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Melville Island is a small peninsula in Nova Scotia, Canada, located in the Northwest Arm of Halifax Harbour, west of Deadman's Island. It is part of the Halifax Regional Municipality. The land is rocky, with thin, acidic soil, but supports a limited woodland habitat. The site was discovered by Europeans in the 17th century, though it was likely earlier explored by aboriginals. It was initially used for storehouses before being purchased by the British, who built a prisoner-of-war camp to hold captives from the Napoleonic Wars and later the War of 1812. The burial ground for prisoners was on the adjacent Deadman's Island. Later, Melville Island was used as a receiving depot for black refugees escaping slavery in the United States, then as a quarantine hospital for immigrants arriving from Europe (particularly Ireland). It briefly served as a recruitment centre for the British Foreign Legion during the Crimean War, and was then sold to the British for use as a military prison. In 1907 the land was granted to the Canadian government, which used it to detain German and Austro-Hungarian nationals during the First World War. During the Second World War, prisoners were sent to McNabs Island instead, and ammunition depots were kept on Melville Island. The peninsula now houses the clubhouse and marina of the Armdale Yacht Club. Melville Island has been the subject of a number of cultural works, most of which concern its use as a prison. == Geography == Melville Island is part of the Halifax Regional Municipality, on the southeast coast of Nova Scotia. The peninsula lies on the eastern boundary of Melville Cove in the Northwest Arm, an inlet between the Halifax Peninsula and Mainland Halifax.〔 It has a total area of approximately . Melville Island is west of Deadman's Island, and southeast of Regatta Point. The peninsula lies on a fracture zone trending northwest–southeast, and is located at the border between the Halifax Slate Formation and a granite-based formation. There is evidence of glacial scouring in the area. The surrounding seabed ranges from gravel to muddy gravel, and the shore is rocky. The water surrounding Melville Island is salty and ranges from in summer to partially or completely frozen in winter.〔 The water is polluted by sewage discharges from Halifax and is considered heavily contaminated.〔(【引用サイトリンク】accessdate=15 April 2012 )〕 Water colour ranges from olive brown to greenish black, with little current.〔 The water depth around Melville Island is . The peninsula features thin and acidic soil, and hosts plants like witherod, Indian pear, Labrador tea, wintergreen, and blueberry shrubs. It is a woodland area, with birch, tamarack, maple, oak, beech, and white pine trees. Given the development of the land by the Armdale Yacht Club, plant growth is now largely limited to the hill on which the main clubhouse sits; most of the peninsula was paved in 1971.〔〔(【引用サイトリンク】accessdate=15 April 2012 )〕 Fish caught from Melville Island include cod and mackerel. Local birds include grebes, loons, and alcids. There is no weather monitoring station on Melville Island (the closest is the Halifax dockyards); however, as with most of the surrounding area, Melville has a humid continental climate heavily influenced by the water temperature in Halifax Harbour. Average air temperatures range from in January to in August. It receives about of precipitation per year, and may receive snow from October through April.〔(【引用サイトリンク】accessdate=15 April 2012 )〕 Though the area is fairly sheltered, it is subject to damage from hurricanes and other storms, notably Hurricane Juan in 2003. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Melville Island (Nova Scotia)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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