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The National Academy of Sciences’ Committee on the Improvement of Greytown Harbor, Nicaragua
[The following narrative is taken from Frederick W. True’s Semi-centennial history of the National Academy of Sciences, A History of the First Half-Century of the National Academy of Sciences 1863-1913, pp. 247-253.]
For one brief period the Academy was concerned with a question connected with the great problem of an isthmian canal which had occupied so many minds since the discovery of America. In the middle of the 19th century attention was being concentrated more and more on Nicaragua as the region which offered the greatest natural advantages for the construction of this important artificial waterway, and diplomatic contests were being waged unceasingly by capitalists and by the principal commercial nations of the world to gain or maintain control over the enterprise. Companies were organized which obtained valuable concessions from the existing Nicaraguan government, only to have them withdrawn in a few months by a succeeding government; undertakings commenced with great enthusiasm and a liberal outlay soon languished for lack of financial support, or terminated abruptly in consequence of the expiration of charters; adventurers appeared who misled the Nicaraguan legislatures by claiming the support of European powers, but were soon repudiated by their governments and forced to withdraw. Such kaleidoscopic changes went on continuously down to the time when the French Panama Canal Company decided to offer its holdings to the United States at a price which the latter was willing to consider, and attention turned suddenly from Nicaragua to Panama.
Among the American companies which undertook to build the Nicaraguan canal obtained concessions from the government was one organized in 1849 and called the “Compania de Transito de Nicaragua.” This soon merged in the larger “Atlantic and Pacific Ship-Canal Company” controlled by Cornelius Vanderbilt and other American capitalists. As the ship-canal was likely to be long in building, a subsidiary company was formed in 1851, which opened a passenger route from Greytown up the San Juan River and across Lake Nicaragua by boat, and thence down to the Pacific coast by a stage road. This route had been in operation but a few years when the American adventurer Walker appeared in Nicaragua and having been successful in overturning the existing government proceeded to have the charter of the canal company revoked and its property confiscated in retaliation for an action unfavorable to his ambitions which was taken by the United States. While the company was endeavoring to recover its rights, a French adventurer persuaded the Nicaraguan government to turn over the canal concession to him, claiming that he was supported in his enterprise by France. The French government, however, repudiated him, and the Nicaraguans being now in a friendly mood toward he United States granted the rights of the steam navigation within her territories and the construction of an interocaen canal to a new American organization, known as the Central American Transit Company of which Francis Morris was the president. It was this company which invoked the aid of the National Academy of Sciences in solving the problem of improving the harbor of Greytown on San Juan del Norte, that was to be the Atlantic terminus of the canal.
At the beginning of the 19th century the harbor was one of the most important on that coast. In 1832 it was reported that its width at the mouth was one and three-quarters miles, with a channel depth of 30 feet. Afterwards it became rapidly choked by sand, and in 1861 the width of the entrance was only 300 feet, while in 1865 Captain Jones of H.M.S. Shannon reported that it had a bar across it after a storm from the North, though in continued fine weather the river scoured out a channel of eight or ten feet. The chart made by the American engineer Preston C.F. West shows but 8 feet at the entrance at low water on February 4, 1865, while on May 25 of the same year this entrance was closed and a new one was opened through the sand spit farther to the East.
The idea that the National Academy of Sciences should investigate the condition of the harbor and if possible recommend means for improving it appears to have originated the J.E. Hilgard, who was the Acting Superintendent of the U.S. Coast Survey in 1866, and corresponded with the Nicaraguan minister on the subject. The minister, Don Luis Molina, repeated the suggestion in a letter addressed to Secretary Seward and requested that a committee of the Academy be appointed to carry it into effect. Seward in turn presented the matter to Joseph Henry, then Acting President of the Academy, with the request that he would comply with the wishes of the Nicaraguan minister, and a committee was duly appointed. The correspondence which has been printed in the report of the Academy, is as follows:
“Department of State,
“Washington, July 12, 1866.
“Sir: The department has received a communication from the minister of the republic of Nicaragua containing a note addressed to him by Mr. J.E. Hilgard, in charge of the United States Coast Survey office, recommending the appointment of a board to consist of the members of the Academy of Sciences, of which you are the vice-president, for the purpose of investigating and reporting upon the practicability and best means of improving the navigation of the Lower San Juan river, and reclaiming the harbor of San Juan del Norte, in Nicaragua, which recommendation is fully approved by the minister in his communication to this department. He recommends in addition that Mr. Hilgard form a member of the board, whom he represents as possessing the necessary charts and reports, and as being well advised on the difficult subject to be investigated.
“It may not be unnecessary to mention the fact that by a contract entered into between the government of Nicaragua and the Central American Transit Company on the 10th of November, 1863, the latter undertakes to affect a good interoceanic transit through the republic of Nicaragua.
“I would thank you if you would act upon the suggestion of the minister of the republic of Nicaragua; and, in the event of the organization of the board, I will beg of you to instruct the same, that should a good interoceanic transit be found impracticable under the limitations contained in the contract of the Central American Transit Company, above referred to, inquire into the expediency of effecting such transit way within the region surveyed by Captain West.
“I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
“William H. Seward.
“Professor Joseph Henry &c., &c., &c., Washington.”
“Smithsonian Institution,
“September 20, 1866.
“Sir: I have the honor to inform you that in compliance with your request of July 12, 1866, the subject of the improvement of the river and harbor of San Juan del Norte, in Nicaragua, was referred to a committee of the National Academy of Science, and this committee has made the investigation required, and now through me presents the accompanying report.
“The committee, which was chosen with reference to special fitness from previous study and experience for this investigation, consisted of the following members of the Academy: A.A. Humphreys, major general and Chief Engineer United States Army; C.H. Davis, rear-admiral United States navy and Superintendent National Observatory; J.E. Hilgard, assistant United States Coast Survey, acting Superintendent.
“In accordance with article II, section 4, of the act of incorporation of the Academy, Mr. Henry M. Mitchell, of the United States Coast Survey, (not a member of the Academy), was appointed to assist in the investigation.
“The committee, after a careful study of all the materials furnished by Don Luis Molina, and those obtained from other sources, has arrived at conclusions and are enabled to give suggestions, which, it is hoped, may be found of value to the government of Nicaragua, and of importance in the commerce of the world. The report of the committee points out the causes and progress of the deterioration of the harbor of Greytown; considers the question of it partial restoration, and the means to be adopted to attain this end. It also considers the problem of increasing the depth and volume of water in the river as an essential condition of the improvement of the entrance of the harbor, and presents a definite opinion as to the results which may be expected when the works which are indicated have been completed. It discusses the availability of the Colorado pass, and closes with a recapitulation of all the conclusions.
“I have the honor, to remain, very truly, yourobedient servant,
“Joseph Henry,
“Vice-President of the National Academy.
“Hon. William H. Seward,
“Secretary of State.”
There is little to add to Henry’s summary of the report of the committee, which report was published in full in 1867 as an appendix of the Annual Report for the preceding year and gives a good general idea of the operations of the committee.
The committee did not visit Nicaragua, but formed its conclusions entirely from the documents and maps laid before it by Molina its principal recommendation for the improvement of the San Juan River and the harbor of Greytown will be readily understood when the conformation of the lower portion of the river is explained. At a point about 15 miles from the coast it divides into two branches one of which retains the name of San Juan, while the other is known as the Colorado. The latter has by far the greater flow of water, is comparatively unobstructed, and is open to navigation by steamboats at all seasons of the year. The recommendation of the committee was that a weir should be placed at the point of bifurcation of the two streams so as to direct about one-half of the water of the Colorado River to the San Juan, the idea being that the increased flow in the latter which would result would probably deepen its channel, while at the same time increasing the supply of water in the harbor.
It is obvious, however, that the committee regarded the condition of the harbor as practically hopeless, and that it was far from being convinced that the adoption of its suggestions would produce satisfactory results. This will appear from the following excerpts from the report:
“The deepening that we have advised in the lower San Juan, in the neighborhood of the weir, may prove sufficient to improve he whole stream, since the great proportion of water added at the dry season and the considerable increase of the wet season discharge must act powerfully upon the bed of the stream, and increase its depth wherever a yielding bottom is found. It may, however, well be feared that this scour, induced along the bed of the stream, will sweep into the harbor-basin masses of material not so easily removed from the deeper water of the anchorage-ground as from their present positions.
“It appears possible that the fate of Greytown harbor might have been averted by timely efforts to arrest the sand and cut off their supply…/.We have proposed improvements, but these must fall very short of renovation of the noble harbor that once welcomed to an ample and secure anchorage the largest ships that crossed the Caribbean Sea….The original blight of Greytown cannot be restored. The only hope of improvement rests upon the possibility of maintaining a navigable outlet from the present lagoon by increasing the outflow of the lower town, where ships formerly lay at anchor, has been largely reduced in size and depth by the advance of the river delta upon one side and the drifting in of sand on the other. The time is not very distant at which the river will debouch directly upon the sea.
“It will be necessary to maintain a sufficient anchorage basin by means of dredging.” [Rep. Nat. Acad. Sci. for 1866, pp. 14, 15.]
It is a matter for conjecture how far the committee would have modified its recommendations if it had visited Nicaragua and made an examination into the conditions actually existing there. Commander E.P. Lull, U.S. Navy, who made a survey of the San Juan River in 1873, was not at all hopeful that the suggestions of the committee could be carried into effect. He remarks in his report:
“A committee of the National Academy of Science in 1867 proposed, as a partial remedy for the decay of the river and harbor, the dredging out of the channel of the Lower San Juan and the construction of a weir from Leaf’s Island to Concepcion Island. The latter of these is in the main river, near its right bank, and above the forks. The former has now become joined to the angle or point of the mainland between the two branches. Concepcion Island is 2,000 feet from the point. The strongest part of the current runs between the two. The island is constantly cutting away at one place and forming at another, being composed entirely of silt banked around drift-logs which have lodged in the shoal water.
“The weir, if indeed it could be constructed at all with such a combination of unfavorable conditions, viz. the depth and strength of the water, and the yielding view. i.e., the turning of the current into the Lower San Juan, unless the latter was dredged out to a sufficient width and depth to prevent, by drawing it away, the water from cutting around the dam. This would have to be done for a distance of thirteen miles. I confess myself to have been very much discouraged when those facts and convictions impressed themselves on my mind.” [Report of the Explorations and Surveys for a Ship Canal through Nicaragua, 1872-73, p. 61. Sen. Exec. Doc. No. 57, 43d Congress, 1st Session.] 
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