The Duke of York Islands (formerly ) are a group of islands located in

East New Britain Province East New Britain is a province of Papua New Guinea, consisting of the north-eastern part of the island of New Britain and the Duke of York Islands. The capital of the province is Kokopo, not far from the old capital of Rabaul, which was largely ...

, Papua New Guinea. They are found in StGeorge's Channel between

New Britain New Britain () is the largest island in the Bismarck Archipelago, part of the Islands Region of Papua New Guinea. It is separated from New Guinea by a northwest corner of the Solomon Sea (or with an island hop of Umboi Island, Umboi the Dampie ...

and New Ireland islands and form part of the

Bismarck Archipelago The Bismarck Archipelago (, ) is a group of islands off the northeastern coast of New Guinea in the western Pacific Ocean and is part of the Islands Region of Papua New Guinea. Its area is about . History The first inhabitants of the archipela ...

. The Duke of York Islands were named in 1767 by

Philip Carteret Rear-Admiral Philip Carteret, Seigneur of Trinity (22 January 1733 – 21 July 1796) was a Royal Navy officer and explorer who participated in two of the British navy's circumnavigation expeditions in 1764–66 and 1766–69. Biography Carte ...

to honour Prince Edward, son of

Frederick, Prince of Wales Frederick, Prince of Wales (Frederick Louis, German: ''Friedrich Ludwig''; 31 January 1707 – 31 March 1751) was the eldest son and heir apparent of King George II of Great Britain. He grew estranged from his parents, King George and Queen C ...

and younger brother of

George III of the United Kingdom George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and Ireland from 25 October 1760 until his death in 1820. The Acts of Union 1800 unified Great Britain and Ireland into the United Kingdom of Great ...

History

In the 1870s and 1880s German commercial firms began to site trading stations in

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

. Agents of J. C. Godeffroy & Sohn reached the Bismarck Archipelago from the

Caroline Islands The Caroline Islands (or the Carolines) are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically, they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) in the cen ...

in 1872 and had established a trading post on the Islands from 1876. The wreck of HMAS ''AE1'', lost in 1914 possibly due to a diving accident, was located near these islands in December 2017 after 13 search missions. The submarine was found at a depth of and was seen to be well preserved and in one piece. The exact location of the wreck was not announced by the Australian government at the time of discovery, to protect it from "unauthorized salvage attempts". The government's stated position is that the wreck will be treated as a war grave.

Geography

The Duke of York islands consist of a total of 13 islands and cover in area. The largest island of the group is Duke of York Island, and other islands include Makada, Kabakon,

Kerawara Kerawara is an island in the Duke of York Islands archipelago in Papua New Guinea.Ulu, Mioko, and Mualim. The island group lies in an active seismic zone, where two tectonic plates push upon each other. Earthquakes and tsunamis are not uncommon for inhabitants of the islands. The islands are low-lying, and are threatened with inundation due to

rising sea levels The sea level has been rising from the end of the last ice age, which was around 20,000 years ago. Between 1901 and 2018, the average sea level rose by , with an increase of per year since the 1970s. This was faster than the sea level had e ...

. On 28 November 2000 the evacuation and resettlement of one thousand inhabitants to New Britain was announced.

References

External links

Photo from the Duke of York Islands
{{authority control Islands of Papua New Guinea East New Britain Province

History

Geography

See also

References

External links