Burray () is one of the

Orkney Islands Orkney (), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago off the north coast of mainland Scotland. The plural name the Orkneys is also sometimes used, but locals now consider it outdated. Part of the Northern Isles along with Shetland ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

. It lies to the east of

Scapa Flow 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 Hoy. Its sheltered waters have played an impor ...

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 b ...

Geography and geology

Burray lies between

Mainland, Orkney The Mainland, also known as 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 Orkney's popu ...

and

South Ronaldsay South Ronaldsay (, also , ) 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 Ronaldsay, the islan ...

, 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 is a small uninhabited islet in Orkney, Scotland. It lies in Holm Sound, one of the eastern entrances to Scapa Flow, between Mainland Orkney and the island of Burray. Nearby is Lamb Holm. The two are linked by Churchi ...

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 that ...

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 raised area of land within a waterbody, which is connected to the larger mainland by a natural isthmus or man-made causeway that is exposed at low tide and submerged at high tide, causing the land to switch between being ...

of Hunda, 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 ha ...

and Calf of Flotta, 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 Hamburg, Manche ...

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 Old Red Sandstone, abbreviated ORS, 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 eastern seaboard of North America. It ...

of the

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a period (geology), geologic period and system (stratigraphy), system of the Paleozoic era (geology), era during the Phanerozoic eon (geology), eon, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the preceding Silurian per ...

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

Loch ''Loch'' ( ) is a word meaning "lake" or "inlet, sea inlet" in Scottish Gaelic, Scottish and Irish Gaelic, subsequently borrowed into English. In Irish contexts, it often appears in the anglicized form "lough". A small loch is sometimes calle ...

. 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 preserve ...

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 ...

herring Herring are various species of forage fish, belonging to the Order (biology), order Clupeiformes. Herring often move in large Shoaling and schooling, schools around fishing banks and near the coast, found particularly in shallow, temperate wate ...

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. However, it has increased dramatically in North America, especi ...

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 ...

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 a Scottish word for minor lord (or landlord) and is a designation that applies to an owner of a large, long-established Scotland, Scottish estate. In the traditional Scottish order of precedence, a laird ranked below a Baronage of ...

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

Kirkwall Kirkwall (, , or ; ) is the largest town in Orkney, an archipelago to the north of mainland Scotland. First mentioned in the ''Orkneyinga saga'', it is today the location of the headquarters of the Orkney Islands Council and a transport hub wi ...

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 took place on 16 April 1746, near Inverness in the Scottish Highlands. A Jacobite army under Charles Edward Stuart was decisively defeated by a British government force commanded by the Duke of Cumberland, thereby endi ...

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 city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

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

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...

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 (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. 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, The original document in single pages, 1864 The Geneva Conventions are international humanitarian laws consisting of four treaties and three additional protocols that establish international legal standards for humanitarian t ...

, 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 Orkney, Scotland. It was built during the Second World War by Italian prisoners of war, who were housed on the previously uninhabited island while they constructed the Chur ...

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