By Kim Griggs Wellington, New Zealand

Last week, charges were laid in the Pitcairn Magistrates Court against nine men, alleging offending of "a sexual nature". More charges, against Pitcairners living in New Zealand, are expected to be laid when the island's Public Prosecutor, Simon Moore, returns from Pitcairn.

For those from this last scrap of British Empire pink on the map of the South Pacific, the advent of the legal proceedings after three years of waiting brings little relief.

"This has tainted the island completely and everyone connected with it," said Kari Young, a member of a Pitcairn family now resident in New Zealand

Pitcairn is home to just 45 people

Last year Mr Moore said that he was bringing charges for the rape of girls as young as seven and 10, and of indecent assault against a girl as young as three. In New Zealand's parliament last year, Foreign Affairs Minister Phil Goff said one of the complaints related to the alleged multiple rape of an eight-year-old.

Mrs Young believes that the long process leading up to this past week's court sittings on Pitcairn could have been avoided.

"Everybody on the island has petitioned the governor, who could have done something to have it resolved - by a truth and reconciliation [commission], restorative justice. You know, settle it around the table and I am sure it would never happen again. This is just a result of ignorance and isolation," she said.

But the gravity of the allegations precluded any possibility of a commission.

"The charges are very serious," said Pitcairn's Deputy Governor, Wellington-based British diplomat Matthew Forbes, this week. "We have a responsibility to ensure that the courts can deal with serious allegations like this so that the rights of all the islanders, young and old, are respected."

"We are pleased that the judicial process is now under way," he added.

Much of that process is likely to take place in Auckland, New Zealand. New Zealand's parliament last year passed a law to allow the Pitcairn court to sit here; many in the Pitcairn diaspora live in New Zealand.

We just can't afford to lose anybody else from there Betty Christian

But for the islanders, the most worrying aspect is just what might happen if any of the men on the island have to leave, men on whom the 45-strong population depend in order to handle the longboats that connect Pitcairn to the ships that pass the island.

"You can bring people to help with other machinery and stuff if that became necessary, engineers and electricians and that kind of stuff, but boating is our life. That's our connection to the outside world. Everything that goes to Pitcairn has to be brought ashore in our boats," said Betty Christian, an island resident temporarily in New Zealand.

"I'm not saying there's nobody else that can handle the boats but our guys certainly are experienced. They've done it all their lives," she said.

"We just can't afford to lose anybody else from there," she added.

The British Government, which administers the island, has sought to assuage those fears.

"We also realise this is a very worrying time for the islanders, and that there has been much speculation about the effect this will have on the island," said Mr Forbes. "We are seeking to minimise this and will continue to work with the islanders to ensure a secure future for Pitcairn."

For many years, the governor's representative on Pitcairn was also the New Zealand schoolteacher.

The representative and the island council were responsible for the main day to day running of the island and had much of the authority on the island.

From Britain's point of view, the island was managing itself fine, at least until the allegations surfaced. But following that, two Ministry of Defence police officers and two social workers were sent to the island. The just-arrived court contingent has boosted the island's population by a further 12.

"There has never ever been so much attention focused on Pitcairn," said Mrs Young. "We used to be lucky if the governor would come out for maybe one or two days every five years."

Now the island's governor, British High Commissioner in Wellington Richard Fell, has appointed a British diplomat, Jenny Lock, to be his representative on the island for the next 12 months. And Mr Fell, himself, made the longest ever gubernatorial visit - 2� weeks- to the island late last year.

He, too, has tried to reassure the islanders.

"I am well aware that the community faces a difficult period ahead, but I believe that by working together we can get though it," Mr Fell wrote in Pitcairn's newsletter, The Pitcairn Miscellany.

Twice already Pitcairners have left their island; in 1831, they left for Tahiti but returned just months later; in 1856 the entire island moved to Norfolk Island but three years later 16 homesick Pitcairn Islanders returned, and four more families later followed.

Now, the island community faces yet another test.