St. George’s Island is a small Cornish island. Better known as Looe Island, it lies just a mile off the southern Cornish coast, near the small fishing village of Looe.

The island is 22½ acres in extent, one mile in circumference, and rises up to 150 feet.

From the early 1960s until 2003 the island was owned by the indomitable Atkins sisters.

The story of how Evelyn and Babs Atkins came to find themselves on the island was told in the bestselling We Bought an Island and Tales From Our Cornish Island by Evelyn, who died in 1997.

When Babs died in 2004, she left the island to the care of the Cornwall Wildlife Trust.

The island has been a popular tourist attraction for decades, as it enjoys magnificent coastal views from Prawle Point in Devon to the Lizard Peninsula. With snow and frost virtually unknown it has an exceptionally mild climate. Daffodils bloom at Christmas, and unlike most small islands it is wooded.

A natural sanctuary for sea and woodland birds and one time haunt of smugglers, its known history includes a Benedictine chapel built in 1139 of which only a few stones remain visible. Legend has it that Joseph of Arimathea landed here with the child Christ.

For more details, take a look at Island Life: A History of Looe Island, by David Clensy