Colonial Despatches

The Virgin Islands are part of the Caribbean, in the group known as the Lesser Antilles, and, today, they divide politically into the British Virgin Islands, and the Virgin Islands of the United States.1 The main islands in the former are Jost Van Dyke, Virgin Gorda, Anegada, and Tortola, and, in the latter, St John, St Croix, and St Thomas. The diversity of these islands' names speak to their political and cultural past.2

• 1. Virgin Islands, Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language.
• 2. Ibid.