key species, tropical forests are in general characterized by diver-
sity and rarity—­no one species dominates. At the same time, Wallace noticed
a curious global pattern in species distribution. For most groups of plants and
animals, more member species inhabited the tropics than the temperate
zone. A genus or f­amily might contain many times more tropical than tem-
perate species. Moreover, the tropics harbored a wide array of groups rarely
found or entirely absent in the North—­parrots and palms, for example, as
well as ­whole families of insects, reptiles, and amphibians. Oddly, the reverse
pattern was extremely uncommon. Whereas pre-­Darwinian biogeographers
used such regional concentrations of species numbers to posit “centers of
creation,” Wallace offered evolutionary explanations, notably a “less severe”
strug­gle for existence against “physical conditions” and the historical absence
of glaciation in the tropics.21 This, he argued, had allowed the “comparatively
continuous and unchecked development of organic forms” at the equator,
leaving the region a “more ancient world.”22 Biologists would continue to de-
bate ­these proposed evolutionary and ecological ­causes of tropical diversity
over the next ­century.
The way that Wallace and subsequent researchers i­magined the tropics
resonated powerfully with broader ideas about tropical exuberance, excess,
8 Introduction

and primitiveness. Nevertheless, biologists’ views cannot be reduced to such

tropes. Tropical biology emerged around a scientific subdiscourse about the
characteristics and qualities of tropical life that was also part of broader cur-
rents in ecological and evolutionary thought. The specificity of t­hese con-
cerns distinguished (although never freed) scientists’ conceptions from the
broader discourse of tropicality. Among their key concerns about tropical life
was its diversity—­its ­great numbers and variety of species.
This book argues that the articulation of biological ideas about diversity
and tropicality went hand in hand through the twentieth ­century. It examines
this relationship particularly as biologists from the United States began to work
in the circum-­Caribbean and form a professional community of tropical biolo-
gists. Biological concepts of diversity have many roots; t­ hose that lie in tropi-
cal research are especially significant and have been surprisingly neglected by
historians. This neglect has obscured the ideas and institutions that laid the
foundations for the explosive rise of biodiversity at the end of the ­century.

A Place-­Based Science
Tropical biology is a place-­based science that has historically been practiced
by ­people from outside that place. This central irony has played a profound
role in determining the development of the field and its major institutions.
For North Americans and Eu­ro­pe­ans, studying tropical life meant traveling
to the tropics. Expeditions allowed northern naturalists to pass through the
tropics, bringing back observations and collections of specimens to the met-
ropolitan scientific centers of their home countries. Expeditionary science
could reveal the global biogeographic patterns that Humboldt, Wallace, and
­others commented upon, but it did not permit extended, in situ observations
of living tropical organisms and their complex interactions. Understanding
the ecological and evolutionary pro­cesses that caused the ­great differences
and diversities of tropical life meant not just traveling through but staying in
the tropics. It required a more permanent institutional basis, in the form of
tropical research stations.23
By not only tracing the flow of U.S. scientists into the tropics but also ex-
amining how they ­were sometimes able to take root in place, American Trop­
ics contributes to understandings of mobility and knowledge production.24
Field stations became nodes of scientific migration, giving form to a commu-
nity of tropical biologists in the United States and shaping its research prac-
tices and priorities. As the United States made its first foray into tropical
empire at the turn of the twentieth c­ entury, so did the nation’s biologists,
 From Tropicality to Biodiversity 9

founding such stations as Harvard’s Atkins Institution at Soledad, Cuba (1899);

Cinchona Botanical Station in Jamaica (1903); William Beebe’s stations in Brit-
ish Guiana (Guyana, 1916 and 1919); and, most notably, the station at Barro
Colorado Island (BCI), Panama (1923). While the first professional associa-
tions, university programs, and specialty journals in tropical biology did not
appear ­until the 1960s, they emerged directly from a ready-­made community
centered on stations founded at the beginning of the ­century. Indeed, we ­will
see in chapter 5 that the final stage in the professionalization of tropical biol-
ogy was catalyzed by po­liti­cal and environmental threats to long-­established
research sites.
The U.S. movement to establish tropical stations was part of a larger, inter-
national groundswell for stations in the field. The influential marine stations
Stazione Zoologica in Naples, Italy, founded in 1872, and Marine Biological
Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mas­sa­chu­setts, founded in 1888, have played a
significant role in the historiography of biology and American science, signal-
ing the rising prestige of the laboratory and the professionalization of the dis-
cipline.25 Investigations into the relationship between place and practice at
field stations ­were pioneered by Robert Kohler, who approached them as
border zones between the scientific cultures of the laboratory and field.26
Historians of biology have recently begun to examine stations in relation to
not only laboratory science but also other institutions and spaces, such as
museums, aquaria, parks, and gardens, as well as in the context of a broader
set of goals, priorities, and practices.27
If, as Raf de Bont notes, field stations have too often been seen primarily as
extensions of urban laboratories, then tropical stations have doubly been cast
as mere appendages to northern scientific institutions.28 The Cinchona sta-
tion, for example, has been discussed as part of the expanding scientific “em-
pire” of the New York Botanical Garden (although its institutional affiliations
changed over time), but how the tropical and Jamaican context s­ haped day-­
to-­day scientific practice ­there has remained unexamined.29 Likewise, BCI
has been cast as a “failed” attempt to replicate the Naples and Marine Bio-
logical Laboratory model, fi­nally saved only by coming ­under the aegis of
the Smithsonian Institution ­after World War II.30 Tropical stations have
been approached as decidedly peripheral and subordinate to metropolitan,
temperate-­zone institutions. A significant exception is the pioneering Dutch
tropical botanical station known as the Treub Laboratory of the Buitenzorg
Gardens, Java, established in 1884, which Eugene Cittadino has argued played
a central role in the emergence of Darwinian plant physiology.31 Buitenzorg, in
fact, stood out as the prime exemplar of the possibilities of tropical research
10 Introduction

U.S. tropical biological stations, 1899–1969. This map depicts biological stations operated
by U.S.-­based institutions. H­ ere, station denotes a scientific site with facilities and
accommodations for permanent or prolonged and repeated research outdoors—­not
including temporary camps, parks, or other types of research lands—­and biological
research means basic research on living organisms. This does not include strictly
agricultural or forestry experiment stations, botanical gardens, or medical laboratories but
does include biological stations that contained or emerged from such institutions. Dates
indicate when they ­were operated by U.S.-­based institutions. If a station or other
institution exists at this site ­today, its current name is noted.

for U.S. scientists in the early twentieth ­century, as explored in chapter 1. This
history further complicates narratives centered on the dichotomy of lab ver-
sus field, b­ ecause tropical research stations often emerged in relation to (or
even on the grounds of) another distinct and venerable institution: colonial
botanical gardens.32 Thus, American Tropics examines U.S.-­run stations not
only in connection with a variety of U.S. metropolitan institutions but also in
context with existing scientific institutions in tropical countries.
 From Tropicality to Biodiversity 11

map key U.S. Tropical Biological Stations, 1899–1969

1. Soledad station (Also called Harvard Botanical
Station for Tropical Research and Sugarcane
Investigation/Atkins Institution of the Arnold
Arboretum/Atkins Garden and Research
Laboratory), Harvard, 1899–1961. (­Today the
Jardín Botánico de Cienfuegos.)
2. Cinchona Botanical Station (New York Botani-
cal Garden, 1903–1914; Smithsonian Institution,
1916–1921), 1903–1921. (­Today the Cinchona
Botanical Gardens.)
3. Dry Tortugas Marine Biology Laboratory at Log-
gerhead Key, Car­ne­gie Institution, 1903–1939.
4. “Kalacoon” Tropical Research Station, New York
Zoological Society, 1916–1917.
5. “Kartabo” Tropical Research Station, New York
Zoological Society, 1918–1926.
6. Barro Colorado Island (Institute for Research
in Tropical Amer­i­ca, 1923–1946; Smithsonian
Institution 1946–­present. Part of the Canal Zone
Biological Area, 1940–1966; STRI 1966–­present),
1923–­present.
7. Lancetilla Experiment Station, United Fruit
Com­pany, 1925–1974. (­Today El Jardín Botanico y
Centro de Investigacíon Lancetilla.)
8. El Verde Field Station, U.S. Forest Ser­vice,
1937–­present.
9. Villavicencio Yellow Fever Laboratory, Rocke­fel­
ler Foundation, 1938–1948. (­Today the Estación
de Biología Tropical Roberto Franco.)
10. Rancho Grande Station, New York Zoological
Society, 1945–1948. (­Today the Estación
­Biológica Fernández Yépez.)
11. “Simla” Tropical Research Station, New York
Zoological Society, 1949–1974. (­Today William
Beebe Tropical Research Station.)
12. La Selva Biological Station (OTS, 1968–­present),
1954–­present.
13. Institute of Marine Biology Laboratory/Isla
Magueyes Laboratories, University of Puerto
Rico, 1954–­present.
14. Las Cruces Biological Station (OTS,
1973-­present), 1962–­present.
15. Galeta Marine Laboratory, STRI, 1965–­present.
16. Naos Island Laboratories, STRI, 1965–­present.
17. Palo Verde Biological Station, OTS,
1969–­present.

Although they borrowed from established models, tropical stations ­were

varied and heterogeneous. Some emphasized the study of plants over animals
or vice versa. They focused on applied or basic science to varying degrees.
They ­were sponsored by universities, zoos, botanical gardens, government
agencies, and corporations, as well as through collaborations among such
organ­izations. They incorporated a variety of scientific spaces on site: Sole-
dad ­housed experimental plots, botanical gardens, and green­houses, as well
as a biological laboratory, and had access to uncultivated land. BCI com-
prised a forested island nature reserve, laboratory space, herbarium, dark
room, and library, as well as buildings and plots of land that might be turned
to a variety of experimental or observational purposes. Depending on the
12 Introduction

moment or context, ­these stations might be elided as laboratories, gardens, or

institutions or just denoted by locality—­naming practices that suggest their
flexibility as scientific sites.33 Rarely, however, did they appear without the
modifier tropical close at hand. More than the promotion of any par­tic­ul­ar
institutional model or set of research methods, then, tropical research sta-
tions shared a common purpose: to bring northern scientists into contact
with nature in the tropics.
Of course, field stations elsewhere w ­ ere also built to bring scientists “close
to nature,” but this goal carried very par­tic­u­lar meanings for the twentieth-­
century U.S. scientific community regarding the tropics. During the nine-
teenth c­ entury, U.S. botanists and zoologists w ­ ere occupied by the proj­ect of
cata­loguing the species of their nation’s expanding continental empire.34 Very
few had experience working in the tropics. The new stations gave ­these
temperate-­zone scientists a tropical foothold, serving as outposts in the sci-
entific colonization of lands to the south. Research stations removed much of
the hardship of organ­izing a scientific expedition and ameliorated the real
and ­imagined dangers to health and safety of travel in the tropics. By encour-
aging a much larger number and broader array of biologists to work in the
region, stations built up a population of U.S. researchers with experience in
tropical fieldwork during the twentieth c­ entury. Over time some stayed lon-
ger, using stations not just for brief tours but instead as a “home” in the field.35
By midcentury, ­these researchers came to identify themselves as “tropical
­biologists.”
Research stations not only offered the ability to access tropical organisms
and environments while living in relative comfort, health, and safety, how-
ever. They also allowed a wider and qualitatively dif­fer­ent set of research
practices—­practices that this book shows w ­ ere crucial to the development of
the study of species diversity. As discussed in chapter 1, as early as the begin-
ning of the twentieth c­ entury scientists realized that the study of the ecolo-
gies, life histories, and be­hav­ior of tropical organisms lagged far b­ ehind ­those
of temperate-­zone organisms—­comparatively few biologists worked in the
tropics where, paradoxically, the greatest numbers of species existed. Whereas
expeditions and surveys are best suited for the collection of specimens and
mea­sure­ments from a broad geographic area, permanent stations orient work
­toward the study of living organisms in place over longer periods of time.
They permit repeated or ongoing experimentation and monitoring. Thus,
tropical field stations opened up studies in ecol­ogy, physiology, and be­hav­ior
where taxonomic and biogeographic work had long dominated. Taxonomic
and distribution studies continued, however, and stations encouraged them
Another random document with
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 About eight o’clock, the streets began again to be crowded. The
barrooms and public resorts were closed, that the incentive to
precipitate action might not be too readily accessible. Nevertheless
there was much excitement, and among the crowd were many men
from the country, who carried shot and duck guns, and old-fashioned
horse-pistols, such as the “Maryland line” might have carried from
the first to the present war. The best weapons appeared to be in the
hands of young men—boys of eighteen—with the physique, dress and
style of deportment cultivated by the “Dead Rabbits” of New York.
About ten o’clock, a cry was raised that 3,000 Pennsylvania troops
were at the Calvert street depot of the Pennsylvania railroad, and
were about to take up their line of march through the city. It was said
that the 3,000 were at Pikesville, about fifteen miles from the city,
and were going to fight their way around the city. The crowd were
not disposed to interfere with a movement that required a
preliminary tramp of fifteen miles through a heavy sand. But the city
authorities, however, rapidly organized and armed some three or
four companies and sent them towards Pikesville. Ten of the Adams’
Express wagons passed up Baltimore street, loaded with armed men.
In one or two there were a number of mattresses, as if wounded men
were anticipated. A company of cavalry also started for Pikesville to
sustain the infantry that had been expressed. Almost before the last
of the expedition had left the city limits, word was telegraphed to
Marshal Kane by Mayor Brown from Washington, that the
government had ordered the Pennsylvania troops back to
Harrisburgh, from the point they had been expected to move on to
Baltimore. It seemed incredible, but, of course, satisfactory to the
belligerents.
The moment it was known that the government had abandoned
the intention of forcing troops through Baltimore, this intense
commotion settled into comparative calm, but the city was forced to
feel the effect of its own folly. The regular passenger trains north had
been stopped.
Many business men have been utterly ruined by the extraordinary
position into which the city was plunged through the action of the
mob. Capital has been swept away, and commercial advantages
sacrificed, that no time or enterprise can replace. Those engaged in
trade, have no part in these troubles except to suffer. The mob had
them in complete subjection, and a stain has been cast on the city
which no time can efface. Yet the whole of this attack was doubtless
the work of those classes who form the bane and dregs of society, in
every great city; after events have proved that it was the uprising of a
lawless mob, not the expression of a people. But the Mayor of the city
and the Governor of the State were for a few days in which these
revolters triumphed alike powerless. In this strait they notified the
authorities in Washington that troops could not be passed through
that city without bloodshed.
The difficulties and dangers of the 19th of April were speedily
removed by President Lincoln’s determination to march troops
intended for Washington by another route, backed by the
determination and efficiency of the government and by the supplies
which were sent to the aid of loyal men of the city and State, and
thereby Maryland has been saved from anarchy, desolation and ruin.
The work of impious hands was stayed—a star preserved to our
banner, and the right vindicated without unnecessary loss of life! But
nothing save great caution and forbearance almost unparalleled in
civil wars, rescued Baltimore from destruction.
When the news of the disaster to the brave Massachusetts
regiment reached the old Bay State, a feeling of profound sorrow and
deep indignation seized upon the people. Troops gathered to the
rescue in battalions, armed men arose at every point, and every
railroad verging toward Washington became a great military
highway. Not only Massachusetts, but all New England looked upon
the outrage with generous indignation, as if each State had seen its
own sons stricken down. It seemed to be a strife of patriotism which
should get its men first to the field. Directly after the Massachusetts
troops, the first regiment of Rhode Island Volunteers passed through
New York, on their way to the South. Governor Sprague, who had
magnanimously contributed one hundred thousand dollars to the
cause, accompanied these troops, as commander-in-chief of the
Rhode Island forces. His staff consisted of Colonels Frieze, Goddard,
Arnold, and Captain A. W. Chapin, Assistant Adjutant-General. And
this was followed by a continued rush of armed men till all the great
thoroughfares leading to the capital bristled with steel, and
reverberated with the tramp of soldiery.
 Governor Andrews sent to Maryland requesting that the martyred
soldiers should be reverently sent back to Massachusetts, that the
State might give them honored burial. This request was complied
with, Governor Hicks responding in a delicate and sympathetic
manner, and not only Massachusetts but a whole nation awarded
them the glory of first dying for a country that will never forget them.
The names of these men were, Sumner H. Needham, of Lawrence;
Addison O. Whitney, of Lowell City Guards; and Luther C. Ladd,
Lowell City Guards.
 MILITARY OCCUPATION OF ANNAPOLIS,
Md.

April 21, 1861.

On the 18th of April, the Eighth Massachusetts regiment, under

the command of General Butler, left Boston for Washington. On
arriving at Philadelphia, he ascertained that all communication with
Washington by the ordinary line of travel through Baltimore had
been cut off, and telegraphic operations suspended. He proceeded to
the Susquehanna river, and at Perryville seized the immense ferry-
boat “Maryland,” belonging to the railroad company, and steamed
with his regiment for Annapolis. Through the supposed treachery of
the pilot, the boat was grounded on the bar before that place, and
they were detained over night. The arrival of troops at this point
proved of vital importance. A conspiracy had been formed by a band
of secessionists to seize the old frigate Constitution, which lay
moored at the wharf of the Naval Academy at that place, being in
service as a school for the cadets. Captain Devereux, with his
company, was ordered to take possession of the noble old craft,
which was promptly done, and the vessel towed to a safe distance
from the landing. Governor Hicks, of Maryland, hearing of their
arrival, sent a protest against troops being landed at that place.
On Monday, the 22d, the troops landed at the Naval Academy,
followed by the New York Seventh regiment, which had just arrived
on board the steamer Boston, from Philadelphia, by the help of
which vessel the Maryland was enabled to get off the bar.
In order to insure the ready transportation of troops and
provisions which were to follow him by the same route, General
Butler seized several vessels in the neighborhood, and promptly
entered them into the United States service. Meantime a
Pennsylvania regiment had arrived at Havre de Grace, and,
anticipating the speedy accession of reinforcements from New York
by water, three companies of the Eighth Massachusetts were
detached as an engineer corps to repair the road to the Annapolis
and Elk Ridge Railroad, of which General Butler had taken military
possession.
The Seventy-first New York and other regiments having arrived
during the night of April 23d, early on the following morning the
Seventh regiment, from New York, took up its line of march on the
track to Washington Junction. A member of this regiment, young
O’Brien the poet, pays a merited tribute to the brave men who
preceded them:
On the morning of the 22d we were in sight of Annapolis, off which
the Constitution was lying, and there found the Eighth regiment of
Massachusetts volunteers on board the Maryland. They were
aground, owing, it is supposed, to the treachery of the captain, whom
they put in irons and wanted to hang. I regret to say that they did not
do it. During the greater portion of that forenoon we were occupied
in trying to get the Maryland off the sand-bar on which she was
grounded. From our decks we could see the men in file trying to rock
her, so as to facilitate our tugging. These men were without water
and without food, were well-conducted and uncomplaining, and
behaved in all respects like heroes. They were under the command of
Colonel Butler, and I regret that that gentleman did not care more
for the comforts of men whose subsequent pluck proved that nothing
was too good for them.
On the afternoon of the 22d we landed at the Annapolis dock, after
having spent hours in trying to relieve the Maryland. For the first
time in his life your correspondent was put to work to roll flour-
barrels. He was entrusted with the honorable and onerous duty of
transporting stores from the steamer to the dock. Later still he
descended to the position of mess servant, when, in company with
gentlemen well known in Broadway for immaculate kids, he had the
honor of attending on his company with buckets of cooked meat and
crackers—the only difference between him and Co. and the ordinary
waiter being, that the former were civil.
 We were quartered in the buildings belonging to the Naval School
at Annapolis. I had a bunking-place in what is there called a fort,
which is a rickety structure that a lucifer match would set on fire, but
furnished with imposing guns. I suppose it was merely built to
practice the cadets, because as a defence it is worthless. The same
evening boats were sent off from the yard, and towards nightfall the
Massachusetts men landed, fagged, hungry, thirsty, but indomitable.
The two days that we remained at Annapolis were welcome. We
had been without a fair night’s sleep since we left New York, and
even the hard quarters we had there were a luxury compared to the
dirty decks of the Boston. Besides, there were natural attractions.
The grounds are very prettily laid out, and in the course of my
experience I never saw a handsomer or better bred set of young men
than the cadets. Twenty had left the school owing to political
convictions. The remainder are sound Union fellows, eager to prove
their devotion to the flag. After spending a delightful time in the
Navy School, resting and amusing ourselves, our repose was
disturbed at 9 P. M., April 23, by rockets being thrown up in the bay.
The men were scattered all over the grounds; some in bed, others
walking or smoking, all more or less undressed. The rockets being of
a suspicious character, it was conjectured that a Southern fleet was
outside, and our drummer beat the rollcall to arms. From the stroke
of the drum until the time that every man, fully equipped and in
fighting order, was in the ranks, was exactly, by watch, seven
minutes. The alarm, however, proved to be false, the vessels in the
offing proving to be laden with the Seventy-first and other New York
regiments; so that, after an unpremeditated trial of our readiness for
action, we were permitted to retire to our couches, which means,
permit me to say, a blanket on the floor, with a military overcoat over
you, and a nasal concert all around you, that, in noise and number,
outvies Musard’s concerts monstres.
On the morning of the 24th of April we started on what afterwards
proved to be one of the hardest marches on record. The secessionists
of Annapolis and the surrounding districts had threatened to cut us
off in our march, and even went so far as to say that they would
attack our quarters. The dawn saw us up. Knapsacks, with our
blankets and overcoats strapped on them, were piled on the green. A
brief and insufficient breakfast was taken, our canteens filled with
vinegar and water, cartridges distributed to each man, and after
mustering and loading, we started on our first march through a
hostile country.
General Scott has stated, as I have been informed, that the march
that we performed from Annapolis to the Junction is one of the most
remarkable on record. I know that I felt it the most fatiguing, and
some of our officers have told me that it was the most perilous. We
marched the first eight miles under a burning sun, in heavy
marching order, in less than three hours; and it is well known that,
placing all elementary considerations out of the way, marching on a
railroad track is the most harassing. We started at about 8 o’clock, A.
M., and for the first time saw the town of Annapolis, which, without
any disrespect to that place, I may say looked very much as if some
celestial schoolboy, with a box of toys under his arm, had dropped a
few houses and men as he was going home from school, and that the
accidental settlement was called Annapolis. Through the town we
marched, the people unsympathizing, but afraid. They saw the
Seventh for the first time, and for the first time they realized the men
that they had threatened.
The tracks had been torn up between Annapolis and the Junction,
and here it was that the wonderful qualities of the Massachusetts
Eighth regiment came out. The locomotives had been taken to pieces
by the inhabitants, in order to prevent our travel. In steps a
Massachusetts volunteer, looks at the piece-meal engine, takes up a
flange, and says coolly, “I made this engine, and I can put it together
again.” Engineers were wanted when the engine was ready. Nineteen
stepped out of the ranks. The rails were torn up. Practical railroad
makers out of the regiment laid them again, and all this, mind you,
without care or food. These brave boys, I say, were starving while
they were doing this good work. As we marched along the track that
they had laid, they greeted us with ranks of smiling but hungry faces.
One boy told me, with a laugh on his young lips, that he had not
eaten anything for thirty hours. There was not, thank God, a
haversack in our regiment that was not emptied into the hands of
these ill-treated heroes, nor a flask that was not at their disposal.
Our march lay through an arid, sandy, tobacco-growing country.
The sun poured on our heads like hot lava. The Sixth and Second
companies were sent on for skirmishing duty, under the command of
Captains Clarke and Nevers, the latter commanding as senior officer.
A car, on which was placed a howitzer, loaded with grape and
canister, headed the column, manned by the engineer and artillery
corps, commanded by Lieutenant Bunting. This was the rallying
point of the skirmishing party, on which, in case of difficulty, they
could fall back. In the centre of the column came the cars, laden with
medical stores, and bearing our sick and wounded, while the extreme
rear was brought up with a second howitzer, loaded also with grape
and canister. The engineer corps, of course, had to do the forwarding
work. New York dandies, sir—but they built bridges, laid rails, and
headed the regiment through. After marching about eight miles,
during which time several men caved in from exhaustion, and one
young gentleman was sunstruck, and sent back to New York, we
halted, and instantly, with the divine instinct which characterizes the
hungry soldier, proceeded to forage. The worst of it was, there was
no foraging to be done. The only house within reach was inhabited by
a lethargic person, who, like most Southern men, had no idea of
gaining money by labor. We offered him extravagant prices to get us
fresh water, and it was with the utmost reluctance that we could get
him to obtain us a few pailfuls. Over the mantel-piece of his
miserable shanty I saw—a curious coincidence—the portrait of
Colonel Duryea, of our regiment.
After a brief rest of about an hour, we again commenced our
march; a march which lasted until the next morning—a march than
which in history, nothing but those marches in which defeated troops
have fled from the enemy, can equal. Our Colonel, it seems,
determined to march by railroad, in preference to the common road,
inasmuch as he had obtained such secret information as led him to
suppose that we were waited for on the latter route. Events justified
his judgment. There were cavalry troops posted in defiles to cut us
off. They could not have done it, of course, but they could have
harassed us severely. As we went along the railroad we threw out
skirmishing parties from the Second and Sixth companies, to keep
the road clear. I know not if I can describe that night’s march. I have
dim recollections of deep cuts through which we passed, gloomy and
treacherous-looking, with the moon shining full on our muskets,
while the banks were wrapped in shade, and each moment expecting
to see the flash and hear the crack of the rifle of the Southern
guerilla. The tree frogs and lizards made a mournful music as we
passed. The soil on which we travelled was soft and heavy. The
sleepers, lying at intervals across the track, made the march terribly
fatiguing. On all sides dark, lonely pine woods stretched away, and
high over the hooting of owls, or the plaintive petition of the whip-
poor-will, rose the bass commands of “Halt! Forward, march!”—and
when we came to any ticklish spot, the word would run from the
head of the column along the lines, “Holes,” “Bridge—pass it along,”
&c.
As the night wore on, the monotony of the march became
oppressive. Owing to our having to explore every inch of the way, we
did not make more than a mile or a mile and a half an hour. We ran
out of stimulants, and almost out of water. Most of us had not slept
for four nights, and as the night advanced our march was almost a
stagger. This was not so much fatigue as want of excitement. Our
fellows were spoiling for a light, and when a dropping shot was heard
in the distance, it was wonderful to see how the languid legs
straightened, and the column braced itself for action. If we had had
even the smallest kind of a skirmish, the men would have been able
to walk to Washington. As it was, we went sleepily on. I myself fell
asleep, walking in the ranks. Numbers, I find, followed my example;
but never before was there shown such indomitable pluck and
perseverance as the Seventh showed in that march of twenty miles.
The country that we passed through seemed to have been entirely
deserted. The inhabitants, who were going to kill us when they
thought we daren’t come through, now vamosed their respective
ranches, and we saw them not. Houses were empty. The population
retired into the interior, burying their money, and carrying their
families along with them. They, it seems, were under the impression
that we came to ravage and pillage, and they fled, as the Gauls must
have fled, when Attila and his Huns came down on them from the
North. As we did at Annapolis, we did in Maryland State. We left an
impression that cannot be forgotten. Everything was paid for. No
discourtesy was offered to any inhabitant, and the sobriety of the
regiment should be an example to others. Nothing could have been
more effective or energetic than the movements of the Engineer
Corps, to whom we were indebted for the rebuilding of a bridge in an
incredibly short space of time.
 The secret of this forced march, as well as our unexpected descent
on Annapolis, was the result of Colonel Lefferts’ judgment, which has
since been sustained by events. Finding that the line along the
Potomac was closed, and the route to Washington, by Baltimore,
equally impracticable, he came to the conclusion that Annapolis,
commanding, as it did, the route to the Capital, must of necessity be
made the basis of military operations. It was important to the
government to have a free channel through which to transport
troops, and this post presented the readiest means. The fact that
since then all the Northern troops have passed through the line that
we thus opened, is a sufficient comment on the admirable judgment
that decided on the movement. It secured the integrity of the
regiment, and saved lives, the loss of which would have plunged New
York into mourning. Too much importance cannot be attached to
this strategy. To it the Seventh regiment is indebted for being here at
present, intact and sound.
On Thursday, April 24, this regiment reached Washington, having
taken the cars at the junction. They were followed directly by their
noble comrades of the march, the Massachusetts Eighth, and
immediately moved into quarters.
While the troops under Butler and Lefferts were lying at
Annapolis, great anxiety was felt regarding them at Washington. The
lamented Lander was then at the capital, pleading for the privilege of
raising a regiment for the defence of the government, but, for some
inexplicable cause, General Scott had not yet accepted his services.
With Baltimore in open revolt, and Annapolis doubtful in its loyalty,
this anxiety about the troops become so urgent, that Lander was sent
forward to Annapolis, with general directions to aid the troops with
all his ability, and to direct Colonel Butler not to land his men until
the kindly feeling of the citizens of Annapolis was ascertained.
Lander started on the mission, as he undertook everything, with
heart and soul. He rode from Washington to Annapolis on
horseback, without stopping for darkness, or any other cause save
the necessary care of his horse, and reached Annapolis an hour after
the troops had landed. Bringing his experience, as a frontiersman,
who had seen hard service against hostile Indians on the plains, to
bear on the position, Lander gave Colonel Butler such aid and advice
as assisted greatly in bringing the soldiers forward with less danger
and suffering than might otherwise have arisen during their march to
the junction.
 MARYLAND.

The attack by an armed mob upon the Massachusetts regiment

had called the attention of the entire country to the State of
Maryland, and her future course was the subject of deep feeling.
Indirectly, Washington was, of course, menaced by her movements,
and it became a matter of vital importance that she should be
retained in the Union and restored to her fidelity. Not here alone
were keen eyes watching her future. England and France, in their
eager thirst for dominion and their jealousy of America and her
liberal institutions, scrutinized every action, with reference to their
own future course. Second only to Washington, therefore, for the
time, became the “Monumental City.”
 From the 19th of April, the day when the banner of the
Massachusetts Sixth was baptized in blood, until the 14th of June, all
was suspense, and those who still retained their fealty were reluctant
to express their loyalty from fear of personal violence. Then an
election was held for members of Congress, and every district, save
one, returned decisive majorities for unconditional Union men. The
majority of the Legislature were unreserved in their expressions of
disunion, and were secretly, if not openly, urging on the State to
revolt. As early as December, 1860, Governor Hicks had been
solicited to call a Convention for that purpose, and emissaries of the
rebel government had labored with untiring zeal to spread secession
sentiments among the people. The Governor, knowing the heart of
the masses to be true, refused, and his decision came like a thunder-
clap upon the Southern partizans who hoped to find him a pliant tool
in their hands.
 The proclamation of the President, of the 15th April, was tortured
into a means of exciting popular clamor, and every effort was made
to fan the fires of secession, until they should burst forth in fierce
flame. Meetings were held for that purpose, and every possible
means resorted to for its accomplishment. While very many of the
wealthy and commercial classes of Maryland, and particularly of
Baltimore, were in favor of disunion, eminent and influential
citizens, some of whom were among the most distinguished public
men of the State, and whose names are inseparably connected with
its civil and political history, were committed irrevocably to the
support of the government. In this cause the industrial classes—the
working-men and the farmers—were true to the principles they had
always professed. Whatever political parties they had sympathized
with, it had been ever on the broad basis of the Union and the
Constitution.
An illustration of this was given on the 18th of April, the day
previous to the attack on the Massachusetts regiment. A party of
secessionists had raised a rebel flag in the suburbs of Baltimore, and
had a cannon with which they saluted it, but a vast crowd of working-
men from the neighboring foundries assembled, tore down the flag,
and threw the cannon into the river. His Excellency, Thomas H.
Hicks, Governor; John P. Kennedy, Secretary of State under
President Fillmore; Reverdy Johnson, John R. Kenley, ex-Governor
Francis Thomas, Hon. Henry Winter Davis, Edwin H. Webster,
Alexander Evans, and many others boldly stepped forward, and
planted themselves in the foreground, to resist the tide of dishonesty,
passion, and frenzy, into which the State was plunged by the
conspirators. Five thousand citizens of Baltimore addressed a letter
to Governor Hicks, on January 2d, approving his course in refusing
to call the Legislature together to authorize a Convention, and public
meetings were held throughout the State for the same purpose.
Notwithstanding this great demonstration of popular opinion, the
secessionists were resolved upon making the attempt; and, though
foiled in their measures, seized the opportunity afforded by the
passage of Northern troops through Baltimore, to enkindle the
flames of civil war, hoping, in the confusion, to urge their schemes to
a fulfilment.
 The pressure upon the Governor after this event became almost
insupportable. All the combined influences of political, social and
commercial classes were brought to bear upon him, and the wild
denunciations and contemptuous and bitter invective and threats
hurled incessantly upon Baltimore and Maryland by a large portion
of the northern press were persistently used to press the Executive to
the commission of the fatal act. Thus urged on all sides, he was
compelled, in deference to the sudden and violent appeals of the
people, to request the government to send no more troops through
Maryland. The proclamation of the President of the 15th of April, and
the call for troops, was represented by the secessionists of Maryland,
as in other States, as an attempt to “coerce,” “invade” and
“subjugate” the Southern States. They used this appeal with great
effect on the popular mind, and the passions of the people were so
inflammable, that many whose convictions were utterly opposed to
the disunion measures were determined to resent this attempt to
“subdue” them. On the 17th of April an excited disunion meeting had
been held in Baltimore, and great efforts were made to commit the
citizens to the secession movement. On the following day Governor
Hicks and his Honor George Wm. Brown, Mayor of Baltimore, issued
proclamations calling upon all citizens to keep the peace. The
Governor assured the people that no troops should be sent from
Maryland, except to defend the national capital. The arrival of
Massachusetts troops and the fatal occurrences of the 19th, caused
an almost entire cessation of business, and all commerce was
suddenly prostrated.
The secessionists were determined to render it impracticable for
any more troops to reach Washington, and for this purpose
destroyed the bridges and a considerable portion of the tracks of
several railroads both north and south of Baltimore.
The Pennsylvania Northern, Philadelphia, Annapolis Junction,
and Baltimore and Ohio roads suffered extensively; and in
consequence of these lawless proceedings, the greatest difficulty was
apprehended in getting troops to Washington in time to protect the
capital from the threatened attack.
On the 21st the government announced that it took possession of
the Philadelphia and Baltimore railway as a military road. During the
temporary delay and obstruction to the travel, it was almost
impossible for travellers to pass either way. Many were molested in
Baltimore; some were placed in confinement under false charges by
the secessionists, and all were compelled to pay exorbitant prices and
resort to the rudest means of conveyance to pursue their journeys,
when permitted so to do. On the 22d the Mayor and Police Board of
Baltimore laid an embargo on provisions and necessary supplies, as
the interruption to transportation threatened a deficiency of food.
The Governor, under these extraordinary circumstances, called a
special session of the Legislature, which assembled at Frederick, on
the 26th of the month, the capital, Annapolis, being then in
possession of General Butler, who threatened to arrest the whole
body if an ordinance of secession were passed. The secession
members of the Legislature then attempted to procure the
organization of a Board of Safety, which should have discretionary
power during the crisis, but public meetings were immediately
called, which were loud in their denunciations of this covert transfer
of the State to its enemies, and it was abandoned. Resolutions
protesting against the war, and recommending the President to
desist, and resort to arbitration, were adopted, and a committee
appointed to visit the President and induce him to promise that no
more troops should be passed through Maryland. The President
replied that the public necessity must govern him, and that he would
consult the wishes of the people to the utmost extent that the
national welfare would permit.
The Legislature, after the report of the Committee had been
submitted, on May 6, discussed the questions at issue, and on the
10th adopted a preamble and resolution, declaring Maryland
sympathized “with the South in the struggle for their rights, solemnly
protests against this action, and will take no part in it, denouncing
the military occupancy of the State, and transportation of troops, and
imploring the President, in the name of God, to cease this unholy
war.”
The reorganization of the military departments for the war was
progressing with all possible dispatch. The Department of
Washington was assigned to Colonel Joseph K. F. Mansfield, the
Department of Annapolis to Major-General Butler, and that of
Pennsylvania to Major General Robert Patterson.
 On the 5th of May, General Butler took possession of the junction
of the Baltimore and Washington and Baltimore and Ohio railroads,
at the Relay House, nine miles south of Baltimore. Four days
afterwards a body of United States troops landed at Locust Point in
that city, and were conveyed by the cars through it without
interruption. The Marshal of the city, John K. Kane, was known to be
deeply implicated in the work of rebellion, and he was arrested and
search was made at the police headquarters for concealed arms and
supplies.
The people of Maryland held views which her disloyal legislators
had misrepresented. On the 14th of May, a meeting was held at East
Baltimore, at which strong Union resolutions were adopted, pledging
“lives, fortunes, and sacred honor,” to its defence, declaring the right
of the government to convey troops through the State, and their own
right and duty to aid them in the work.
General Butler the same day occupied Federal Hill, at Baltimore,
and issued a proclamation which was scattered in immense numbers
among the people, and contributed in a high degree to the
restoration of confidence and harmony among all classes. An
important step was also taken by Governor Hicks, who, on the same
day issued a proclamation calling for the State quota of four
regiments of volunteers for three months, to sustain the government
and to protect the capital. General Butler had seized various military
stores intended for the rebels, and also took possession of arms and
powder belonging to loyal parties, to prevent their being removed by
enemies to the government.
Brigadier-General Butler, having been appointed Major-General,
and placed in command of the military Department of Virginia,
North Carolina and Tennessee, a most important position, was
transferred to Fortress Monroe, and was succeeded by General
Cadwallader on the 20th. Fort McHenry was reinforced, and put into
the most effective condition for immediate service, and the
conspirators of Baltimore were restrained from further disorders by
the apprehension that any attempt at insurrection would be the
signal for a bombardment of the city. After Cadwallader came into
command, several arrests of prominent persons had been made.
Among these was Mr. John Merryman, who applied to Chief-Justice
Taney for a writ of habeas corpus. This was granted; and General
Cadwallader, in answer, said that the prisoner had been arrested on
charge of various acts of treason—of holding a command in a
company having in possession arms belonging to the United States,
and of avowing his purpose of armed hostility to the Government of
the United States. In such cases General Cadwallader said he was
authorized by the President to suspend the habeas corpus act; he
therefore requested Judge Taney to suspend further action until
instructions could be had from the President.
Judge Taney thereupon issued a writ of attachment against
General Cadwallader for contempt of court. The Marshal proceeded
to Fort McHenry to execute the writ, but was refused admission.
Judge Taney urged that the President had no authority to suspend
the act of habeas corpus, or to authorize others to do so. An
elaborate opinion to that effect was prepared by the Judge and has
since been published.
A sufficient number of troops were also at this time stationed in
Baltimore, and the loyal citizens were assured that they would be
protected in all their rights and privileges, at every hazard. Thus
fortified, protected and encouraged, the loyalty of the people was
fully displayed, while the disloyal were held in check. Maryland,
glorious in her past history, and her devotion to the Constitution,
was saved from destruction, and her loyal citizens will in generations
to come receive the plaudits of millions whose gratitude will be deep
enough to overwhelm her few days of revolt.
 DESTRUCTION OF THE GOSPORT NAVY
YARD.

April 21, 1861.

The splendid naval and military establishment at Gosport,

Virginia, belonging to the Federal Government, was, at the time
Virginia seceded, in the possession of the United States. It was
supplied with immense quantities of military and naval stores; and
several old vessels which had been withdrawn from service, and
others of great value, were either waiting orders to sail or undergoing
repairs. The entire establishment, whether on land or water, was
indispensable to the conspirators, for the possession of the Navy
Yard would give them immediate control of ordnance stores and
property worth $30,000,000.
The seizure of this vast establishment having been determined
upon, five or six vessels had been sunk by the rebels in the channel of
the Elizabeth river, below the Navy Yard, thus effectually preventing
the passage of larger vessels.
General Taliaferro was placed in command of the insurgent forces
then rapidly concentrating at Norfolk. Commodore McCauley, who
commanded at the Navy Yard, had been reluctant to adopt any
measures which would bring him into hostility with the State troops,
and thus inaugurate the war. The rebels took advantage of this
leniency, but for once they were disappointed in their expectations of
success. The Commodore determined to destroy the immediate
agencies of the war, leaving the armories, ship wood, docks and
dwellings unharmed, hoping that, although they might for a time be
occupied by the insurgents, the stars and stripes would eventually
float over them in triumph.
 At 8½ o’clock on Saturday evening, the 20th April, the Pawnee,
containing 600 Massachusetts troops from Fortress Monroe, arrived
at Gosport harbor, the Commodore’s flag at its mast-head the white
sails, relieved by the dark blue sky, appearing more like the floating
wings of the dove of peace than heralds of destruction. The scene
that followed is thus graphically described by an eye-witness.
Her coming was not unexpected, and as she glided to her place at
the dock, the men on the Pennsylvania and the Cumberland, several
hundred in number, greeted her with a volley of cheers that echoed
and re-echoed till all Norfolk and Portsmouth must have heard the
hail. The men of the Pennsylvania fairly outdid themselves in their
enthusiasm on this occasion. They clambered into the shrouds, and
not only answered to the “three cheers,” but volunteered “three times
three,” and gave them with a hurricane of heartiness. This intense
feeling on their part is easily explained. They had been a long time
almost imprisoned on shipboard, on a ship imbedded in the river,
motionless and helpless, and subject to promises from the
secessionists of speedy demolition. In the advent of the Pawnee they
saw deliverance from such durance, and they exulted with
tremendous emphasis.
All Portsmouth and Norfolk were thoroughly aroused by the
arrival of the Pawnee. They did not expect her, and were not
prepared for her. They were seized with trepidation, thinking,
perhaps, she had come, and along with the Cumberland and
Pennsylvania, meant to bombard the towns for having obstructed the
channel, and for having, the night before, rifled the United States
magazine, just below Norfolk, of about 4,000 kegs of powder. Being
utterly defenceless and quite terrified, the secessionists made no
protest against the Pawnee’s presence, nor did they venture too near
the Navy Yard.
The Pawnee made fast to the dock, and Colonel Wardrop marched
out his regiment and stationed them at the several gates of the Navy
Yard to oppose the entrance of any forces from without, in case an
attempt to enter should be made. Having adopted this precaution,
the Commodore set the marines on the Pennsylvania, the
Cumberland, the Pawnee, and in the yard, to work. All the books and
papers, the archives of the establishment, were transferred to the
Pawnee.