Mizzen Mast of the S.S. Great Britain

		Condemned, and sold to the Falkland Islands Company Limited for use as a storage hulk. She lay at anchor in Stanley harbour and used as a floating warehouse until 1937, when she was eventually beached at Sparrow Cove, in Port William. In 1969 she was salvaged, in 1970 she was placed aboard a barge and towed back to Bristol for restoration, (in the same dock where she was built) which is still ongoing. The mast that you see is the vessel’s mizzen mast (roughly three and half feet in diameter, made of wood with steel bands). During the First World War, she remained in Stanley, and her coal was used to replenish the battle cruisers Inflexible and Invincible before the decisive battle of the Falkland Islands on December 8th 1914, in which the armoured cruisers Gneisenau and Scharnhorst and light cruisers Nurnberg and Leipzig were sunk. For further information about the SS Great Britain click this link

In the rear of the picture, you will see the red roofed row of cottages originally named as Marmont Row and built in 1854 by Jacob Napoleon Goss, an entrepreneur who had arrived in the Falklands from England about ten years earlier. Built purposely as a hotel, it was then known as the "Eagle Inn", catering mainly for sailors. It was also the birthplace of the famous Edwardian actress Ellaline Teriss. In 1875 after Goss' death, Mr J M Dean bought the establishment, and renamed it as the Ship Hotel, in 1889 the Falkland Islands Company Limited took over the ownership. During the late 20th Century when Des King was the proprietor he renamed it as the "Upland Goose Hotel". The present owners are again the Falkland Islands Company Limited, who could not make the hotel into a 'going concern', so sadly, this fine old structure with the exception of far end of the row (which is occupied by the British Antarctic Survey [BAS]), is now being converted into apartments.