Other-waters

An archipelago in the region of the Falkland Islands appeared on maps from the early sixteenth century, suggesting they may have been sighted by Ferdinand Magellan or another expedition of the 1500s.

They were seen by Davis in 1592, and Sir Richard Hawkins sailed along their north shore in 1594. In 1598, Sebald de Weert, a Dutchman, visited them and called them the Sebald Islands, a name which they bore on some Dutch maps into the 19th century. Captain John Strong sailed between the two principal islands in 1690, and called the passage Falkland Sound, and from this the island group afterwards took its English name.

In 1763 the islands were taken possession of by the French, who established a colony at Port Louis on Berkely Sound. The French name of Îles Malouines was given to the islands - malouin being the adjective for the Breton port of Saint-Malo. The Spanish name Malvinas is derived from the French adjective.

The French were expelled by the Spaniards in 1767 or 1768. In 1761, Commander Byron took possession on the part of Britain on the ground of prior discovery, and his doing so was nearly the cause of a war between Britain and Spain, both countries having armed fleets to contest the barren but strategically important sovereignty (like the Mascarene Islands but without their intrinsic resources, it was well placed as a base for pirate and privateer raids). On January 22, 1771, however, Spain yielded the islands to Great Britain by convention. The British colony was abandoned in 1774 and a plaque was left asserting Britain's continuing sovereignty over the islands.

As they had not been actually colonised by Britain, Argentina claimed the group in 1820 and for

The Falkland Islands were uninhabited when first discovered by Europeans, but the recent discovery of the remains of a wooden canoe is strong evidence that they had previously been visited, most probably by the Yaghan people of Tierra del Fuego. It has also been suggested that the warrahs found on the island were introduced by the Yaghans, bearing as they did a resemblance to the Fuegian fox.

An interesting episode for those investigating the various soverignty claims is the true story of "El Gaucho Rivero". Antonio Rivero in August 1833 was involved in an incident where a number of important figures on the islands were murdered. Rivero was taken to London to be judged, however when the case came before the high court it was dismissed because the court felt that the British Crown had no authority over the islands at this time and Rivero was returned to Argentina.

The strategic significance was confirmed by its becoming the location of the second major naval engagement of the First World War. Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee's East Asia Cruiser Squadron called at the islands on their trip from the Pacific Ocean back to Germany intending to destroy the Royal Navy radio relay station and coaling depot there. Unknown to Spee however, a British squadron, including two battlecruisers which were considerably more powerful than his forces, had been sent to hunt down his squadron and happened to be in the harbour coaling. In the one-sided battle which followed, most of Spee's squadron was sunk.

Falklands War - Argentina invaded the islands on 2 April, 1982. The British responded with an expeditionary force that landed seven weeks later and after fierce fighting forced the Argentinian garrison to surrender on 14 June, 1982.

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