1897

De ALLIANCE werd op 20 februari 1897 om wettelijke redenen onder de vlag van Santo Domingo gebracht met Carlos A. Mota als "papieren" eigenaar en manager, maar in feite bleef Leonard B. Smith de eigenaar.
The steamer ALLIANCE was built at Curaçao in 1895 for Leonard B. Smith, a native citizen of the United States then domiciled in that island. (opm: Curaçao) She was 59 feet4 inches in length, 12 feet10 inches in breadth and 5 feet in depth, with a capacity of 41 tons, and cost the sum of $ 12,030.03. Smith registered the ALLIANCE as a Dutch ship, and she carried the Dutch flag until February 1897. He then made arrangements to use the ship in the trade between Santo Domingo and Curaçao, but found that it would be necessary to register her as a Dominican ship in order to be permitted to trade along the Dominican coast. The memorialist says:To comply with said laws still further the papers were taken out in the name of Carlos A. Mota, a citizen of Santo Domingo, who, however, never acquired any real interest in the ALLIANCE, his title being purely nominal, and the vessel continued to be still the property of myself solely. The Dominican registry, given February 20, 1897, is, in part, as follows: The President of the Republic to all to whom these presents may come, greeting: The citizen Carlos A. Mota, having proved that he is the lawful owner of the Dominican steamer ALLIANCE, its captain being at present the citizen, Martin Senior, and said owner, C. A. Mota, having furnished the bond required by law, I, therefore, grant him this letter of marque, etc. On June 15,1897, the ALLIANCE sailed from Santo Domingo under the Dominican flag with clearance for Curaçao. On the morning of the 20th she was discovered on the shoals of the bar at Maracaibo flying a signal of distress. Epitasio Rios, one of the pilots of the port, thus describes her condition at the time: We descried from San Carlos a vessel with the flag hoisted, asking for assistance, on the shoals of the bar, near the place where the bark Bremen lies a wreck. I immediately left to send her the proper assistance, reached where she was at about 8 o'clock in the morning, and at once observed that the vessel, as well as her crew, was running the greatest risk. The vessel is a small steamship, bearing the name ALLIANCE; she had the Dominican colors hoisted; her fuel being exhausted it was necessary to break the windows to the cabin, 1 cask and some cots, with which, and even empty bags, her engine could get up 40 pounds of steam, which enabled us to arrive at San Carlos, where the commander of that fortress supplied her with firewood, provisions, and water, of all which elements the vessel was absolutely in want, and with which we could come that very day to Maracaibo. The steamship was at that moment leaking in consequence of the blows she had sustained by touching on the shoals of the bar.
Upon the arrival of the ALLIANCE at Maracaibo, she was seized by the collector of the port on suspicion of unlawful traffic in fraud of the revenues of Venezuela. Proceedings were had before the captain of the port and the national court of finance of Maracaibo, which court on August 14, 1897, after a full investigation, decreed that the ALLIANCE and her cargo were freed from sequestration and to be returned to the owners.