Island commemorates Britain’s handover of country’s last ‘treaty port’ 75 years on

Schoolchildren yesterday heard of their island home’s “unusual history” during a local commemoration of the 75th anniversary handover of a former British-built fort to Ireland.

Fort Berehaven was the last of three British ‘treaty ports’ vacated by the British in 1938, after the residents of Bere Island had experienced 141 continual years of a garrison presence.

Three gun batteries were constructed on the island to protect a British naval fleet patrolling the Atlantic in the 1800s and World War One.