Qualla: Great Stirrup Cay

Great Stirrup Cay: Introduction

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User516, Public domain. Two people are buried on Great Stirrup Cay, and neither one planned to be there. Allan Bertram, a Royal Navy captain who owned the island, died in 1834 and requested burial on his land. Elizabeth Wright Braden Hixson was a passenger on a ship passing through in 1838; she died mid-voyage and was interred ashore. Their graves sit in a fenced grassy area near what is now a cruise ship visitor center, surrounded by thousands of sunburned tourists in swimsuits who step off Norwegian Cruise Line tenders and rarely notice the headstones. The living and the dead share this 268-acre island in the Berry Islands chain, separated by a fence and two centuries of history that most visitors never learn.

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Image: User516 | Public domain

Great Stirrup Cay: Hideouts, Blockades, and a Presidential Fishing Trip

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User516, Public domain. Before the cruise ships, before the lighthouse, before the graves, Great Stirrup Cay belonged to pirates. While the British busied themselves with Nassau and the larger Bahamian islands, the smaller cays in the Berry Islands chain offered perfect cover for ships that preferred no...

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Image: User516 | Public domain

Great Stirrup Cay: Listening for Submarines, Tracking the Shuttle

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User516, Public domain. World War II transformed Great Stirrup Cay from a forgotten plantation island into a listening post. The United States military installed submersible cables along the ocean floor to detect enemy submarines approaching the eastern seaboard, and two "cable houses" built for this pu...

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Image: User516 | Public domain

Great Stirrup Cay: The Lighthouse at the Edge of the Channel

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit BloodNinjasPinwheel, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1863, the Imperial Lighthouse Service erected a lighthouse on Great Stirrup Cay to guide ships through the Northwest Providence Channel. The structure stands nearly 80 feet tall, and its beam reaches more than 20 miles across open water. For years it was a manned station, tend...

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Image: BloodNinjasPinwheel | CC BY-SA 4.0

Great Stirrup Cay: From Oil Speculation to All-Inclusive Paradise

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Denis Santana, CC BY-SA 2.0. The Belcher Oil Company of Miami held claim to the northern section of Great Stirrup Cay for years, pursuing a mix of real estate speculation, oil exploration, and a possible corporate retreat that never materialized. In 1977, Norwegian Caribbean Lines leased the property from Be...

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Image: Denis Santana | CC BY-SA 2.0

Great Stirrup Cay: What the Coconut Palms Keep

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Armsoo, CC BY 3.0. Great Stirrup Cay is a protected marine sanctuary, and removing anything from the water is strictly prohibited. Coconut palms dominate the landscape, along with sea grape trees whose fruit darkens to purple in the tropical heat. Land crabs scuttle through the undergrowth, and liz...

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Image: Armsoo | CC BY 3.0