(formerly Volunteer Island), coral atoll in the Central and Southern Line Islands, part of Kiribati, southwest Pacific Ocean; 2,000 mi (3,200 km) s. of Honolulu; land area of 8 sq mi (21 sq km) and a lagoon 5.5 mi by 2 mi (9 by 3 km); sighted in 1823 by Valentine Starbuck, the British master of a whaling ship; claimed by the U.S. under the Guano Act of 1856; annexed by Britain in 1866; became part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony in 1972; became part of independent Kiribati in 1979; island is uninhabited.