‘Desolate, despairing and awful’: Britain’s uninhabitable island

In 1978, an invitation was sent to some 200 members of Oxford’s Dangerous Sports Club, which simply read: ‘Tea, Rockall, Black Tie.’ The good news was that invitees had never visited this part of the UK; the bad was that it is way out west. Forget Land’s End, or the Western Isles, or even far-flung Fermanagh. First get to the Outer Hebrides and then head into the Atlantic for 230 miles or so. There a single tooth of granite, 60-foot high, will emerge from the waves. Welcome to Rockall, the last acquisition of the British Empire.

Though known to the Vikings, and to map-makers since the 16th century, Rockall was until 1955 terra nullius: land claimed by no one. No wonder. With no trees, no bushes, no shrubs, no soil, and no permanent wildlife, Rockall is, well, all rock. But when Britain started nuclear testing in the north Atlantic, fears arose that this uninhabitable island would give a foothold to Soviet spies.