JARVIS ISLAND

formerly Bunker Island, Volunteer Island, Jervis Island, or Brook Island, coral atoll, unincorporated territory of the U.S., in the Northern Line Islands, in the west central Pacific Ocean, 1,000 mi (1,600 km) southwest of Honolulu. The atoll has an area of 1.6 sq mi (4.1 sq km). Sighted in 1821 by a Captain Brown in the British ship Eliza Francis, the island was claimed in 1856 by the U.S. under the Guano Act, and the guano deposits were worked from 1857 to 1879. Britain annexed Jarvis in 1889 but did not exploit it. Claimed by the U.S. in 1935, it came under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1936. Researchers visited the atoll during the International Geophysical Year (195758). There are no permanent inhabitants.