Introduction

The Channel Islands form an archipelago off the Cotentin peninsula of Normandy. They are divided administratively into two Bailiwicks, each with a non-political chief citizen known as a Bailiff, who serves as senior judge in the Royal Courts of Jersey and Guernsey, and moderator of each of those two islands' parliamentary assemblies, or States. The Bailiwick of Jersey comprises the island itself, which has an area of forty-five square miles and a population of 88,200 and two rocky reefs, the Minquiers and the Ecrehous. The other islands in the archipelago, belonging to the Bailiwick of Guernsey, are Guernsey (twenty-five square miles, population 65,228), Alderney (three square miles, pop. 2,294), Sark (two square miles, pop. 610), and five islands of under one square mile: Herm, Jethou (combined population 97), Brecqhou (estimated population no more than 40), uninhabited Burhou off Alderney, and a tidal island called Lihou, off Guernsey's west coast, which does not have a permanent population.

Though situated geographically closer to France than to the UK (at its nearest point, Alderney lies only some nine miles west of Normandy), the Islands are dependencies of the British Crown, to which they were formally annexed in 1254 (though never forming part of the kingdom of England). Prior to this they formed part of the Duchy of Normandy, itself established in the early years of the tenth century. The first tenuous link with England came in 1066 when William, Duke of Normandy became king of England by right of conquest.