St Helier Jersey

The Channel Islands, which lie within thirty miles (forty-eight kilometers) of the French coast, become part of the county of Normandy in 933.

French poet Robert Wace of Jersey, in collaboration with the historian Geoffrey Gaimar, adapts adapts Geoffrey of Mommouth’s Arthurian tales into French verse, fleshing out the details of Arthur's fame in Le Roman de Brut, published in 1155.

Philip restores Normandy, seized by England’s Henry I in 1106, to French control, but the English retain the Channel Islands when Guernsey and Jersey decide, after a plebiscite of wealthy land owners, to remain with the English crown.

Neither of the islands’ two separate bailiwicks, Guernsey and Jersey, are today part of the United Kingdom; rather they are considered the remnants of the Duchy of Normandy.

England has confronted repeated raids throughout this period by pirates that heavily damage trade and the navy.

There is some evidence that Henry IV employed state-legalized piracy as a form of warfare in the English Channel, using such privateering campaigns to pressure enemies without risking open war.

The French respond in kind and French pirates, under Scottish protection, raided many English coastal towns.

A Breton squadron defeats the English in the Channel in 1403 and devastates Jersey, …

Sir Walter Raleigh, as Governor of the Channel Island of Jersey from 1600 to 1603, has modernized its defenses.

This includes construction of a new fort protecting the approaches to Saint Helier, Fort Isabella Bellissima, or Elizabeth Castle.

Royal favor with Queen Elizabeth I had been restored by this time but does not last: he is arrested at Exeter Inn, Ashburton, Devon, due to alleged involvement in the Main Plot against King James, and imprisoned in the Tower of London on July 19.

The British government, aware of the military importance of the island of Jersey, had ordered that the island be heavily fortified.

On January 6, 1781, a French invasion force of two thousand men sets out to take over the island, but only half of the force arrives and lands.

The Battle of Jersey lasts about half an hour, with Britain successfully defending the island.

There are about thirty casualties on each side, and the British take six hundred French prisoners whom will subsequently be sent to England.

Both British and French commanders are slain.

The first roadside pillar boxes in the British Isles are brought into public use in Saint Helier, on Jersey in the Channel Islands, on November 23, 1852, at the suggestion of English novelist Anthony Trollope, at this time an official of the British General Post Office.

Morisot, with Degas, remains among the most affluent of the French Impressionists.

She spends June 1886 in Jersey.