Position 14:44.54N 61:10.72W

Saturday 9^th January

We are anchored off St Pierre and it has a very interesting history ……

St Pierre lies at the foot of Mt Pelee volcano not far from where the last of the Carib residents were wiped out in 1658.

It is said that the last ones that died uttered horrible curses invoking the mountain to take it’s revenge.

In true Caribbean style, it took it’s time until Ascension Day 8^th May 1902.

At that time St Pierre was known as the Paris of the Caribbean with a population of 30,000 and the cultural, commercial and social centre of Martinique.

The wealth of the island lay in the rich plantations surrounding St Pierre which exported rum, sugar, coffee and cocoa by sea.

The city also provided enough bars, brothels and dancing girls for the visiting sailors !

There was plenty of warning from the volcano’s rumblings but the newly elected governor was encouraged to sit tight by the planters and business leaders who would have suffered financial losses if the city was evacuated.

At two minutes past eight in the morning, the side of the volcano facing St Pierre glowed red and burst open releasing a giant fireball with more energy than an atomic bomb.

All that remained were smoking ruins, 29,933 people burned to death leaving only two survivors, Leon Leandre, the local cobbler, who was in his cellar and the famous Cyparis who was imprisoned for murder in a stone cell.

Twelve ships in the bay were also destroyed.