500 Years of Bermuda History

by Historian William Zuill
Compliments of Bermuda Department of Tourism.

Centuries ago they were known as the “Isles of Devils”. Isolated, uninhabited and surrounded by treacherous reefs, Bermuda was a navigational menace. Mariners who sailed the trade routes of the Atlantic treated the uncharted islands with the same fearsome respect as the plague.

No one knows exactly when the islands were discovered, but their discoverer, Spanish records say, was Captain Juan Bermudez when commander of La Garzain 1505 and 1506. For the next hundred years sailors from wrecked ships found their way ashore, built new vessels or repaired their own, and sailed away. The first known Portuguese arrived in 1543 (and left a rock carving at mis-called Spanish Marks, Smith’s Parish); the first Frenchman between 1560 and 1570, and the first Englishman in 1593. The first black man recorded to have come to Bermuda was Venturilla, in 1603.

The next shipwreck, in 1609, had important consequences. An English fleet, bound for the new settlement at Jamestown, Virginia, was hit by a hurricane and the flagship, the Sea Venture, ended up wedged between two of Bermuda’s reefs. All aboard were saved. The ship’s company built two vessels, the Patience and Deliverance, and ten months later arrived at Jamestown where only 60 settlers were left alive of the 500 there the autumn before. Bermuda supplies saved them, but all decided to give up the colony and sail back to England. Just as the survivors were nearing the mouth of the James River they met a relief fleet and all turned back, never to give up again. Apart from some Newfoundland fishing hamlets, Jamestown was the first successful English settlement in the Americas - and Bermuda was the second.

Sir George Somers, the Admiral of the Sea Venture fleet, returned to Bermuda to obtain more supplies for Virginia. He died in Bermuda, and the old capital, St. George’s, was named after him. This historic town was made a UN Heritage Site in November, 2000. News of the beauty and plenty of Bermuda spread rapidly. William Shakespeare’s The Tempest was almost certainly inspired by these events, and in 1612 the first colonists were sent out in the Plough. Presumably they were white. The first recorded black man and native American to arrive came in 1616 on board the Edwin.

The settlement expanded rapidly and on August 1, 1620, the first meeting of the House of Assembly, a representative body, took place, one year after the Virginia House of Burgesses, and the same year as the Pilgrim Fathers sailed from England. The colonists tried tobacco as an export crop and more whites, blacks and native Americans arrived. Some of them were indentured servants, and others slaves.

Some 70 years after the founding of the colony tobacco growing was abandoned and the community turned to the sea - a time of“cedar, salt and sailors”.

CEDAR was the principal Bermuda tree, a juniper which turned out to be excellent for shipbuilding.

SALT came from the Turks Islands at the eastern end of the Bahamas chain, for a time Bermuda’s colony.

SAILORS - the men who sailed the ships.

Black men and white, freemen and slaves, participated in all these trades while the womenfolk did their best to keep households together, particularly during the long months when husbands, brothers and sons would be away. Many did not return. Other sailors engaged in privateering (in wartime) and to a lesser extent in piracy, in smuggling, and in salvaging sunken cargoes, with Bermuda’s reefs providing excellent practice.

When the American Revolutionary War broke out in 1775 food to Bermuda and other colonies was embargoed. It was suggested that if gunpowder sent to America the embargo might be lifted - and on the night of August 14/15 the colony’s powder magazine was emptied - and food supplies were available again.

At the end of the war many trading links were shattered and Bermuda lost the Turks Islands. Fortunately for the island’s economy the British realised that they needed a naval base at Bermuda to replace American ports, and Bermudians began to find a living working for the army and navy.

On August 1, 1834, Emancipation Day brought an end to the long anguish of slavery. Today it is celebrated with a cricket match which attracts crowds of holiday makers. In the 1840s British Governor Sir William Reid awakened an interest in agriculture, and soon Bermuda spring crops were finding a ready market in New York. In 1849 the first Portuguese arrived to work on Bermuda farms.

During the American Civil War Bermuda experienced a brief boom as a base for blockade-running into the Confederacy, and fortunes were made. In 1883 Princess Louise, daughter of Queen Victoria, spent the winter here, and tourism received a tremendous boost. Another major improvement came in the 1920s when the British Furness, Withy Steamship Company invested heavily. There was a further tourist impetus from 1920s prohibition in the United States - and Bermuda also became a base for run-running.

Bermuda was deeply involved in World War II. At first the tourist trade came to an end, causing depression, but then Britain and America evolved a deal in 1940 under which a 99 year lease on bases in Bermuda was given to the United States (other bases were in exchange for 50 old U.S. destroyers) and an airfield was built. The US, Britain and Canada abandoned their bases in 1995.

Tourism gained from the airfield, and rapidly developed further. Other changes included the ending of much de facto segregation,the development of trade unions, and the end of a prohibition of cars. There was pressure to democratise the franchise, and this was achieved in 1963, the same year the first political party, the Progressive Labour Party, was formed. Soon after, the United Bermuda Party came into being and quickly dominated the electoral scene, holding power for 30 years, until in 1998 the PLP finally came into power.

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