Reason why ‘world's most infected island' that man visited is full of human skulls and '500-year-old coffins'

Here is the story of how one of ‘world’s most infected islands’ came into existence.

Now, if you heard the name Deadman’s Island you’d be forgiven for thinking this was the location of a shelved Pirates of the Caribbean film – but it’s actually a very real place and has a pretty grim history.

Located in the estuary in the River Medway in Kent, England, Deadman’s Island is uninhabited and currently under the ownership of Natural England as a sight of Site of Special Scientific Interest.

While the marshy island is currently a hotspot for the nesting and breeding of birds, the place also holds a much darker history.

The island is located off of Kent, UK (YouTube/Dara Tah)

Back in 2016, more than 200 sets of human remains were located on the island, so what the hell happened here?

The story of Deadman’s Island

During a period from the 1600s and until the end of the 1800s, convicted men and boys across England were held in prison hulks. Heavily relied on during the 18th and 19th century, prison hulks were a quick solution to overcrowded jails alongside the influx of prisoners of war. However, as you can imagine, the conditions onboard these floating jails would’ve been absolutely dire.

“Convicts came from London, Newcastle, everywhere around the country and they were kept on hulks in Sheerness until merchant ships big enough arrived to take them to places like Tasmania,” researcher Daf Charman told Kent Messenger of the prisoner process back in 2020.

Diseases such as cholera and typhoid were rife amongst the prisoners and anyone who passed away was chucked into a wooden coffin and buried in an unmarked grave on the island.

It’s also believed that plague victims from 1665-1666 found their final resting place on Deadman’s Island.

The story of the men and boys buried on the island would remain largely lost to history until 2016, when 200 sets of human remains were discovered after coastal erosion and rising sea levels unearthed their bodies.

The island is littered with bones (YouTube/Dara Tah)

Since then Deadman’s Island has become a place of morbid fascination online, with YouTuber Dara Tah uploading a video on his channel (@DaraTah) sharing snippets of his visit to the location.

In the video, he shows clips of bones washed up amongst rocks and sand along the island’s shores. “I have visited Dead Man’s Island once before. It is a small marsh island in the south of England that was used as a mass dumping ground for possibly thousands of skeletons infected with the Black Plague but this time we’re spending the night,” he explained.

“There’s literally bones everywhere, oh my god, there is a rib bone, a leg bone, an arm bone.”

He continued: “Seeing that stuff is is very freaky, you just totally dissociate from it being a person but it’s a person that lived a long time ago and they just end up on on this island and no one does anything about it. It’s quite sad.”

Tah’s reaction isn’t a unique one, as BBC Inside Out presenter Natalie Graham said the experience will stay with her ‘forever’.

YouTuber Dara Tah was left feeling creeped out by his visit (YouTube/Dara Tah)

“What I saw there will stay with me forever. This is a really strange sight. I would imagine there can’t be anywhere on earth like this,” she told The Sun.

However, dark tourists looking to book a ticket to Kent might want to hold off, as the island is completely out of bounds to visitors due to its importance for local bird nesting.

Birds or not, it’s probably a good idea to leave the island’s dead to rest in peace.