SS Titus at Gavutu, 1897

Abstract

This picture shows the scene when the British Government was first being established in the Solomon Islands. On this occasion the Titus, a screw steamer of 760 T. gross register, under the command of Captain John Williams, and owned by Burns, Philp & Co. Ltd, arrived and anchored at Gavutu, where a whaleboat was loaded with tents and personal equipment for the first Resident Commissioner, Charles Morris Woodford (later CMG) and his small party, including native police from Fiji. They proceeded from Gavutu through unchartered reefs and passages to the Island of Tulagai, where the Commissioner was landed on a beach and the boat's crew remained until some space was cleared and tents erected. Thus was founded the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, with a one-man government in residence.