Watford Island, Bermuda

Watford Island is an

island An island or isle is a piece of land, distinct from a continent, completely surrounded by water. There are continental islands, which were formed by being split from a continent by plate tectonics, and oceanic islands, which have never been ...

Bermuda Bermuda is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. The closest land outside the territory is in the American state of North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. Bermuda is an ...

. Watford Island was part of the British Admiralty presence at the west end of Bermuda. Together with neighbouring Boaz Island it was developed in the 1840s as a prison to house convicts transported to Bermuda to labour on the construction of the Royal Naval Dockyard on Ireland Island and other Government works. Prior to this, convicts had been accommodated in unhealthy conditions aboard

prison hulk A prison ship, is a current or former seagoing vessel that has been modified to become a place of substantive detention for convicts, prisoner of war, prisoners of war or civilian internees. Some prison ships were hulk (ship type), hulked. W ...

s. Clarence Barracks were built on Boaz Island. Watford Island held a hospital for the convicts, who had previously been treated at the Royal Naval Hospital on Ireland Island. This hospital building no longer survives, though a separate building used to isolate patients with contagious diseases (principally Yellow fever) still remains. A convict cemetery was placed atop a knoll on Watford Island, near to the hospital. After the last convicts were removed from Bermuda in the 1860s, Boaz and Watford Islands were transferred from the Admiralty to the War Department, which used them as a

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

base, replacing the bridge that had linked them with a man-made isthmus, effectively turning the two islands into one and the channel between into a camber. As the

Bermuda Garrison The Bermuda Garrison was the military establishment maintained on the British Overseas Territory and Imperial fortress of Bermuda by the regular British Army and its local-service militia and voluntary reserves from 1701 to 1957. The garrison ev ...

was reduced after the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, Boaz and Watford Islands were transferred back to the Admiralty in the 1930s and re-developed as Royal Naval Air Station Bermuda. This was placed on a care-and-maintenance basis with the end of the war, and both islands were among the Admiralty and War Department lands transferred to the local government of the

British Overseas Territory The British Overseas Territories (BOTs) or alternatively referred to as the United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs) are the fourteen dependent territory, territories with a constitutional and historical link with the United Kingdom that, ...

in the 1950s. The buildings became derelict, and many have since been demolished, though one on Watford was converted by the local Government to Police barracks in 1956 (no longer serving that function). Islands of Bermuda Military of Bermuda Installations of the British Army Royal Navy shore establishments {{Bermuda-geo-stub