The Great Wood Wall

Line of The Wall from Flagstaff

The Great Wood Wall around Middlepoint, crossing Bilberry Field Gut and rising towards Bottom Woods is all that remains of the stone wall built by the East India Company in an attempt to protect its own future wood supplies in The Great Wood from destruction from “browsing by goats and rooting by swine”.  Built in the period 1723 – 1727, mainly by Governor John Smith only about 150 acres were completely enclosed, the scheme was ultimately unsuccessful, none of the original trees remain and only around 800 metres of the original wall.



The best exposition of the "devastation of the native vegetation and the ecological despoilaton" of St. Helena, The Wall and The Vanishing Great Wood can be found in Ashmole and Ashmole, St Helena and Ascension Island: a natural history.  Published by Nelson in 2000.

Looking North towards Flagstaff

Janisch’s Extracts from the St Helena Records describes, year after year, the frustration and impotence of successive Governors to prevent the over-exploitation and ultimately the destruction of the natural assets of St. Helena.   http://openlibrary.org/books/OL23471107M/Extracts_from_the_St._Helena_Records

Rising from Bilberry Field Gut towards Bottom Woods

Both Beatson’s 1816 “Tracts relative to the Island of St. Helena and JC Melliss’ 1875 “Physical, Historical and Topographical Description of the Island” describe in detail, to quote Ashmole “the inexorable progress of the tragedy of the commons, the remorseless destruction of a potentially sustainable resource by a number of independent exploiters following their own self-interest even though the result in the long run is a disaster for everyone.

Looking South-East across Bilberry Field Gut

Alfred Russel Wallace in “Island Life” published in1880 summarised the effects on St. Helena by European occupation. When first discovered, in the year 1501, St. Helena was densely covered with luxuriant forest vegetation, the trees overhanging the seaward precipices and covering every part of the surface with an evergreen mantle.  This indigenous vegetation has been almost wholly destroyed; and although an immense number of foreign plants have been introduced, and have more or less completely established themselves, yet the general aspect of the island is now so barren and forbidding that some persons find it difficult to believe that it was once all green and fertile.  The cause of the change is, however, very easily explained.  The rich soil formed by decomposed volcanic rock and vegetable deposits could only be retained on the steep slopes so long as it was protected by the vegetation to which it in great part owed its origin.  When this was destroyed, the heavy tropical rains soon washed away the soil, and left a vast expanse of bare rock or sterile clay.  This irreparable destruction was caused in the first place by goats, which were introduced by the Portuguese in 1513, and increased so rapidly that in 1588, they existed in thousands.  These animals are the greatest of all foes to trees, because they eat off the young seedlings, and thus prevent the natural restoration of the forest.  They were, however, aided by the reckless waste of man.  The East India Company took possession of the island in 1651, and about the year 1700 it began to be seen that the forests were fast diminishing, and required some protection.  Two of the native trees, redwood and ebony, were good for tanning, and to save trouble the bark was wastefully stripped from the trunks only, the remainder being left to rot; while in 1709 a large quantity of the rapidly disappearing ebony was used to burn lime for building fortifications.  By the records quoted in Mr. Melliss' interesting volume on St. Helena it is evident that the evil consequences of allowing the trees to be destroyed were clearly foreseen, as the following passages show: "We find the place called the Great Wood in a flourishing condition, full of young trees, where the hoggs (of which there is a great abundance) do not come to root them up.  But the Great Wood is miserably lessened and destroyed within our memories, and is not near the circuit and length it was.  But we believe it does not contain now less than fifteen hundred acres of fine woodland and good ground, but no springs of water but what is salt or brackish, which we take to be the reason that that part was not inhabited when the people first chose out their settlements and made plantations; but if wells could be sunk, which the governor says he will attempt when we have more hands, we should then think it the most pleasant and healthiest part of the island. But as to healthiness, we don't think it will hold so if the wood that keeps the land warm were destroyed, for then the rains, which are violent here, would carry away the upper soil, and it being a clay marl underneath would produce but little; as it is, we think in case it were enclosed it might be greatly improved" ... "When once this wood is gone the island will soon be ruined" ... "We viewed the wood's end which joins the Honourable Company's plantation called the Hutts, but the wood is so destroyed that the beginning of the Great Wood is now a whole mile beyond that place, and all the soil between being washed away, that distance is now entirely barren."  In 1709 the governor reported to the Court of Directors of the East India Company that the timber was rapidly disappearing, and that the goats should be destroyed for the preservation of the ebony wood, and because the island was suffering from droughts.  The reply was, "The goats are not to be destroyed, being more valuable than ebony." Thus, through the gross ignorance of those in power, the last opportunity of preserving the peculiar vegetation of St. Helena, and preventing the island from becoming the comparatively rocky desert it now is, was allowed to pass away. Even in a mere pecuniary point of view the error was a fatal one, for in the next century (in 1810) another governor reports the total destruction of the great forests by the goats, and that in consequence the cost of importing fuel for government use was £2,729. 7s. 8d. for a single year.



Looking South



Drainage Detail

Looking North into Bilberry Field Gut

Looking South towards Bottom Woods

Rising towards Bottom Woods



Photographs taken in May 2010.





The Church in the Country



Once again I am indebted to Edward Cannan’s “Churches of the South Atlantic Islands” for the outline of this post and to Barry Weaver’s St Helena Virtual Library and Archive for four of the pictures used.  Janisch, as always, provides some detail.

Wathen, Plantation House and St. Paul's Church, 1812

The present St. Paul’s, which became the Cathedral in 1859, is the third church built in this area of the island since Captain Dutton arrived in May 1659 to take possession of and fortify St Helena on behalf of The East India Company.

The first building was insubstantial, Janisch recording that:

Oct 26, 1691.—The Church in the Country in bad repair—the windward part much decayed it being all done with Boards.  St James’ was in no better condition: The Chappel in Town in bad repair and the Roof in danger of falling.

July 6, 1697.—Country Church to be rebuilt by an Assessed Rate. The Company contributing £20.

April 20, 1699.—and whereas the Church in the countrey is much decayed being made all of Timber it was thought convenient that it be rebuilt with stones and for that end the day's work be for the gathering of stones towards the rebuilding of a new Church.

Sept. 30, 1732.—Churches.  Churchwardens letter to Governor.  Vestry meeting concerning ruinous condition both of the Chapple in the Country and the Chapple at the Fort the former of which has laid level with the ground for two or three years past, and the latter is so much out of repair that it’s shameful a place set apart for the celebration of divine service and in the open view of all strangers especially of foreign nations.

A new stone church was eventually built south-west of the present Cathedral.  Wathen’s view, above, was painted in 1812, but only published in his “Views of St Helena” in September 1821, to no doubt capitalise on the interest generated following Napoleon’s death in May of that year, shows the new church behind Plantation House which itself had been built in 1791-92 as a country residence for The Governor.



This map which seems to be a copy of Read's 1817 map shows the Country Church with a spire.

It could not have been very well built.  In April 1844 GW Melliss, the Surveyor General of the Island, and perhaps most well known for supervising the building of the inclined plane for the St Helena Railway Company in 1829, now called Jacob’s Ladder, produced what is evidently his second report on the state of the Country Church. 

In a former memorandum that I furnished on the subject of the country church, I alluded to the defective state of east and back walls; but as other parts of the structure are of the same inferior description of masonry, and would not correspond with new work so as to form a substantial edifice, and moreover as additional accommodation is required, which, in this climate, could not be properly obtained without a greater area than the present church affords, I am of opinion that the most advisable plan is to rebuild the country church.

A considerable sum of money will certainly be required to accomplish this object, the amount of which will of course vary much according to the size and style of the new building; but supposing a plain substantial church, containing about 100 more sittings than the present one, be approved of, in such case I do not apprehend that the outlay would so far exceed the cost of thorough repair and addition to the present church as might at first be supposed.

By attention to the small repairs mentioned in my former paper, particularly to the street at the east end, the present building may be used for some time longer, during which period a fund could be raised for either " rebuilding or repairing the country church."

The accompanying plans and elevation of the church were prepared to assist the present consideration of the subject. Attached thereto is a ground sketch of an idea that occurred to me of enlarging and repairing the present building, so as to take advantage of such parts of the walls as were sound. Instead of a tower or steeple, a small bell turret was intended to be erected on the west gable end; the accommodation was calculated at an increase on the present of 50 free and 50 pew sittings; the congregation would face the pulpit, and the approach was to have been made from the westward. I have, however, merely mentioned this circumstance, as it was one among other plans of alterations that suggested themselves; but they do not in the least dispose me to alter the opinion that rebuilding the country church is the wisest plan.

(signed) G. W. Melliss.

On the 17^th December 1846 the Minister and Churchwardens wrote to the Governor, Patrick Ross:

My Lord, We, the minister and churchwardens of the parish of St. Helena, most respectfully solicit your Lordship's consideration of the difficulties we are called upon to encounter in consequence of the dangerous state of our parish church, and the severe pressure of our rates.

A grant, authorized some time ago by a predecessor of your Lordship, from the Colonial Treasury, in aid of a voluntary subscription on the island, was the means of effecting important alterations in the church of James' Town, for which we offer our grateful acknowledgments; but we trust your Lordship will honour our present application in behalf of the church in the country, by viewing the case on its separate and peculiar merits.

The benefits of the former church are limited to the town by high and precipitous crags on every side, and thus the Governor of this colony, with his establishment3 and more than 2,000 of the rural population, are dependent upon the country church for the public services of religion.

It has been therefore usual for the Government to extend generous assistance towards the reparation of this church.  For example, £698 in the year 1806, when the costs of repairs amounted to £1,396 and again, when repairs were effected at the cost of £380.  In the year 1825 we find the parish recording a grant from the Government of £200. towards that object.

These facts are not advanced merely in excuse for our present importunity, but as proving to your Lordship, when viewed in connexion with the existing state of the fabric, that all attempts to arrest its steady progress towards decay have been hitherto unavailing. The parish authorities have expended a considerable sum on repairs even during the last seven years; and yet our attention has been for some years past specially called to a fissure in a principal angle of the church, immediately over the Governor's pew. Its progressive enlargement has excited anxiety and examination, issuing in an official report that the foundation of the building is impaired, and that the materials generally are in a loose and decayed state.

The report (by GW Melliss) shows that repairs, combined with the requisite enlargement, cannot be professionally recommended, and that a new church (the materials to be all prepared in England) would eventually be attended with less expense, far less inconvenience, and no interruption whatever to public worship.  As a parish, my Lord, we labour under most serious disadvantages, compared with the parishes in England, especially those which form the peculiar property of the Crown.

We have reason to believe that by having all the ornamental parts of a church executed in England we could erect a new building, holding 450 persons, adequate to our wants in respect of religious worship, at the cost of £2,000, postponing the steeple till additional funds will admit of its being erected.

When we find, my Lord, that in less than 30 years, the repairs of the country church have cost nearly £3,000, we very respectfully implore your Lordship to view all these circumstances with kind consideration, and to place at the disposal of his Excellency the Governor, in conformity with the precedents above stated, one moiety (£1,000) of the amount required as a grant, and the other moiety as a loan, on the security of the pew-rents, and of the fund above-mentioned, as being the only means of applying the prompt and decisive remedy demanded by the state of our church, and of preserving on the spot, where our friends, relations and fathers, have worshipped, and where their ashes now repose, those religious services which form the best inheritance of ourselves and our children. We have, &c.

(signed) Richard Kempthorne, C. Chaplain, J. Torbett, Thomas Charlett, Churchwardens.

Ross was very much in favour and, acting quickly, on the 23rd December forwarded the request to Earl Grey in London:

At the request of the minister and churchwardens of St. Helena, I have the honour to submit to your Lordship's attention the accompanying memorial, representing the dilapidated and dangerous state of the parish country church, adjoining the Governor's official residence.

I have made a minute examination .of this building, and I am decided in opinion, that any attempt to repair it would be only incurring expense, without any permanent benefit, and I therefore take the liberty to support the prayer of the petition, viz:

A Government Grant                          £1,000

And a Loan of                                   £1,000

and to express my hope that by such aid as your Lordship may be pleased to recommend on the part of the mother country, the island may have the advantage of a safe and permanent building, capable of accommodating a congregation of at least (500), five hundred people.

Were it practicable to repair the present church with any degree of safety to the inhabitants, they would of necessity be deprived for a considerable period of any means of public worship, whereas by an adjoining site having been already obtained for the contemplated edifice, the old building can, by the means of wooden buttresses be used, though not without insecurity, till the other is complete.

Under these circumstances, I take the liberty to urge strongly your Lordship's favourable consideration and support of a measure so important to the welfare of the colony.

I have, &c.  (signed) Patrick Ross, Governor.

The favourable consideration sought was, alas, not forthcoming.

Sir, Downing-street, 1 March 1847.

I have received your despatch No. 56, of the 23d December last, forwarding a memorial from the colonial chaplain and churchwardens of St. Helena, representing the dilapidated state of the parish country church, and praying for a grant from the public treasury of 1,000 I. and a loan of equal amount for building a new church.

I regret that I cannot comply with this application. In this country and in the colonies, churches have been erected by different communities entirely from their own resources, and where those resources have been very limited in amount, the community has been contented with a plain and moderate structure proportionate to their means.

This course should be followed by the inhabitants of St. Helena; or if they cannot raise the necessary funds for a new church, they must provide, by voluntary contributions, the means of effecting such repairs in the present building as will keep it from further dilapidation; I can hold out to them no hopes of assistance from the British Treasury.

I have, &c. (signed) Grey.

The money to pay for the new building was eventually found, Cannan citing the St Helena Gazette of March 30^th 1850:  Tenders invited for loan of money (£1,000 or any part) stating interest, for the building of Country church - repaid over 20 years.

Having taken the decision to rebuild, in July 1848 the building committee wrote to Benjamin Ferry, a well-known London architect of the time requesting him to “furnish us with a design and a working plan of a Church capable of containing Four Hundred and Fifty persons together with a Chancel, Tower, Vestry and Registry Office.  Finding the plans acceptable the foundation stone was laid by The Governor, Sir Patrick Ross, on Wednesday 6th February 1850.  With the exception of the main part of the walls which were of local stone, some from the old country church, the stone for doors and windows was hewn into form and shipped from England by Winsland and Holland of Duke Street Bloomsbury on the barque Glentanner.  The roof and other woodwork, ironwork, paving slates, pulpit and seats followed later on board the Juliana.

It is indicative of the links built in the EIC trading days that this report of the exportation of the church appeared in the Straits Times and Singapore Journal of Commerce of 30^th April 1850.

Cannan describes the work of construction.  It was a work of some months to transport all the stone and timber to the site 580m above sea level.  Every empty vehicle going towards the church was pressed to help and all the long timbers and curved roof trusses had to be carried by manual labour.  Some of this was voluntary and the Governor lent a considerable number Africans recently liberated from a captured slaver who were rewarded with tobacco and refreshed with wine and water in the sober proportion of one bottle of wine to a pail of water. Stones for the foundations were gathered from the neighbouring hills and there was some difficulty in obtaining qualified masons.. The only one in the island who had ever seen a similar work was a soldier.  The clerk of works was the adjutant of militia, though he knew nothing either of the qualities of materials or of construction, and the lava plinths were dressed by a gang of five French masons accidentally left on the island who proved quite a godsend for two or three weeks.

GW Melliss, Plantation House, St. Paul's Church and Burial Ground, 1857

GW Melliss, St. Paul's Church, 1857

   JC Melliss, St. Paul's Church, 1875

On Wednesday3rd September 1851 the Church was opened, though Governor Ross was not there to see it, having died on the 28^th August 1850.

Not everyone liked the completed building. Emily Jackson opined much later that “St. Paul's is utterly devoid of architectural beauty outside or in, but it is commandingly situated on a hill above and at the back of Government House, and is surrounded by the cemetery”.

Mr Scott in the February 1851 issue of The Ecclesiologist was scathing about the incongruity of sending a ready-made stone church, all natty and nice with its trim neat windows and a cocky little spire to such a place.  Lady Ross recently widowed and by then lately arrived from St Helena replied that “She notices that Mr. Scott in his interesting " thoughts on Tropical Architecture," objects to the First-Pointed style of church lately sent out to S. Helena by Mr. Ferrey, on account of its incongruity with the landscape scenery.  The truth is, she observes, that the scenery amidst which the church is placed, is with its hills, fields, and hedge-rows, exactly of an English character; so similar, that it might be well taken for a rural scene in one or other of the English counties.”

I can only concur with Cannan who concludes that “on the whole we agree with Lady Ross”

St Paul's Cathedral, May 2010

St James' Church

The most accessible source of information on ecclesiastical buildings on St. Helena is Edward Cannan’s “Churches of the South Atlantic Islands 1502-1991” from which the basic outline and some of the detail below has been taken. Cannan was Bishop of St. Helena from 1979 to 1985.

The East India Company’s first Chaplain, William Noakes, arrived on the island in 1671 and Cannan opines that the Jamestown’s first Anglican Church must have been built shortly thereafter.  Janisch’s Extracts from the St Helena Records trace the deterioration of this building and the embarrassment of the Churchwardens at its state.

30th September 1678.  The Church suffered damage by the extreme heat of the weather to be examined and repaired.  Also ordered that half a measured acre of ground about the said Church be forthwith enclosed by the Inhabitants to be and remain for a Public Church Yard or burying place—the said enclosure shall be by a bank cast up out of a ditch that shall be five foot in breadth and five foot in depth upon the Topp whereof shall be set Lemon Trees round the whole enclosure and a Gate shall be made with a bridge to goe over the Ditch for a comely and convenient entrance and passage to and from the said Church and Church Yard.

Oct 26 1691.  The Chappel in Town in bad repair and the Roof in danger of falling.

April 7 1711.  The Churchwardens petition that whereas our Churchyard at the Fort is very small and hardly room to dig a grave for rocks and graves already digged also our yard wall is very bad and irregular we pray that we may inlarge our yard backwards by cutting the water in a new course near the hill and have liberty of ranging the front wall with the street.  The Petitioners are answered that its commendable in them to promote the putting that piece of rubbish called a church yard in order; it’s for the credit of the island, and we advise you to repair the Church or it will tumble down in a little time.

Sept. 30.1732.  Churchwardens letter to Governor.  Vestry meeting concerning ruinous condition both of the Chapple in the Country and the Chapple at the Fort the former of which has laid level with the ground for two or three years past, and the latter is so much out of repair that it’s shameful a place set apart for the celebration of divine service and in the open view of all strangers especially of foreign nations.

Captain Cook described Jamestown in May 1771:  The greater part of the houses are ill built.  The church, which was originally a mean structure, is in ruins and the market-place nearly in the same condition.

Finally in 1772 preparations were made for building the present St James’.  Cannan gives details of the costs of construction and fitting out which included £1 12s 11d for 10 gallons of arrack for workmen and wages of masons at 18d/day.  Janisch records on Feb. 2, 1774.  Three Houses built upon the ground where the Old Church stood for the use of the Comp. Servants i.e. the three Govt. Houses next above St. James and which therefore mark the site of the Old Church.

George Hutchins Bellasis.  Scene taken from the Castle Terrace.  Plate 3 from Views of St. Helena from a sketch made in 1804/05.  The Church had a tower at the West end but no spire or North porch.

Completed in 1744 it is the oldest Anglican Church South of the Equator.  The oldest surviving Anglican Church in continuous use outside the UK is St Peter’s in Bermuda, parts of whose current structure date from 1620 though the building has been much expanded since. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:St._Peter%27s_Church_-3.jpg

Returning in May 1775, Cook noted that “within these three years a new church has been built and some other new buildings were in hand.

Bellasis was a professional soldier in India where his Father, a Major General with the HEIC, and three of his brothers were also serving.  Arriving in Bombay in July 1801 he suffered recurring bouts of illness in 1802-1803, and eventually departed for Britain in August 1804.  However, he was so ill during the voyage that he was forced to disembark at St. Helena on 4 November 1804 to recover his health.  He stayed on the island for the next eight months, later revisiting in 1812, and during his first visit he sketched the “diverse landscapes and inhabitants of the island” and his “Views of St. Helena” was published in 1815, with six of his original landscapes engraved in aquatint by Robert Havell.

Published on November 1st 1815, shortly after Napoleons’ arrival on the Island the book is dedicated to The Duke of Wellington....The Island of Saint Helena being at this time an object of interest to the whole world.  It was Bellasis' hope that his illustrations would "at the present period be the more interesting, when this singularly romantic Island is the appointed residence of one of the most extraordinary men recorded in the annals of History."  In 1801 Wellington, then Colonel Arthur Wellesley, was a neighbour of Bellasis’ father in Bombay and had met George there, so the dedication is no surprise and the timing of the publication surely no coincidence.

He refers twice more to Napoleon:

Plate 2.  .......Near the opening between the two mountains, Ladder Hill on the right, and Rupert's Hill on the left, is a small knoll, or conical hill, at the foot of which is a house called the Briars, marked in this View, though not seen from the Roads; this situation is the more interesting, as it is said to be the place intended for the residence of Buonaparte.

Plate 3.  ........At the head of the valley is shown the Briars, the intended residence of Buonaparte.

James Fort, Town and Church from Read's map of St Helena 2nd Edition, 1817

Janisch records that by July 1835.  Church Steeple in danger of falling and ordered to be taken down.  It was dismantled and in 1843 a new tower and porch were built by the north door, as it is today, but with a spire surmounting the tower

GW Melliss, 1857 Plate 1



JC Melliss, 1875

By 1862 the white ants (termites) reputedly from wood used from a captured slave vessel ravaged the town and the church had to be closed for public worship, services being held in the Court House and in St John’s.  The damage was such that a Committee was set up to decide whether to repair the church or rebuild it.  In February 1865 it was decided to carry out repairs and modifications and £1,151 was expended carrying these out.

Jackson in 1905 commented on the island’s churches:  None of the churches can lay much claim to architectural beauty, the most imposing is that of St. James', which it is generally considered should be the Cathedral, seeing that it is situated where the greater number of people are compelled to live, and also that it is in all probability the site, or very near the site, on which the first chapel was built by the Portuguese.

St James' 1902

The spire continued to be a constant source of problems and in 1980 the decision was taken to remove it.  A plaque in the church porch marks the safe completion of this operation which left the church as one sees it today.

According to Quentin Keynes' August 1950 National Geographic article "St. Helena: The Forgotten Island" the spire was "surmounted by a fish instead of the usual weathercock"

Church Plaque, May 2010

St James' Church, April 2010