We arrived in St Helena early on 24th Feb. St Helena rises, as Darwin promised, like a fortress from the sea. The first view of the tall volcanic cliffs and sparse vegetation hides a lush interior of rolling hills. The interior is dotted with pretty cottages and the occasional Georgian house with cows grazing in green pastures – not unlike rural England. Interestingly, this similarity extends beyond the landscape to the building style, culture and people.
Politically, St Helena is a British Protectorate and its inhabitants enjoy full British Citizenship. Most islanders we spoke to had lived and worked in Britain for many years and many still had children working overseas (including in the Falklands Islands and Ascension Island).
Architecturally, Jamestown, the only town on the island, with its with many brightly painted buildings, beautifully kept public garden and old parish church is considered one of the best preserved Georgian towns.
In terms of culture, the island follows British social habits and fashions. Nevertheless there is a distinctive St Helenian look which comes from generations of intermarrying English, Portuguese, African, Chinese, Indian and Boor. The local dialect has been described as combining Dickensian English with a Deep South twang. All the Saints we met were wonderful, had a smile or a joke waiting to be told. They have a great pride in their island and willingness to share this with the few visitors they receive.
These similarities unexpected and somewhat curious, if you consider that St Helena is over 10,000 miles from Europe. At the same time, this makes St Helena instantly familiar, almost like a place one has visited before or of which one has some distant childhood memory.
One might have expected that the island would have close links to South Africa also, as this is the nearest ‘developed’ country. That this is not so can possibly be explained by the fact that most Saints would not have been welcome in Apartheid SA.
We enjoyed our short stay in St Helena, especially our two hikes in varied and beautiful countryside, passing from one vegetation zone to the next as we climbed the arid cliffs and into the lush interior. We also visited the famous Napoleonic sites, along with other, more expert Napoleon ‘spotters’ who had arrived by the mail boat, the RMS St Helena. St Helena is most famous for being Napoleon’s place of exile, the island ‘at the end of the world’ that the emperor was sent to as a punishment for escaping his prison in Elba. There are several Napoleonic sites – the two houses he lived in, and his grave. Longwood House, his long term residence and house in which he died, is a very pretty country house. Beautifully kept and carefully preserved, it was not always so – in Napoleon’s time it was reported to be damp, in a state of disrepair and rat infested. Spacious by our standards, the house would have seemed very small in comparison to Versailles and would barely contained Napoleon and his entourage. The grave is in a well kept garden, it’s location of Napoleon’s own choosing, but is unmarked as the English would not allow the title “Emperor”, while the French would not accept anything less. His body was disinterred and returned to France some 20 years after his death.