02 May 2024

Nevis

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Where Nelson won his spurs and lost his heart

Now it is one of the Caribbean's most perfect retreats. But Nevis' chequered past saw it launch the career of Horation Nelson. And he find found love here, as Giles Milton recounts.

1 Nevis Island 2 Horatio Nelson 3 Nisbet Plantation beach

FROM AFAR, THE ISLAND LOOKS like a sea captain’s tricorn - a crumpled mountain with two curving flanks. But as the light aircraft banks steeply towards the landing strip, you notice that the tricorn is fringed with white sand and its steep sides are cloaked in lush, tropical vegetation.

The tiny Caribbean island of Nevis has long been a favourite of the rich and famous. Princess Diana escaped here after her marriage separation, aware it was one of the few places to avoid the paparazzi.

Last autumn marked the 200th anniversary of Nelson’s greatest triumph, the Battle of Trafalgar.

Less familiar is the extraordinary saga of his early years on Nevis - one of the Leeward Islands. It is here he first proved his mettle by challenging American merchants conducting an illicit trade with Britain’s wealthiest colonies.

It was here, too, that Nelson - whose affair with Lady Emma Hamilton would later scandalise English society - first fell in love. He met the young Fanny Nisbet, daughter of a plantation owner, and married her on the island.

Nevis has preserved its history intact. Covering just 36 square miles, it’s dotted with rambling plantation houses, abandoned sugar mills and lovely 17th century churches. Its tiny capital, Charlestown, is the best-preserved old town in the Caribbean and there are as many places of interest for Nelson enthusiasts as there are beaches for sun-worshippers.

Spectacularly beautiful, every vista is dominated by 3,200ft Mt Nevis - an extinct, cloud-wrapped volcano that made Columbus so homesick he named the island Las Nieves after a mountain range in his adoptive Spain. ‘So where should I begin my tour of Nelson’s Nevis?’ I asked Walter Plachta, general manager of Nisbet Plantation Beach Club. ‘Why not here?’ he said. ‘After all, this was where Nelson and Fanny lived after they were married.’

Nisbet’s blend of easy-going beach club and upmarket hotel represents luxury in paradise. Nelson delighted in its flowering gardens after months at sea.

The great house

The great house must have looked austere when first built in 1776, with its walls of heavy stone. But the recent addition of a lattice veranda has given it a colonial flourish. The food served (after an obligatory rum-punch cocktail) must beat anything that Nelson ever ate here. I feasted on pan-fried scallops (which were heavenly) while the roasted sea bass was the best I’ve tasted.

Nelson would have appreciated the seascape from the great house. Less than two miles away is the neighbouring island of St Kitts.

Most guests spend their days on the beach or sipping cocktails in the beach bar. Nisbet only really wakes from slumber on Thursday evenings, when Walter and his wife Beverly host a lively barbecue.

When Nelson was sent to Nevis its wealth hinged on one fantastically valuable commodity - sugar, in great demand in Georgian England. Sugar cane grew like weeds in the climate, and before long British colonists settled.

They imported vast numbers of African slaves and forced them to labour in pitiful conditions. In 1774 the white population of Nevis was fewer than 1,000. More than 10,000 slaves were toiling on the plantations. The excellent Museum of Nevis History in Charlestown sheds a grim light on the lives of the slaves, whose descendants now inhabit the island. One document records how colonist Edward Higgins flogged slaves to death, giving 365 lashes to the men and 292 to the women.

Nelson arrived in June 1784 aboard a 28-gun frigate as senior captain of the northern Leeward Island and spent the next three years sailing between Antigua, St Kitts and Nevis.

Most colonists disliked Britain’s Navigation Acts, which forbade trade with any foreign country. But Nelson was a stickler for the law. To the dismay of islanders, he began searching foreign shipping and seize vessels breaking the law. In May 1785, he struck gold. ‘I seized four vessels at Nevis,’ he wrote. ‘American-built and navigated by Americans.’

The ships’ captains were infuriated and tried to sue him for wrongful imprisonment, seeking a staggering £40,000 damages.

Nelson was able to land only when colonist John Herbert offered to protect him.

He spent months at Herbert’s hillside plantation, now the newly refurbished Montpelier Plantation Inn. Sensitively restored by its American owners, Lincoln and Muffin Hoffman, the plantation is perched above the sea and engulfed by a tangle of creepers.

It was at Montpelier that Nelson met Fanny Nisbet, a 25-year-old widow with a child and no suitors.

‘He soon proposed marriage,’ explained Lincoln, ‘and the couple were wedded two years later under a silk cotton tree that can still be seen in the garden.’ Fanny was given away by Prince William, later King William IV, who was travelling on Nelson’s vessel.

Nevis inhabitants, not always sympathetic towards him, recognised he won his spurs on their island and established the Horatio Nelson Museum in the village of Bath.

There’s an excellent collection of memorabilia, including letters, pictures and toby jugs, and even a scrap of Union Jack from Victory.

It’s impossible to get lost. One principle road encircles Nevis, with tracks up to the mountain and down to the beach. But drive with care, for the road is shared with monkeys, goats, chickens and cows.

Charlestown is on the west coast. There is a picturesque main street and a smattering of shops selling rum, chilli sauce and more rum.

The island road takes you past crumbling Ft Charles, high-ridged Saddle Hill and St John’s Fig Tree Church, where you can see Nelson and Fanny’s marriage certificate.

You pass through the settlement of Gingerland, no prizes for guessing what they grow here, before swinging along the eastern coast. This is less tropical than the west coast and often battered by fearsome Atlantic squalls. The road passes abandoned plantation houses and disused sugar mills.

Most extraordinary is the New River Estate. The towering chimney is still in place along with much of the machinery. I pulled away creepers and found old cogs and millstones, pistons and flywheels - solid iron and bearing the maker’s name, Fletcher and Co of London and Derby. All that’s missing is the sugar. The plantations are no longer viable and have been abandoned to nature.

Gibralter of the west indies

Most holidaymakers visit neighbouring St Kitts, a 40-minute ferry ride. When I told a bar owner of my plans, he frowned. ‘I’m not sure you’ll like St Kitts,’ he said. ‘Far too lively.’

Lively is not a word I’d use. The ferry arrives at Basseterre - and you blink in disbelief when you see Independence Square. With its tidy lawn, church and red phone box, you could be in England.

The real draw is Brimstone Hill Fortress, an extraordinary military defence sprawling over 38 acres. Dubbed Gibraltar of the West Indies, Brimstone was first fortified in 1690. Its biggest moment came in 1782 when 8,000 French attacked. They fired thousands of red-hot cannonballs into the fort to dispirit the 950 British defenders.

After three weeks, Governor Sir Thomas Shirley was forced to capitulate. In the event, the French enjoyed their victory for less than a year. When peace was signed in 1783, St Kitts and Nevis were restored to the British.

St Kitts was settled by the English in the early 17th century when adventurer Sir Thomas Warner landed colonists and some buildings survive from this time.

Nelson and Fanny left the Caribbean in the summer of 1787, shortly after marrying and settled in London. A short-lived peace left Nelson without a ship and it was six years before the Navy remembered his work in the Leewards and returned him to duty.

By this time, Nelson’s affection for Fanny had been replaced by his infatuation with Lady Hamilton, who became his much-publicised mistress. He separated from his wife in 1801 and would never see her, or Nevis, again.

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