A remote Scottish island became a ghost town after disease and harsh living conditions forced residents to leave.
Hirta is the largest island in the remote St Kilda archipelago(Image: Getty Images)
Far out in the Atlantic Ocean, beyond the coast of the Outer Hebrides, lies one of Scotland’s most isolated abandoned communities where nature has reclaimed a once thriving settlement.
The island of Hirta, the largest island in the St Kilda archipelago, was home to generations of islanders for thousands of years before the final residents left in 1930. Today, the remote island is uninhabited and accessible only by boat when weather conditions allow, Express reports.
St Kilda is made up of around 40 islands and sea stacks and is now internationally recognised for its extraordinary wildlife and dramatic landscape. It is home to nearly one million seabirds, including the world’s largest colony of northern gannets and the UK’s largest colony of Atlantic puffins.
Towering cliffs rise from the Atlantic while steep grassy slopes provide ideal breeding grounds for seabirds. Beneath the surface, underwater rock faces are covered in marine life, making the islands one of the most important seabird sites in the north east Atlantic.
The islands are also the UK’s only dual UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of only 39 places in the world to hold the status for both natural and cultural significance.
Long before tourists arrived, the people of Hirta survived through seabird harvesting and small scale farming. Islanders depended heavily on puffins, fulmars and gannets for food, oil and trade. Almost every part of the birds was used or sold, including feathers and meat.
Life on the island was harsh and unforgiving. Fierce Atlantic weather, limited resources and isolation made survival difficult year round. During the winter months, residents brought animals inside their stone homes to help generate heat, with animal waste acting as insulation against the cold.
At its peak in 1851, Hirta had a population of 112 people. However, the numbers steadily declined as younger generations left and the challenges of island life intensified.
Medical care remained extremely limited and increased contact with visitors brought diseases unfamiliar to the isolated community. Conditions that could be treated on the mainland often proved fatal on the island.
The final turning point came in 1930 following the death of a young woman from appendicitis and pneumonia. After years of struggle, the remaining 36 residents voted to leave the island permanently as their way of life was no longer sustainable.
In August that year, the islanders were evacuated by ship to mainland Scotland. Before leaving their homes for the final time, families followed local tradition by placing a plate of oats and an open Bible inside each cottage.
The last surviving former resident of St Kilda, who was eight years old at the time of the evacuation, died in 2016.
Many traces of the former community still remain scattered across Hirta. Traditional stone cottages and unique dry stone storage structures known as cleitean continue to stand across the landscape, alongside a handful of later military buildings that now overlook the abandoned settlement.
What was once the island’s main street is now occupied largely by sheep, including Soay sheep descended from some of Scotland’s earliest livestock.
The islands are also home to rare wildlife found nowhere else. Isolation over centuries led to the development of a unique St Kilda wren and a subspecies of field mouse believed to be twice the size of a typical British field mouse.
Although no one permanently lives on St Kilda today, visitors still travel to what many call the “islands at the edge of the world” to witness the haunting remains of a lost community surrounded by one of Britain’s most spectacular natural landscapes.