History of Micronesia: A Collection of Source Documents: Vol. 33 Japanese Traders, 1890-1897
Levesque, Rodrigue (2005). History of Micronesia: A Collection of Source Documents: Vol. 33 Japanese Traders, 1890-1897. 33. Gatineau, Québec: Lévesque Publications. ISBN 978-0-920201-33-6.
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Abstract: HOM.33 (1890–1897) documents the growing competition for influence and commerce in Micronesia during the final decade of Spanish rule, with particular emphasis on the emergence of Japanese trading activity alongside German, Spanish, British, and American commercial networks. The sources range from colonial correspondence and mission reports to whaling logbooks, travel narratives, and official government documents. Geographic coverage centers on Pohnpei (Ponape), Yap, Palau, the Marshall Islands, the Gilbert Islands, and the Mariana Islands, with repeated references to specific locations including Metalanim, Kiti, Sokehs, Jokaj, Mutok Harbor, Tomil Harbor, Koror (Goror), Angaur, Jaluit, Majuro, Mili, Ailinglaplap, Nauru, Saipan, Guam, Pagan, and Agrigan. The documents also contain numerous descriptions of harbors, trading stations, mission settlements, and navigation routes, illustrating how copra trading, whaling traffic, and inter-island shipping connected communities across Micronesia and the wider Pacific maritime world. 
The volume introduces a large number of officials, missionaries, traders, and mariners active in the region during the 1890s. Among the colonial administrators and naval officers appearing in the records are José Montes de Oca, Julio Merás, Luis Santos, Miguel Abrial, and Spanish naval officers commanding vessels such as the cruiser Don Juan de Austria. Missionary activity is represented by Capuchin figures including Fr. Antonio de Valencia, Fr. Daniel de Arbácegui, and Fr. Saturnino de Artajona, whose reports describe mission stations in Yap, Koror, Kiti, and Pohnpei. Commercial and maritime actors include traders such as Captain O’Keefe, William Breslin, and representatives of the Jaluit Company, as well as captains of visiting whalers and schooners moving between San Francisco, Japan, Hong Kong, and Pacific island ports. The records also identify indigenous leaders, including the Nanmwarki of districts such as Kiti, U, Sokehs, and Nett, reflecting the continued role of local authority structures within colonial administration. 
Several episodes illustrate the complex political and economic tensions of the 1890s Pacific. These include reports on the establishment of Japanese trading stations in Micronesia, disputes involving foreign traders and colonial authorities in Pohnpei, conflicts between missionaries and administrators, and maritime incidents involving whaling crews, deserters, and visiting naval vessels. Other documents record the activities of European traders and beachcombers, the influence of missionary networks, the circulation of goods such as copra, trepang, and turtle shell, and encounters between local communities and expanding foreign commercial interests. Together the materials provide a detailed documentary guide to the interaction of island societies, colonial governments, trading companies, and maritime networks across Micronesia during the decade preceding the transfer of the region to German control in 1899
