“The English in the Channel Islands”
The 1885 version
The same old complaint – Time to change the
record?
Henri Boland “a native of Guernsey” devoted
an article in the “Revue Internationale” to proving that the Channel
Islands are rapidly being Anglicized “and that this archipelago essentially
Norman is losing its characteristics very rapidly.”
His article was republished in the London “St James Gazette” of 8 October
1885 and picked up by many CIs and other journals such as the Guernsey “Star”
and Jersey “Independent” that same month.
Henri was French speaking and described
himself as a journalist or author and he did pen many volumes and articles
during his life from 1854 to 1909 but he seems to have followed a busy and
somewhat erratic lifestyle – and was not shy of presenting political views.
During 1883 he was accused of a major bank
fraud in Belgium at a time when such things seemed to be an everyday occurrence
but was acquitted by the Liege court.
The next year he was officially delegated
by the people of Guernsey to lay a wreath on the coffin of the recently
deceased Victor Hugo in Paris.
His 1885 Channel Islands article could have
been written today because it expresses so many of the same sentiments that
have become so tired after yet another 13 decades and two world wars….
He wrote:
“The climate, the soil and the produce of
the latter cannot of course change, but the Norman race is being absorbed by
the English and the English language is elbowing out the Old Norman dialect
which has been in use for six centuries.”
“Jersey holds its own to a certain extent
thanks to its regular communications with France and the number of French tourists who visit
it, not it seems that Guernsey will be completely English by another generation
unless the remnants of the French population in the Island bestirs itself.”
“The French language is dead in the urban
portion of the Island and is on its last legs in the rural districts. The only
reason why English is not already the official language of the Island is that
the rural voters are in a majority.”
“When English has become the official
language of the archipelago the French laws will cease to be intelligible and
will have to be translated into English. If the laws are in English it will be
only rational to have English judges to administer them.”
“But the municipality carries on its
discussions in English and has substituted English names in the streets for the
old French names with the brutality of Vandals and iconoclasts. Education is
given in English although French is supposed to be taught in schools.”
The “Jersey Independent” interpreted some
of his views for the local readership;
“M. Boland was much vexed upon commencing a
conversation with a boy who had obtained a prize for proficiency in that
language to receive the answer Not Much to some question which he had asked.”
Letters in the Guernsey “Star” tried to
counter some of Boland’s arguments;
“He has fallen into several inaccuracies.
The native language is not French but a Patois which probably M. Boland would
not understand and therefore to speak of French as dead in the urban portion of
the Island is wrong.”
And regarding substituting street names;
“The Mill Street has been called Mill
Street as long as anyone can remember and below that name, at the street
corners, the authorities have written Haut Pave which was the Norman name…”
Captain Webb swam the English Channel the same week that Boland's article appeared
