Rats and Ghosts
p. 57 · Read in the full issue
Live at Suwarrow
ANCHORAGE islet’s abandoned settlement in ‘haunted” Suwar row atoll, Cook Islands, is alive with rats, according to Mr. Bob Grant, an American, who is prob ably the most recent caller at the atoll (excepting possible Japanese fishermen).
Mr. Grant called in his yacht Korrigan in March.
The atoll had been uninhabited since Mr. Tom Neale of Rarotonga left in July, 1954, after about nine months’ residence. During that time
he reduced the rat population some what with the aid of cats which he took with him.
A team of Manihiki mother-of pearl shell divers spent from May to September, 1954, at the atoll test diving the lagoon. Shell diving may be resumed there next year.
The atoll has no present value as a copra producer, as the palms are heavily infested with termites which kill them soon after they reach the bearing stage.
The atoll has a lurid past, largely fictionalised, and is said by many Cook Islanders to be haunted.