Malaita of Malaita began in 1893, when Captain Gibson R.N., of , declared the southern Solomon Islands as a British Protectorate with the proclamation of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, claiming to regulate the local warfare and unfair labor trade, although it coincided with the German acquisition of territories to the west and French interest in those to the east. Auki was established as a government station in 1909, as headquarters of the administrative district of Malaita. The government began to pacify the island, registering or confiscating firearms, collecting a head tax, and breaking the power of unscrupulous war leaders. One
Choiseul Province capital of the province. When the natives first arrived and discovered the big island, they called it Lauru. Then, in 1568, the Spanish explorer Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira rediscovered the island and named it San Marcos ('Saint Mark'). Mendana himself never set foot on Lauru. He called it San Marcos, because he saw the island from Santa Isabel on the Day of Saint Mark. 200 years later in 1768, the French explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville saw the island again and named it Choiseul after the Minister of foreign affairs and statesman Choiseul. Today, the two most common names