Napoleon's St. Helena

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Photographs courtesy of Peter C. Gibbs, Text David Watkins

This set of photographs was uncovered by Peter when going through some of his father's belongings. Now Pete's dad was a 14 year old boy seaman in the Royal Navy and was on board HMS Calcutta when the last Empress and Emperor of Austria were being taken into exile in South America at the end of World War One. Actually young Gibbs was the messenger boy to the Empress and is actually mentioned in her memoirs! En route they stopped off at St. Helena to take on coal etc., whilst there, Gibbs senior took to the island and purchased the following set of picture post cards. Now this was in 1918, and although we cannot date the photos exactly, they must have been taken in the previous five or so years. So obviously bearing in mind that St. Helena has evolved very slowly - they only got T.V. about 5 years ago - then these pictures show St Helena as it would have appeared to Napoleon some 90 years earlier. Obviously the tomb cannot be included in that statement! High Knoll Fort Jamestown Harbour Residence of Napoleon Jamestown, looking North Tomb of Napoleon, St. Helena Back to Table of Contents -- First Empire #46 Back to First Empire List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by First Empire. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com