Outposts (46 page)

The law applies to all colonial citizens, apart from those in two colonies—Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands. Parliament, which wrote the laws, specifically excluded both groups—25,000 people, all told—and permitted them full right of access to Britain as and when they might want. No logical reason was ever given—indeed, the Falkland Islanders were only given the status after their war—but the inference is obvious. They were given free access because they were white; every other colonial citizen is coloured either black or brown, or yellow.

The stated reason for the Act’s introduction was to prevent the possible tidal wave of five million Hong Kong Chinese into Britain once the agreement with China is finally implemented in 1997. The implied secondary reason is to ease the immigration burden posed by tens of thousands of other non-white colonials who might think of arriving in a country already displaying the effects of widespread immigration from the Indies, East and West, in the post-war years. And yet, ironically, it seems very much as though few would-be immigrants actually want to come to Britain to take up their prize. Few Gibraltarians have come, and even fewer from the Falklands. And surveys claim to show that even the St Helenians—most loyal and devoted of all—would come with great reluctance. Of the 6,000 islanders, perhaps 800 would come if the law were changed tomorrow.

But the principle seems an insulting and unkind device, whatever its actual practical results might or might not be. It seems a modest and appropriate reward to all those remaining citizens of Empire,
that should they feel they want to come home, they should be permitted so to do. It is the feeling of rejection that is so hurtful to them—and it is a feeling that could be reversed with a change in the law that would have almost no effect, no detrimental effect, at least, upon the welfare of the Britons themselves. The Foreign Office says it will not change the law: Anguillians and Pitcairners and the people of Grand Turk remain foreigners, aliens, for the time being. Only when Hong Kong is safely back in Chinese hands will any minister look at the law again—and it is doubted in Whitehall that it will, in fact, ever be changed. The few thousand remaining colonials are condemned to live for ever denied the small honour of being full citizens of the country that took so much from, and made such use of, the colonies from which they come.

This law aside, there have been some few successes. The Hong Kong agreement was a piece of skilful diplomacy; there seems likely to be some amicable arrangements between Britain and Spain over the future of Gibraltar. For one thing the gates are now open. And it can fairly be said, in the particular case of St Helena, that since 1984, when the Overseas Development Administration took over the day-to-day running of their colony from the Foreign Office, island morale has perked up, there is more optimism than before. Some cynics might suggest this is because ODA is a money-spending arm of the British Government, while the Foreign Office is not; others might suggest that the calibre of people working within the ODA is more suited to the particular needs of small and helpless states, and that there is no attempt by the mandarins at ODA to do more than assist in development—which is all that most colonies want—and no attempt to formulate policy of which, it must be said, there is none currently that relates to the colonies.

But generally, I must conclude that the state of the Empire—that state I thought I might try to divine when first I planned the journeys—is less than ideal. How is the Empire? Were the King to ask, one might fairly reply: ‘Lamentable, Your Majesty,’ and be fairly right. There are exceptions—Hong Kong is one, the Falklands another, Tristan da Cunha, for very peculiar reasons, a third. In the main, though, the tail-end of Empire is an unhappy collection of peoples
and places, wanting in imagination, in policy, in a future, in money, in sympathetic administration or talented leaders. Some islands may seek, and win, their independence; others, I fear, will become relentlessly poorer and more morose, trapped by their history, condemned to an eternity of begrudged expenditure, parsimonious direction, second-rate thought and government, to listlessness and ill-fortune. For those, the former glories of that grand assemblage of the British Empire must have a bitter aftertaste today, must trigger the sardonic laugh in the bar, a smirk, and some grim remark about the England of far away and long ago.

There is, I feel, one way out. The idea is not new, and others—notably the French—have tried it with some degree of success.

All the colonies that wish to remain linked to and ruled by the British Crown should continue to be so, as full and integral parts of the United Kingdom, or associated with it in some intimate and constitutionally attractive way. The six West Indian colonies, for example—Bermuda, Anguilla, Montserrat, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Caymans and the Virgins—could be made into the External British County of the West Atlantic, with their own Member of Parliament (who could sit in the Lords if needs be). The new ‘constituency’ would have a population of some 45,000 people—about the right size for representation at Westminster. The same arrangement could be made for the South Atlantic possessions of Ascension, St Helena, Tristan, the Falklands, the Falklands Dependencies and the British Antarctic. The population would be considerably lower—no more than nine thousand; but the six territories are of a kind, their needs and peoples more similar than separate. (I have long found it odd, for instance, that the BBC has for many years broadcast a regular brief weekend programme to the people of the Falklands—1,800 of them—but has never thought it worthwhile to broadcast to its equally loyal colleagues in St Helena and Tristan, where there are nearly four times as many British subjects. ‘Calling the South Atlantic’ might be a programme well worth considering—the ‘Saints’, certainly, would feel a little less neglected by London were they to hear direct from Bush House every week or so, in the way the Falklanders do now.)

Gibraltar could quite easily be made an External County of the Kingdom, having the population, the proximity and the desire. As for the remainder—sadly it has to be admitted that Pitcairn is too small, British Indian Ocean Territory has no resident population, and Hong Kong is leaving for fresh pastures shortly before the end of the century. For the two first of these, perhaps some Protectorate status—and would it really harm the interests of the British people if all forty-four members of Pitcairn were offered free and permanent access to the United Kingdom, if such they wanted? I rather think not.

Once thus assimilated into the mainland system, the people of the External Counties would be at one with the people of home—the same laws, the same taxes, the same grants, the same rights of access to each other’s territories. A man from Plymouth in Montserrat would enjoy precisely the same rights and freedoms as the man from Plymouth in Devon. A child in Edinburgh-of-the-Seven-Seas would have the same future as the child from Edinburgh on the Forth. And the Common Market could take upon itself the burden of financing some of the less well developed parts of the newly expanded but now truly United Kingdom—a grant for an emergency air strip on St Helena, technical help for the new hospital in Road Town, or a broadcasting station on Anguilla. The arrangement would be tidy, it would be kind, and it would recognise the debt an Imperial power owes to those of its Empire who are, for whatever reason, unable to stand upon their own feet and march into the world alone. For those who want us to stand by, we should do so with enthusiasm, with efficiency and with grace: such a scheme as the French—and, to a lesser extent, the Americans—have found ideal might well work for ourselves. I fervently hope some minister, some day, might champion the cause, rather than leave the old Empire to fade and decay in a way unworthy of our greater traditions.

Since I began these final pages I have left the fine old East India Company desk, and the colony of St Helena, too. I am in a cabin down by the waterline of the little cargo ship that brought me here. I have said my farewells to the island that, of all in the remaining
Empire, I feel I have come to know most intimately, the one for which I feel most sympathy, the one I suppose I would say I like above all others.

It is a bright autumn morning, a few minutes before noon. Out at sea there are white horses racing across the wave tops, and in the anchorage a dozen yachts are rolling gaily in the swell. On board our ship there is a silence, pregnant with anticipation.

At noon a bell is struck at the forepeak, and the rumble of the engines shakes the entire vessel. White foam races from the stern, and as the anchors are winched from the seabed, so the ship begins to move forward and into a tight turn to port, out of the anchorage and into open water. The loudspeakers begin to blare their traditionally Imperial farewells: ‘Anchors Aweigh’, ‘Hearts of Oak’, ‘A Life on the Ocean Wave’ and, last of all, ‘Rule Britannia’. Down here the Empire is still alive and well, the memory is the reality, and glorious history is the stuff of the present.

The ship’s siren sounds—three immensely loud blasts which boom and reverberate around the cliffsides. Some of the nearer yachts begin to bounce and rear in our wash. We are turned now, on a heading away from the island, and the engines growl up to their cruising speed. The cliffs move away. The church tower slips behind the jacaranda trees. The great ladder moves out of sight. The Union flags at the summit of Ladder Hill and down beside the Governor’s Castle stream in the trade winds.

The ship begins to roll in the ocean swell, and then to heave as she comes out of the island’s lee and the winds begin to make their own impression on her superstructure. We have the Governor aboard, and his personal standard flies from the stern mast, cracking in the wind. People are waving. A few are in tears. It will be a long time before the next boat to St Helena, and some in the crowds will not see their friends and children and loved ones for many months, or years, or perhaps ever again. Such is the isolation of this most perfectly preserved Imperial relic.

But soon the watchers turn away. There is no point in prolonging the sadness. The ship is moving fast now, and nothing can stop it. The island is fading into the clouds on the far horizon, her cliffs
becoming a little hazy as they plunge into the limitless sea. Soon the island vanishes, to be replaced by a patch of settled grey cloud, and even that fades before long, and the horizon becomes an unbroken line of steel. Before another hour has gone it becomes simple to muse that if there ever were an outpost of the Empire back there, or anywhere, it lingers on only in the memory, and on the maps that no one these days seems to have time to read.

‘Not another tropical island!’ they would groan at the
Sunday Times
, each time I returned, tanned and fit, from one more expedition to an outpost of Empire. In vain would I protest that on this occasion I had been to somewhere cold and windy or had suffered from terrible seasickness. To them all—the
Sunday Times
editor, Andrew Neil, the foreign editor, Stephen Milligan, his deputy, Cal McCrystal and to Peter Jackson, the editor of the
Sunday Times Magazine
—I must have seemed to have been on a perpetual holiday, endlessly away from base, writing far less than is customary for a
Sunday Times
correspondent. I gladly take this opportunity to give them my thanks for their tolerance, forbearance and suppression of envy during my absences and on my returns. And for letting me hang on to my job, through it all.

Out there, the following were among many who gave their help and advice, and in many cases hospitality, for which I am most grateful. In Bermuda, Lord Dunrossil, Sir Edwin Leather, Helen Rowe, Jack Arnell, Gillian and Dai Lewis; in Anguilla, Alastair Baillie, Alan Hoole, Ronald Webster; in the British Virgin Islands, David and Margaret Barwick, Arden Shaw, Jefferson and Jinx Morgan; in Montserrat, Elizabeth McEwan, John Cashin, Reginald Lucie-Smith; in the Cayman Islands, Peter Lloyd, the Tradewinds calypso group; in the Turks and Caicos Islands, Christopher Turner, Edward Brooks, Norman Saunders; on Ascension Island, Ian Thow, Steven Devitt; on St Helena, the Hon. John Massingham, the Hon. Dick Baker, Philip Dale, Ethel Yon, Maureen Jonas, Richard Saltwell, Frederick Ward, Clive Warren; on Tristan da Cunha, Roger Perry, Richard and Margaret Grundy; en route to and in British Indian Ocean Territory, the crew of the tugboat
Robert W
., the staff of Cable and Wireless on Male and Diego Garcia, John
Beasant, John Topp; in Hong Kong, David Akers-Jones, Clare Hollingworth, Cecilia Wong, Donald Wise, Teresa Ma; in the Falkland Islands, Sir Rex Hunt, Patrick Watts, Graham Bound, Les Halliday; in Gibraltar, Admiral Sir David Williams.

In addition I am grateful to Andrew Bell and Simon Sugrue of Curnow Shipping Ltd., for their help in arranging voyages to the South Atlantic, and to Captain Bob Wyatt and Chief Officer David Roberts for taking me there. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office was less eager to offer its assistance after I had made my unwelcome voyage to Diego Garcia than when I began the project; but Walter Wallace of the Dependent Territories Section of the West Indian and Atlantic Department was helpful throughout, and read and criticised several of the typescript chapters. Wing Commander Ian McCoubrey made helpful comments after reading the Hong Kong chapter, and General Sir William Jackson gave me many useful pointers during my study of the history of Gibraltar.

I am grateful to Tracey Skelton for digging out much useful material on the islands in the Caribbean and Atlantic.

Donald Simpson, that most kindly and helpful librarian, who has presided for many years over the finest and most congenially atmospheric of all colonial collections—that at the Royal Commonwealth Society in London—has my keenest gratitude, as do his immensely knowledgeable staff; and I made much use of, and was greatly helped by the librarians and their colleagues at both Queen Elizabeth House and Rhodes House in Oxford.

Any errors that survived the attentions of the scrutineers are, of course, my own.

The Press Facilities Office of the Royal Air Force made possible flights to and from Ascension Island, and to them and the crews of Strike Command based there and at Brize Norton I owe a great deal.

The idea for the book was suggested by the literary agent, Anthony Sheil; his colleague, Gill Coleridge, kept my enthusiasm
alive on those occasions when it seemed likely that the project would never be completed. To them and to my ever-tolerant family and friends, who put up with a lot, my deepest gratitude.

S. B. A. W.
Iffley,
Oxford
August, 1986