Pitcairn Islands

[Alessa]

Pitcairn Islands

The Pitcairn Islands (pronounced /ˈpɪtkɛərn/;[1] Pitkern: Pitkern Ailen), officially named the Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno Islands, form a group of four volcanic islands in the southern Pacific Ocean. The islands are a British Overseas Territory (formerly a British colony), the last remaining in the Pacific.[2] The four islands – named Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie, and Oeno – are spread over several hundred miles of ocean and have a total area of about 18 square miles (47 km2). Only Pitcairn, the second largest and measuring about 2 miles (3.2 km) across, is inhabited.

The islands are best known as home of the descendants of the Bounty mutineers and the Tahitians (or Polynesians) who accompanied them, an event retold in numerous books and films. This history is still apparent in the surnames of many of the islanders. With only about 50 inhabitants[3] (from four families as of 2010: Christian, Warren, Young, and Brown), Pitcairn is the least populous and most remote jurisdiction in the world (although it is not a sovereign nation). The United Nations Committee on Decolonisation includes the Pitcairn Islands on the United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories.[4]

[Alessa]

[Alessa]

Capital
(and largest city)    Adamstown
Official language(s)    English (local dialect is Pitkern)
Ethnic groups     British, Polynesian, or (mixed)
Government    British Overseas Territory
 -     Sovereign    Elizabeth II
 -     Governor/
High Commissioner    Victoria Treadell
 -     Mayor    Mike Warren
Area
 -     Total    47 km2
18.1 sq mi
Population
 -     2010 estimate    48 (238th (last))
 -     Density    1/km2 (197th)
2.7/sq mi
Currency    New Zealand dollar (NZD)
Time zone    UTC−08
Internet TLD    .pn
Calling code    870

[Alessa]

The original settlers of the Pitcairn Islands were Polynesians who appear to have lived on Pitcairn and Henderson for several centuries. Although archaeologists believe that Polynesians were living on Pitcairn as late as the 15th century, the islands were uninhabited when they were discovered by Europeans.[5]

Ducie and Henderson Islands were discovered by Portuguese sailor Pedro Fernandes de Queirós, sailing for the Spanish Crown, who arrived on 26 January 1606. He named them La Encarnación ("The Incarnation") and San Juan Bautista ("Saint John the Baptist"), respectively. However, some sources express doubt about exactly which of the islands were visited and named by Queirós, suggesting that Queirós’ La Encarnación may actually have been Henderson Island, and San Juan Bautista may have been Pitcairn Island.[6]

Pitcairn Island was sighted on 3 July 1767 by the crew of the British sloop HMS Swallow, commanded by Captain Philip Carteret. It was named after Midshipman Robert Pitcairn, a fifteen-year-old crew member who was the first to sight the island. Robert Pitcairn was the son of British Marine Officer John Pitcairn.

Carteret, who sailed without the newly invented accurate marine chronometer, charted the island at 25° 2’ south and 133° 21’ west of Greenwich, but although the latitude was reasonably accurate the longitude was incorrect by about 3°. This made Pitcairn difficult to find, as highlighted by the failure of Captain James Cook to locate the island in July 1773.[7][8]

[Alessa]

The mutineers turning Bligh and part of the officers and crew adrift from the Bounty, 29 April 1789

[Alessa]

Habitation

In 1790, nine of the mutineers from the Bounty and Tahitian companions (six men, 11 women and a baby), some of whom may have been kidnapped from Tahiti, settled on Pitcairn Island and set fire to the Bounty.[9] The wreck is still visible underwater in Bounty Bay. The ship itself was discovered in 1957 by National Geographic explorer Luis Marden. Although the settlers were able to survive by farming and fishing, the initial period of settlement was marked by serious tensions among the settlers. Alcoholism, murder, disease and other ills took the lives of most mutineers and Tahitian men. John Adams and Ned Young turned to the scriptures using the ship's Bible as their guide for a new and peaceful society. Young eventually died of an asthmatic infection. The Pitcairners also converted to Christianity; later they converted from their existing form of Christianity to Seventh-day Adventism after a successful Adventist mission in the 1890s. After the rediscovery of Pitcairn, John Adams was granted amnesty for his mutiny.

The Pitcairn islanders reported that it was not until 27 December 1795 that the first ship since the Bounty was seen from the island, but as she did not approach the land, they could not make out to what nation she belonged. A second appeared some time in 1801, but did not attempt to communicate with them. A third came sufficiently near to see their habitations, but did not venture to send a boat on shore. The American trading ship Topaz under the command of Mayhew Folger was the first to visit the island and communicate with them when they spent 10 hours at Pitcairn in February 1808. A report of Folger's find was forwarded to the Admiralty mentioning the mutineers and a more precise location of the island—25° 2’ S latitude, 130° W longitude[10]—however, this rediscovery was not known to Sir Thomas Staines, who commanded a Royal Navy flotilla of two ships (HMS Briton and HMS Tagus) which found the island at 25° .4’ S (by meridian observation) on 17 September 1814. Staines sent a party ashore and wrote a detailed report for the Admiralty.[11][12][13]

[Alessa]

Ducie Island was rediscovered in 1791 by the British Captain Edwards aboard HMS Pandora, while searching for the Bounty mutineers. He named it after Francis Reynolds-Moreton, 3rd Baron Ducie, a captain in the Royal Navy. Henderson Island was rediscovered on 17 January 1819 by a British Captain James Henderson of the British East India Company ship Hercules. On 2 March 1819, Captain Henry King, sailing aboard the Elizabeth, landed on the island to find the king's colours already flying. His crew scratched the name of their ship into a tree, and for some years the island's name was Elizabeth or Henderson. Oeno Island was discovered on 26 January 1824 by U.S. Captain George Worth aboard the whaler Oeno.

[Alessa]

Geodesy Collection on Pitcairn Island

[Alessa]

British colony

Pitcairn Island became a British colony in 1838 and was among the first territories to extend voting rights to women. By the mid-1850s the Pitcairn community was outgrowing the island and its leaders appealed to the British government for assistance. They were offered Norfolk Island and on 3 May 1856, the entire community of 193 people set sail for Norfolk on board the Morayshire, arriving on 8 June after a miserable five-week trip. But after eighteen months on Norfolk, seventeen of the Pitcairners returned to their home island; five years later another twenty-seven did the same.

In 1902 Henderson, Oeno and Ducie islands were annexed by Britain, Henderson on 1 July, Oeno on 10 July and Ducie on 19 December.[14] In 1938 the three islands along with Pitcairn were formally incorporated into a single administrative unit called the "Pitcairn Group of Islands".

[Alessa]

Since a population peak of 233 in 1937, the island has been suffering from emigration, primarily to New Zealand, leaving some fifty people living on Pitcairn (December 2009: 45 islanders on Electoral Roll)

In 2004 charges were laid against seven men living on Pitcairn and six living abroad with sex-related offences dating back a number of years. On 25 October 2004, six men were convicted, including Steve Christian, the island's mayor at the time. After the six men lost their final appeal, the British government set up a prison on the island at Bob's Valley (Pitkern: Walley). The men began serving their sentences in late 2006. By 2010 all had served their sentences or been granted home detention status (Pitcairn News, 2010).

In 2010 the island received a new and updated constitution.[15]

[Alessa]

View of Bounty Bay

[Alessa]

Map of Pitcairn Islands.

[Alessa]

The Pitcairn Islands form the southeasternmost extension of the geological archipelago of the Tuamotus of French Polynesia, and consist of four islands: Pitcairn Island, Oeno Island (atoll with five islets, one of which is Sandy Island), Henderson Island and Ducie Island (atoll with four islets).

The only permanently inhabited island, Pitcairn, is accessible only by boat through Bounty Bay.

Henderson Island, covering about 86% of the territory's total land area and supporting a rich variety of animals in its nearly inaccessible interior, is also capable of supporting a small human population, but access is difficult, owing to its outer shores' being steep limestone cliffs covered by sharp coral.

The Pitcairn Islands were formed by a centre of upwelling magma called the Pitcairn hotspot.

The other islands are at a distance of more than 100 km (60 mi) and are not habitable.

[Alessa]

Flora and fauna

About nine plant species are thought to occur only on Pitcairn. These include tapau, formerly an important timber resource, and the giant nehe fern (Angiopteris chauliodonta). Some, such as red berry (Coprosma rapensis var. Benefica), are perilously close to extinction. The Pitcairn Islands are one of two places (the other being Mangareva) in the world in which the plant species Glochidion pitcairnense occurs.[16]

In terms of fauna, an interesting and rare introduction is the Galapagos giant tortoise (Testudo elephantopus). The sole surviving tortoise, Ms T (also known as Turpen), was one of five, which arrived on Pitcairn between 1937 and 1951, brought to the island by Irving Johnson, skipper of the 96 foot Brigantine Yankee. Turpen usually resides at Tedside by Western Harbour. A protection order makes it an offence should anyone kill, injure, capture, maim or cause harm or distress to the tortoise.[17]

[Alessa]

The birds of Pitcairn fall into several groups. These include seabirds, wading birds and a small number of resident land bird species. Of 20 breeding species, Henderson Island has 16, including the unique flightless Henderson rail (Nesophylax alter); Oeno 12; Ducie 13 and Pitcairn six. Of the birds breeding on Pitcairn the best known are the Fairy Tern (Gygis alba), the Common Noddy (Anous stolidus) and the Red-tailed Tropic Bird (Phaethon rubricauda). The Pitcairn Island Warbler (Acrocephalus vaughani), known by Pitcairners as a "Sparrow", is a native species, dark-brown above and yellowish to buff below. It used to be common throughout the island but was placed on the endangered status list in 2008.