The Gilbert and Ellice Islands in the Pacific Ocean were part of the British Empire from 1892 to 1976. They were a protectorate from 1892 to 12 January 1916, and then a colony until 1 January 1976, and were administered as part of the British Western Pacific Territories (BWPT) until they became independent. The history of GEIC was mainly characterized by phosphate mining on Ocean Island. In October 1975, these islands were divided by force of law into two separate colonies, and they became independent nations shortly thereafter: the Ellice Islands became Tuvalu in 1978, and the Gilbert Islands became part of Kiribati in 1979.
Four ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Curacoa, after the island in the Caribbean Sea more usually spelled Curaçao:
New Georgia, with an area of 2,037 km2 (786 sq mi), is the largest of the islands in Western Province, Solomon Islands, and the 224th-largest island in the world. Since July 1978, the island has been part of the independent state of Solomon Islands.
The British Western Pacific Territories (BWPT) was a colonial entity created in 1877 for the administration of a series of Pacific islands in Oceania under a single representative of the British Crown, styled the High Commissioner for the Western Pacific. Except for Fiji and the Solomon Islands, most of these colonial possessions were relatively minor.
The British Solomon Islands Protectorate was first established in June 1893, when Captain Herbert Gibson of HMS Curacoa declared the southern Solomon Islands a British protectorate.
The North Solomon Islands form a geographical area covering the more northerly group of islands in the Solomon Islands archipelago and includes Bougainville and Buka Islands, Choiseul, Santa Isabel, the Shortland Islands and Ontong Java Atoll. In 1885 Germany declared a protectorate over these islands forming the German Solomon Islands Protectorate. With the exception of Bougainville and Buka, these were transferred to the British Solomon Islands Protectorate in 1900. Bougainville and Buka continued under German administration until the outset of World War I, when they were transferred to Australia, and after the war, were formally passed to Australian jurisdiction under a League of Nations mandate.
HMSGannet is a Royal Navy Doterel-class screw sloop-of-war launched on 31 August 1878. It became a training ship in the Thames in 1903, and was then loaned as a training ship for boys in the Hamble from 1913. It was restored in 1987 and is now part of the UK's National Historic Fleet.
HMS Cossack was a Cossack-class corvette which was laid down as Witjas for the Imperial Russian Navy. She was seized due to the Crimean War breaking out whilst she was under construction and taken into service with the Royal Navy.
Admiral of the Fleet Sir James Elphinstone Erskine, was a Royal Navy officer. As a junior officer he served on the North America and West Indies Station. This was a difficult time in relations between the United Kingdom and the United States following the Trent Affair, an international diplomatic incident that occurred during the American Civil War when the United States Navy frigate USS San Jacinto intercepted the British mail packet RMS Trent.
HMS Comus was a corvette of the Royal Navy. She was the name ship of her class. Launched in April 1878, the vessel was built by Messrs. J. Elder & Co of Glasgow at a cost of £123,000.
HMS Pylades was a Satellite-class composite screw sloop of the Royal Navy, built at Sheerness Dockyard and launched on 5 November 1884. She was later reclassified as a corvette and was the last corvette built for the Royal Navy until the Second World War.
HMS Royalist was a Satellite-class composite screw sloop of the Royal Navy, built in 1883 and hulked as a depot ship in 1900. She was renamed Colleen in 1913, transferred to the Irish Free State in 1923 and broken up in 1950.
HMS Dart was a schooner of the Royal Navy, built by the Barrow Shipbuilding Company, Barrow and launched in 1877 as Cruiser for Lord Eglinton. She was subsequently purchased by the Colonial Office for the use of Sir Arthur Hamilton Gordon as governor of the Fiji Islands. On his appointment to New Zealand, Cruiser was purchased by the Royal Navy as a tender for the training ship Britannia and the name changed to Dart in March 1882.
HMS Emerald was an Emerald-class corvette, of the Royal Navy, built at the Pembroke Dockyard and launched on 18 August 1876.
HMS Champion was one of nine Comus-class corvettes of the Royal Navy, built in the late 1870s and early 1880s to a design by Nathaniel Barnaby. Champion was one of three in the class built by J. Elder & Co., Govan, Scotland and was launched on 1 July 1878. She was the third vessel under this name in the Royal Navy.
British protectorates were protectorates—or client states—under protection of the British Empire's armed forces and represented by British diplomats in international arenas, such as the Great Game, in which the Emirate of Afghanistan and the Tibetan Kingdom became protected states for short periods of time. Many territories which became British protectorates already had local rulers with whom the Crown negotiated through treaty, acknowledging their status whilst simultaneously offering protection, e.g. British Paramountcy. British protectorates were therefore governed by indirect rule. In most cases, the local ruler, as well as the subjects of the indigenous ruler were not British subjects. British protected states represented a more loose form of British suzerainty, where the local rulers retained absolute control over the states' internal affairs and the British exercised control over defence and foreign affairs.
Richard Blundell Comins was an English Anglican priest who worked as a missionary for the Anglican Mission to Melanesia. He became the first Archdeacon of Northern Melanesia in 1900.
Admiral Edward Henry Meggs Davis was a Royal Navy captain, then admiral, who served in the Cape of Good Hope Station, Pacific Station, Mediterranean Fleet and the Jamaica Division.
William Henry Maxwell was an officer of the Royal Navy who rose to the rank of Admiral. He served on the Cape of Good Hope Station, Australia Station, and as the Commodore in Charge at Hong Kong.
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