9 - A place in the modern world

Summary

It is a commonplace that the world became much smaller for everyone in the course of the twentieth century, but for the inhabitants of remote St Helena the changes took longer to materialize than for most. It might be mentioned that while the logistical and technological changes that form the basis of this final chapter were being acted out, the national status of the islanders themselves within the world underwent a period of unaccustomed turmoil.

Having formerly enjoyed undifferentiated full British citizenship since the granting of the East India Company's royal charter of 1673, St Helena was reclassified as a British Dependency in 1834. For a century and a half the change of status had little discernible impact, but with the introduction of the British Nationality Act 1981 the islanders found themselves suddenly placed at a major disadvantage when (along with thirteen other such territories) they were deprived of their rights of residence in the UK – collateral casualties of government moves to block potential large-scale immigration from Hong Kong to the UK as Britain's ninety-nine-year lease on the New Territories approached its end. Although the numbers directly affected on St Helena were comparatively small, the slight was deeply felt by the entire population, which had come to regard itself as occupying ‘the lost county of England’. Two decades of intensive lobbying followed, with the islanders taking their complaint of injustice as far as the United Nations. Eventually, with the passing of the British Overseas Territories Act on 21 May 2002 (the putative 500th anniversary of the island's discovery), full rights were restored. Even with its national status cemented, far-reaching changes in St Helena's international relations continued to unfold, as they had done throughout the island's history.

The coming of the submarine telegraph

The Boer War had brought to the island a more oblique benefit than that represented by the prisoner-of-war camp (Chapter 8): this was the arrival on 26 November 1899 of a submarine telegraph cable, laid with the primary aim of enhancing communication between South Africa and London.