Samaná Bay

Among its features are protected islands that serve as nesting sites for pelicans and frigatebirds, caves with Taíno pictographs and petroglyphs, and mangrove-lined river tributaries.

[3] The Franklin Pierce administration instructed a special agent to negotiate a treaty permitting the United States to establish a naval base in Samaná Bay, resulting in an agreement in October 1854.

However, British and French envoys (who opposed US military presence in the area) convinced the Dominican government to insert a stipulation that Dominican citizens be treated as white people in the United States, ending the chances of the treaty being ratified.

[4] Again, in the aftermath of the American Civil War, US Secretary of State William H. Seward formed a plan to purchase or lease Samaná Bay for the United States, which was then seeking bases for its navy in the Caribbean.

Later efforts by the Grant Administration to purchase the bay, which soon expanded to annex all of the Dominican Republic also failed in the U.S. Senate.