King Of The Cocos (Keeling) Islands
King of the Cocos Islands was a title given by the press to John Clunies-Ross, a Scottish sea captain, and other members of his family.
He went to live on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands in 1827. Queen Victoria granted the islands in perpetuity to the Clunies-Ross family in 1886. Thus, the title to the islands was claimed by his descendants until 1978 when John Cecil Clunies-Ross sold under threat of expropriation the islands to the Commonwealth of Australia for £2.5m ($4.75m). The Commonwealth had already been administering the islands since 1955.
Clunies-Ross currently lives in Perth, Western Australia, but his son John George Clunies-Ross (born 1957) lives on West Island.
Read more about King Of The Cocos (Keeling) Islands: List Clunies-Ross Family Owners of The Cocos Islands
Famous quotes containing the words king and/or islands:
““Would you—be good enough—” Alice panted out, after running a little further, “to stop a minute—just to get—one’s breath again?”
“I’m good enough,” the King said, “only I’m not strong enough. You see, a minute goes by so fearfully quick. You might as well try to stop a Bandersnatch!””
—Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)
“What are the islands to me
if you are lost
what is Naxos, Tinos, Andros,
and Delos, the clasp
of the white necklace?”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)