The British are a maritime nation - an Island Race. Everyone lives within about 80 miles of the sea, and those of us fortunate enough to live on Scilly live within yards not miles of the ocean. Our national character has been formed by our geographical circumstances, together with a desire to make use of the sea to trade and travel afar. We could never have built an Empire without charts.......

In 1793 when war broke out with France, the Royal Navy was losing eight ships through running aground for every one lost in action. The Lords of the Admiralty were only too aware that something had to be done to stop their Captains from running into things.

They had already commissioned a comprehensive survey of British waters, and sponsored the work of Bligh and Cook, but although they had gathered surveys and charts from around the world, very little had been done to compile this information into reliable charts for the Royal Navy.

When Captain Cook sailed off to start the greatest exploration the world had ever known, Alexander Dalrymple had to hide his disappointment. He had badly wanted the job, and had already charted much of the Pacific. He became official cartographer to the East India Company in 1779 - the year that Cook was murdered.

So in 1795 when their Lordships looked for a candidate to sort out the Navy's chart problem, it was to Dalrymple that they turned.

Putting Scilly on the map....

In order to confirm his suitability for the position, their Lordships requested that Dalrymple produce a chart from existing survey material. He chose the Isles of Scilly as his subject. The chart he produced was beautiful and accurate, and was much admired. He was duly appointed the first Hydrographer of the Navy.

Later that century, their Lordships had the idea of creating a fortified harbour for the Fleet in the Western Approaches. They pulled out Dalrymple's original chart of Scilly and with a pencil started carefully to mark in the massive breakwaters that would be necessary to protect the Fleet. One would stretch between Samson and St Agnes, another would narrow the channel between St Mary's and St Agnes.

They extended the Star Castle fortifications and mounted the big guns necessary to defend the harbour. It was well into the 20th century before Lord Fisher decided that Scapa Flow was a better bet.

On a warm September afternoon, I stood in the Archive Room of the UK Hydrographic Office in Taunton and looked at the chart of Scilly that the first "droggy" had produced in order to win his appointment. I had sailed past almost every rock he had drawn on it. I looked at the careful pencil marks of breakwaters that were never built and thanked God that Scilly had avoided becoming a great Naval Port. I was looking into the face of History, and at a proposal that would have changed the islands for all of us. Anyone who loves Scilly would have enjoyed sharing that moment.

Adventure to the Western Rocks

So much had happened there. So many had taken their last gasping breath in that wild and restless place My two companions and I chose a calm day and set out in the Island Pilot - under power and towing a dinghy - to explore the Western Rocks.

We passed outside Annet and into a rolling swell that rose up steeply as it came in over the shoals. On this calmest of days the dinghy, which we had on a long line astern, would ride four feet or more above us, before surfing down the wave towards our transom. Our objective was Rosevear - the remote island on which the builders of the Bishop Light had been billeted in specially built cottages.

Navigating from a chart when about three feet above the water is no easy task in the Western Rocks, and it took more than a few moments to identify our target. But a couple of fixes confirmed it, and we soon found ourselves in a sheltered channel between the rocks. It was an easy task to anchor and row the dinghy to the lowest lying rocks at Rosevear.

A massive rockscape confronted us as we came ashore. Scrambling over the vast boulders we came onto the higher plateau where the remains of the cottage still stood, an enormous rock formation providing one end-gable. The stench of rotting guano from the seabirds was overpowering. We hurriedly returned to the rocky foreshore to eat our lunch - and were watched inquisitively by a large seal who boldly circled within a few feet of us.

For a few weeks in the summer it is permitted to land on nearby Annet and we set sail for that flat island around which so many ships - including the Thomas W Lawson - were wrecked.

The group of rocks where the two Lawson survivors landed were lapped by gentle waves and the sea was flat in the lee of the island. But looking at the jagged sharks-teeth outline of the reef it wasn't hard to imagine the terror they had faced. In the muggy stillness of the afternoon we landed without difficulty on the beach at Annet. I photographed my companions against the background of a place both tranquil and terrible. The ghosts of the hordes who had lost their lives on the Western Rocks over the last Millennium were around us - and for a while we were silently lost in thought.

After a mug of tea and a slice of cake, it was time to return - this time under sail - tacking close into St Agnes and then a long reach back to Tresco in time for a sundowner on the deck at home before dinner.

It had been, we decided, a quite excellent day and it had reinforced the respect we retained for those Scillonian seamen of years ago who rowed out in huge seas to pluck survivors from the broken ships that met their end on Scilly's Western Rocks.

Something for the Wall....

The Hydrographic Office has produced exclusively for Island Race a strictly-limited edition of Dalrymple's original 1792 Scilly chart. [Tell me more]