Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 November 1903 — Threatened with Extinction. [ARTICLE]

Threatened with Extinction.

Disease and starvation are threatening the inhabitants of the Cape Verd Islands, a Portuguese possession off the west coast of Africa, with extinction. From twenty to fifty persons die daily, and government officials on the islands ask to be released, as they are unwilling to stand the awful sights. Food is being shipped from Portuguese ports to the islanders, but the islands are without physicians, and as a consequence the diseases incident to the lack of food are carrying off the people. The survivors are reduced to mere skeletons, and all the industries on the islands are idle. The Cape Verd Islands number fourteen and have a population of 100,000. The inhabitants are mainly a mixture of Portuguese and negroes, and have not the power of resisting disease.