1870: 2,150, 400lb bales of cotton exported from Levuka, value l0d. to 3 shillings lb

“Cotton is the principal (export) and nearly the only item. 2150 bales left Levuka – with the exception of a few – for Sydney, during the year. 400 pound bales: Reckoning the bales as weighing ‘each 400 lbs. and varying in price from l0d. to 3s. per lb., and the last 150 bales at 4s., [...]

1868: Cotton, copra, trepang tortoise-shell traders in Fiji; Lewis Cohen

Sir Lewis Cohen(1849-1933), merchant and politician, was born on 23 December 1849 at Liverpool, Lancashire, England, son of Henry Cohen, outfitter and businessman, and his wife Elizabeth, née Harris.  Partnership in Fiji with a school mate, Adolphus Meyer Brodziak:  The family arrived in Sydney about 1853 and Cohen was educated there until, at 14, he [...]

1868: Frederick Moss came to Fiji to grow cotton after American civil war made sea-island cotton price rise

Moss was a New Zealand businessman who went to Fiji in 1868 during the cotton rush, when the American civil war made sea-island cotton precious in the markets of the world). In 1869 he returned to New Zealand and became an administrator and politician. He maintained a strong interest in the Pacific and visited the [...]