Dubious St. John Stories - A Customs House on Whistling Cay
Posted by gerald in Uncategorized, tags: St. John, St. John US Virgin Islands, St. John USVI, St. John Virgin Islands, Whistling CayWant to stay updated to Life on St. John - subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
It has been said as well as written that the stone structure on Whistling Cay served as a customs house. As far I know this is supported by the supposition that the cay got is name from the Dutch word “wissel” meaning change. Actually I find it difficult to believe that this tiny cay ever served the function of Customs House.
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Whistling Cay Aerial View - St. John USVI
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Whistling Cay is a small island located just off Mary Point on St. John. If you’ve ever approached Whistling Cay on a small boat you would know how difficult of an entry it is. The shoreline is rocky and scattered with reef. The small gravel beach on the southeastern part of the island is the only possible landing point and there is no evidence that there was ever a dock there.
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Stone Structure on Whistling Cay
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If this were a customs house, than it would have to be manned by officials, who would need to be supplied with there food, water, and office supplies. There would have to have been communication with St. John or St. Thomas only accessible by boat. Arriving vessels would have to find a convenient place to anchor and then arrive in dinghies, fill out the forms and have their vessels inspected by the officials on the cay.
It seems very unlikely that this little stone structure on this hardly approachable island would serve such a purpose. Why not head over to Cruz Bay, Red Hook or Charlotte Amalie and clear customs there?
My guess is that the structure was constructed during that period between 1834 and 1848 when slavery was abolished in the British Virgin Islands, but continued on in the Danish West Indies, creating a temptation for slaves on St. John’s north coast to run away to Tortola lying just a few miles away. The building would supply some shelter for soldiers guarding the passage into the Narrows and the Sir Francis Drake Channel, discouraging escape attempts.
A similar guard house, equipped with cannons, can be found on the Johnny Horn Trail overlooking the Sir Francis Drake Channel.
So in my opinion, it makes a lot more sense for the building to have been constructed and served as a guardhouse and not a customs house. What do you think?
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Thanks again, Gerald, these are great. LOVED the story about you and John selling jellies on STT!!!
Per Reggie Callwood (AKA Mr Reggie), the way it worked was that there were two watch stations, one on Whistling Cay and the other on Great Thatch (there is a similar ruin on the SW beach of Grt Thatch). Each one had a flagpole and black and white flags. Boats passing through the Narrows were supposed to check in with the first station, GT going down, WC going up. If they complied and were okay a white flag was raised. No further action was necessary. If they didn’t stop or were not approved and still continued, a black flag would be raised, and the guards at the other house would launch a fast rowboat with armed men in it. Sailboats in those days were quite slow. They would stop or be fired upon.
All the paperwork involved with customs would still have been done elsewhere. These were just watch stations.
I have no idea how true this is.
Hi Ed,
I have the greatest respect for Mr. Reggie, but it still makes no sense. Lets say a sailboat is going from Tortola to St. Thomas. Are you saying it’s supposed to stop and anchor off the reef at Great Thatch, check in with them and then continue on to St. Thomas? And then what? Check in again? Another theoretical case, a boat heading from Tortola to San Juan is sailing downwind through the Narrows. It passes the checkpoint and doesn’t stop. Then you say that soldiers, who would have to be stationed permanently on Great Thatch waiting for such an occurrence, would jump in a rowboat, pursue the downwind sailboat, catch up to them and threaten them with rifles. Sailboats in those days might have been slow going upwind, but they must have shot down the Narrows pretty quickly when heading west. I don’t think that the rowboat full of soldiers would be able to catch a downwind sailboat or stop the vessel with their small arms, especially if the crew were well armed smugglers or pirates. And if the the boat was headed to San Juan, why should they stop for Danish Customs anyway. Also I can’t imagine having a team of bureaucrats and soldiers, stationed on a rugged, uninhabited, reef infested, British Cay with no dock, water or resources available on the island just to be an intermediate checkpoint for checking cargo on it’s way to St. Thomas, when there would be ample facilities at Charlotte Amalie. Sorry, it just doesn’t make sense.
I don’t know where Mr. Reggie got his information. I admit some of this seems a bit of a stretch. Presumably boats already known to the watchmen would have to approach only close enough to be recognized. As far as some renegade boats getting by, whether by outrunning or outshooting a couple of ragtag guardsmen in a rowboat, this would certainly have been possible but the guards would have seen the boat and could describe it to other authorities.
In any case anyone really concerned with hiding their activities would have crossed at night whether they were slaves trying to get to the BVI, or pirates or smugglers trying to go wherever. It’s hard to see these watchmen being very effective.
Judging from the amount of clothing discarded by presumably illegal immigrants entering US territory found on the beaches across the Sir Francis Drake Channel from Tortola, I would say that guarding the shoreline is still far from being very effective. One difference being that exploited peoples are now sneaking into St. John instead of out of it.