The Probert Encyclopaedia of Places of the World

CAROLINE ISLANDS

The Caroline islands (also formerly known as the New Philippines) are an archipelago in the north west Pacific Ocean between latitude 3 degrees and 12 degrees north and longitude 132 degrees and 163 degrees 6 minutes east, and between the Philippines and the Marshall Isles. They were first discovered by the Spaniards in 1543, if not by the Portuguese in 1525. Many of the islands are mere coral reefs little elevated above the ocean. They form many groups, the most important being the Pelews, and those to which the largest islands of all, Yap and Ponape, respectively belong. The islands were long in the possession of Spain, but in 1899, after the conclusion of the war between that power and the United States, they were sold to Germany. In 1914 they were seized by Japan, who held them after 1919 as a League of Nations mandate. During the Second World War the islands, which had been heavily fortified by Japan, were seized by the United States and in 1947 became part of a UN strategic trust territory under US jurisdiction. After 1986 the trust territory included only the Republic of Palau, all other segments, including the Federated States of Micronesia, having adopted commonwealth status or a form of nationhood in close association with the United States.
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