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Kingdom of Redonda

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Kingdom of Redonda
Motto: Floreat Redonda
StatusCurrent
MembershipPerhaps fewer than 100, but Redondans exist as various rival bands
A view of Redonda from the island of Nevis, with Montserrat faintly visible in the distance.

The Kingdom of Redonda is a name for the micronation aspect of the tiny uninhabited Caribbean island of Redonda.

The island lies between the islands of Nevis and Montserrat, within the inner arc of the Leeward Islands chain, in the West Indies. Redonda is currently legally a dependency of the country of Antigua and Barbuda. The island is uninhabited, and indeed is more or less uninhabitable, since there is no source of freshwater, and most of the island is extremely steep and rocky, with only a relatively small area of grassland at the top.

Redonda also is a micronation which may, arguably and briefly, genuinely have existed as an independent kingdom during the 19th century. The title to this supposed kingdom is still contested to this day in a half-serious fashion. The "Kingdom" is also often associated with a number of supposed aristocratic members, whose titles are prsented by whoever is currently the "King". Currently there are a number of different individuals in several different countries who claim to be the sole legitimate "King" of Redonda.

The idea of the kingdom appears to originate with M. P. Shiel, 1865–1947, an author of fantasy fiction. He claimed that in 1865, his father Matthew Dowdy Shiell, from the nearby island of Montserrat, proclaimed himself to be the rightful, and supposedly legal, "King" of the island of Redonda in order that he might establish his son as the rightful heir to the throne. This story, as first recounted by the son in a promotional leaflet for his books, may be partly or entirely fictional.

History of the "Kingdom"

The history of the "Kingdom" of Redonda is shrouded in doubt and legend, and it is difficult to separate fact from fiction.[1]

M. P. Shiel, an author of works of fantasy fiction, was the first person to ever mention the idea of the "Kingdom of Redonda" and that was in 1929, in a promotional pamphlet for a reissue of his books.[2]

According to one of several different versions of the story, his father, Matthew Dowdy Shiell, a trader and Methodist lay preacher from Montserrat, claimed the island when his son, Matthew Phipps Shiell, was born. Supposedly the father felt he could legitimately do this, because it appeared to be the case that no country had officially claimed the islet as territory. Shiell senior is also said to have requested the title of King from Queen Victoria, and as legend has it, it was granted to him as long as there was no revolt against colonial power.[citation needed] The son (originally named Matthew Phipps Shiell but later known as M.P. Shiel) was said to have been crowned on Redonda at the age of 15, in 1880, by a bishop from Antigua.[2]

However, the story may have originated decades later with the son, M.P. Shiel, a fantasy and science fiction writer best known for his 1901 novel The Purple Cloud, and so it is possible that some, or most, or possibly all of the story of his being made king of Redonda, may in fact be pure invention. In his writings about Redonda, however, Shiel is critical of the egotism that led him to accept the title, sugggesting that there was some truth behind the cororonation and the kingship. Shiel also gave differing names to the bishop who performed the coromation: the Revd Dr Mitchinson and the Revd Dr Semper. These were genuine clerics in the Caribbean at this period. The contradiction could be explained as due to Shiel's faulty memory rather than total invention.

M.P. Shiel in later life gave the title, and the rights of his work, to the writer John Gawsworth (Terence Ian Fytton Armstrong). Gawsworth (1912-70) seems to have passed on the title several times when low in funds. Some Redondan scholars argue that Gawsworth bestowed the title on his friend the publican Arthur John Roberts in 1967. Prior to this the late writer Dominic Behan (1928-89) also claimed Gawsworth passed on the title to him.

This is disputed by Jon Wynne-Tyson, who claims that Gawsworth, prior to his death in 1970s, bestowed the kingship on him with the literary executorships. Wynne-Tyson was subsequently crowned king in a ceremony in Soho and visited Redonda in 1979 on an expedition organized by the American Shielian scholar and publisher A. Reynolds Morse. Wynne-Tyson ruled as King Juan II until abdicating in favour of the novelist Javier Marias of Madrid in 1997, transferring the literary executorship of Gawsworth and Shiel along with the title.[3]

On the question of the kingdom of Redonda Wynne-Tyson has written:

The legend is and should remain a pleasing and eccentric fairy tale; a piece of literary mythology to be taken with salt, romantic sighs, appropriate perplexity, some amusement, but without great seriousness. It is, after all, a fantasy.[4]

Wynne-Tyson and Javier Marias appeared with various contenders to the throne on the BBC Radio 4 documentary Redonda: The Island with Too Many Kings, broadcast May 2007.[5]

List of Kings

In 2007, the Wellington Arms pub in Southampton, England, attempted to declare themselves an embassy of the "nation" of Redonda, in order to gain diplomatic immunity from a nationwide ban on smoking in enclosed workplaces, including pubs.[6][7]

References

  1. ^ John D. Squires, “Of Dreams and Shadows: An Outline of the Redonda Legend with Some Notes on Various Claimants to its Uncertain Throne.”
  2. ^ a b John D. Squires, "The Redonda Legend: A Chronological Bibliography"
  3. ^ Wynne-Tyson, Jon, Finding the Words: A Publishing Life, Wilby, Norwich: Michael Russell, 2004. (Chapter 8, ‘The Cause of Half Our Sorrows,’ covers the author’s perspective on Gawsworth, Redonda and the transfer of his disputed royal claim to Javier Marías, pp 158-195.)
  4. ^ King Robert the Bold. "The Isle of Redonda"
  5. ^ BBC Radio 4. Redonda: The Island with Too Many Kings, 27 May 2007.
  6. ^ "Pub 'embassy' dodges smoking ban", BBC.co.uk. 27 June 2007. Accessed 21 December 2007.
  7. ^ Pub landlord fights smoke ban by declaring his boozer an embassy, Luke Salkeld, Daily Mail, URL accessed 26 June 2007.
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