Michael Bates leads the Principality of Sealand, a self-declared micronation on a former Second World War sea fort in the North Sea off the English coast. The son of founder Roy Bates, he occupied the platform from the 1960s, held the title of Prince Regent and became head of state on his father’s death in 2012. He also runs the family’s shellfish business, Fruits of the Sea.
His memoir Holding the Fort recounts the parts of that history that are hard to believe and nonetheless documented, among them August 1978, when a group led by a German businessman arrived by helicopter under cover of a business meeting and held him prisoner on the platform for several days before releasing him in the Netherlands.
His father then chartered a helicopter, recruited a stunt pilot who had flown for the Bond films and retook the fort at dawn, holding one of the raiders until a German diplomat came to negotiate for him. Sealand still cites that visit as evidence of de facto recognition. Bates has run the place since, and his account of it is unromantic: a micronation is mostly maintenance, weather and paperwork.
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