Compagnie Aerienne Antillaise

     The island Tintamarre, locally better known as Flat Island, is situated just off the north-east point of St. Martin. It is a most unlikely place to be the home base for an international airline, but that is just what it became in 1946. The island measures only about 2500 x 1000 meters, is separated by a 3 km channel from the the island of St. Martin and, most odd of all, it is uninhabited! Still, Tintamarre has a very interesting history. For instance, it was once the private property of the last descendant of the prominent Dutch Van Romondt plantation dynasty, who ran the island like an independent kingdom, growing high grade sea-cotton, weaving and dying it and even issuing his own currency to be used by the plantation laborers. The island had a brief spell of fame when a visiting French journalist wrote a story about "le Roi de Tintamarre" and with his story unleashed a flood of
love letters from French womanhood offering their services as van Romondt’s "queen".
     Alas, van Romondt preferred things as they were and remained, at least legally, a
bachelor and when in 1932 he retired back to the ancestral home at St. Martin, Tintamarre regressed to its former desolate state, visited only now and then by itinerant fishermen. However, an even more exiting episode was to follow just after World War II: it became the birthplace of aviation for St. Martin and surrounding islands. In 1946 an enterprising young man named Remy De Haenen started a unique airline operation at Tintamarre which pioneered the airways in the area.
     Remy De Haenen was born in London of Dutch parents (the original family name was Van Haanen). His father had been a war correspondent and illustrator for the Illustrated London News, based in France during the Great War. The family stayed on in France and this was
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