Burray () is one of the

Orkney Islands Orkney (; sco, Orkney; on, Orkneyjar; nrn, Orknøjar), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of the island of Great Britain. Orkney is 10 miles (16 km) north ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. It lies to the east of

Scapa Flow Scapa Flow viewed from its eastern end in June 2009 Scapa Flow (; ) is a body of water in the Orkney Islands, Scotland, sheltered by the islands of Mainland, Graemsay, Burray,S. C. George, ''Jutland to Junkyard'', 1973. South Ronaldsay and ...

and is one of a chain of islands linked by the

Churchill Barriers The Churchill Barriers are four causeways in the Orkney islands with a total length of . They link the Orkney Mainland in the north to the island of South Ronaldsay via Burray and the two smaller islands of Lamb Holm and Glimps Holm. The ba ...

Geography and geology

Burray lies between

Mainland, Orkney The Mainland, also known as Hrossey and Pomona, is the main island of Orkney, Scotland. Both of Orkney's burghs, Kirkwall and Stromness, lie on the island, which is also the heart of Orkney's ferry and air connections. Seventy-five per cent of ...

and

South Ronaldsay South Ronaldsay (, also , sco, Sooth Ronalshee) is one of the Orkney Islands off the north coast of Scotland. It is linked to the Orkney Mainland by the Churchill Barriers, running via Burray, Glimps Holm and Lamb Holm. Name Along with North R ...

, and is linked to both by the

. Barriers 1, 2, and 3 connect Burray with

via the islets of

Glimps Holm Glimps Holm or Glims Holm ( non, Glums Holm) is a small uninhabited islet in Orkney, Scotland. Geography Glimps Holm lies in Holm Sound, one of the eastern entrances to Scapa Flow, between Mainland, Orkney and the island of Burray. The Churc ...

and

Lamb Holm Lamb Holm is a small uninhabited island in Orkney, Scotland. The Italian Chapel, constructed during the Second World War, is the island's main attraction. Lamb Holm is classified by the National Records of Scotland as an uninhabited island tha ...

in Holm Sound to the north east. Barrier 4 links to

, across Water Sound. To the west is the

tidal island A tidal island is a piece of land that is connected to the mainland by a natural or man-made causeway that is exposed at low tide and submerged at high tide. Because of the mystique surrounding tidal islands, many of them have been sites of ...

Hunda Hunda is an uninhabited island in the Orkney archipelago in Scotland. It is in extent and rises to above sea level. It is situated in Scapa Flow and connected to the nearby island of Burray by a causeway built in 1941 to stop passage of s ...

, also joined by a causeway. Further west, across

, are the islands of

Flotta Flotta () is a small island in Orkney, Scotland, lying in Scapa Flow. The island is known for its large oil terminal and is linked by Orkney Ferries to Houton on the Orkney Mainland, Lyness on Hoy and Longhope on South Walls. The island has ...

and

Calf of Flotta The Calf of Flotta is a small island in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The Calf is next to Flotta, with "Calf" deriving from Old Norse/Norn and meaning a smaller island by a larger one. Geography and geology The Calf is made of red sandstone Sandsto ...

, approximately away. In 2001, the population of Burray was 357, a total that had grown to 409 by 2011. The main settlement, Burray Village, is a former

fishing port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

on the south west coast. There are also settlements of Northtown, Southtown and Hillside on the island. Burray is made up of

Old Red Sandstone The Old Red Sandstone is an assemblage of rocks in the North Atlantic region largely of Devonian age. It extends in the east across Great Britain, Ireland and Norway, and in the west along the northeastern seaboard of North America. It also exte ...

of the

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the Silurian, million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Carboniferous, Mya. It is named after Devon, England, whe ...

period. The island is indented in the north west by Echnaloch Bay, which takes its name from Echna

Loch ''Loch'' () is the Scottish Gaelic, Scots language, Scots and Irish language, Irish word for a lake or sea inlet. It is Cognate, cognate with the Manx language, Manx lough, Cornish language, Cornish logh, and one of the Welsh language, Welsh w ...

. Burray Ness and Burray Haas are two headlands in the east.

Visitor attractions

Attractions in Burray include the

Fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

and Heritage Centre at Viewforth. The island has a reasonable amount of birdlife, with

Eurasian curlew The Eurasian curlew or common curlew (''Numenius arquata'') is a very large wader in the family Scolopacidae. It is one of the most widespread of the curlews, breeding across temperate Europe and Asia. In Europe, this species is often referred t ...

herring Herring are forage fish, mostly belonging to the family of Clupeidae. Herring often move in large schools around fishing banks and near the coast, found particularly in shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and North Atlantic Oceans, i ...

and

lesser black-backed gull The lesser black-backed gull (''Larus fuscus'') is a large gull that breeds on the Atlantic coasts of Europe. It is migratory, wintering from the British Isles south to West Africa. It has increased dramatically in North America, most common alo ...

s breeding here.

History

Viking history

One of the largest Viking hoards in Scotland was discovered on 22 April 1889 by Mr G Petrie, Little Wart, Burray when he was peat-cutting in the North Town Moss. It consisted of over 140 items of silver bullion, including many fragments of

arm ring An arm ring, also known as an armlet or an armband, is a band of metal, usually a precious metal, worn as jewelry or an ornament around the biceps of the upper arm. The arm ring is similar to a bracelet or bangle, though it must be shaped and s ...

or 'ring-money', and about a dozen coins The date proposed for deposition is c.998.

Sir James Stewart

During the early 18th century, the

laird Laird () is the owner of a large, long-established Scottish estate. In the traditional Scottish order of precedence, a laird ranked below a baron and above a gentleman. This rank was held only by those lairds holding official recognition in ...

of Burray was one Sir James Stewart. Stewart is said to have been involved with a murder in

Kirkwall Kirkwall ( sco, Kirkwaa, gd, Bàgh na h-Eaglaise, nrn, Kirkavå) is the largest town in Orkney, an archipelago to the north of mainland Scotland. The name Kirkwall comes from the Norse name (''Church Bay''), which later changed to ''Kirkv ...

in 1725, and went on the run for twenty years. A Jacobite sympathiser, he ended up fighting in the

Battle of Culloden The Battle of Culloden (; gd, Blàr Chùil Lodair) was the final confrontation of the Jacobite rising of 1745. On 16 April 1746, the Jacobite army of Charles Edward Stuart was decisively defeated by a British government force under Prince Wi ...

in 1746, and was one of the few survivors. However, when he returned to Burray after the battle, he happened to chance upon the son of the murder victim, who reported him to the authorities. Stewart was arrested, and ended up dying in a prison cell in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. The novelist

Mary Brunton Mary Brunton (née Balfour) (1 November 1778 – 7 December 1818) was a Scottish novelist, whose work has been seen as redefining femininity. Fay Weldon praised it as "rich in invention, ripe with incident, shrewd in comment, and erotic in in ...

was born Mary Balfour on Burray on 1 November 1778.

WWII and construction of Churchill Barriers

On 14 October 1939, the Royal Navy battleship was sunk at her moorings within the natural harbour of

, by the under the command of

Günther Prien Günther Prien (16 January 1908 – presumed 8 March 1941) was a German U-boat commander during World War II. He was the first U-boat commander to receive the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross and the first member of the ''Kriegsmarine'' to r ...

. ''U-47'' had entered Scapa Flow through Holm Sound, just to the north of Burray, one of several eastern entrances to Scapa Flow. The eastern passages were protected by measures including sunken block ships, booms and anti-submarine nets, but ''U-47'' entered at night at high tide by navigating between the block ships. To prevent further attacks, the

First Lord of the Admiralty The First Lord of the Admiralty, or formally the Office of the First Lord of the Admiralty, was the political head of the English and later British Royal Navy. He was the government's senior adviser on all naval affairs, responsible for the di ...

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...

ordered the construction of permanent barriers. Work began in May 1940 and the barriers were completed in September 1944, but were not officially opened until 12 May 1945, four days after the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The Churchill Barriers project required a substantial labour force, which peaked in 1943 at over two thousand. Much of the labour was provided by around 1200 Italian prisoners of war, who had been captured in the desert war in North Africa, who were transported to Orkney from early 1942 onwards. As the use of POW labour for War Effort works is prohibited under the

Geneva Conventions upright=1.15, Original document in single pages, 1864 The Geneva Conventions are four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war. The singular term ''Geneva Conven ...

, the works were justified as 'improvements to communications' to the southern Orkney Islands. The prisoners were accommodated in two camps, some at Camp 34 at Warebanks on Burray and the rest at Camp 60 on

where the famous

Italian Chapel The Italian Chapel is a highly ornate Catholic chapel on Lamb Holm in the Orkney Islands. It was built during World War II by Italian prisoners of war, who were housed on the previously uninhabited island while they constructed the Churchill B ...

was built. Camp 34 had its own chapel but this was destroyed at the end of the war with the rest of the camp. Photos exist of Camp 34's football team and band.

References

External links

Burray Community Association
{{Coord, 58, 51, 5, N, 2, 56, 6, W, region:GB_type:isle, display=title Islands of the Orkney Islands