Bermuda

A series of islands off the eastern shore of North America on which Europeans landed in the 16th century but did not colonize until the Spanish decided to establish permanent settlements there during the 17th century.

The Bermuda Islands consist of a series of continuous islands, approximately 20 square miles in total surface area. The island’s formidable topography and mazelike appearance prevented European exploration until the 17th century; only then did newcomers push through the jagged waters and dangerous reefs to pursue settlement. Throughout much of the 16th century Spanish travelers referred to the difficult shores of the Bermudas as a “graveyard of ships.” Mariners passing through the Bahamas Channel and up the Gulf Stream felt relieved when their ships passed the Bermudas, considered the last of their American obstacles on the route to the AzoREs and home.

Although the date for first European discovery may have been as early as 1503, by 1511 the Spanish referred to the islands as “La Bermuda.” In 1515, following his earlier, unrecorded landing on the islands, Juan de Bermudez carried out a return mission. This time, Spanish courtier and official historian of the Indies GoNZALO Fernandez de OviEDO Y Valdes traveled with the expedition and chronicled his observations of the isolated islands. Unfortunately, Bermudez encountered challenging winds that prevented him from approaching the islands, and thus Oviedo’s chronicles describe impressions of the Bermudas made from the surrounding waters.

During much of the 16th century the negative feelings toward the Bermudas stemmed from the fears of Spanish and Portuguese explorers who encountered the treacherous coast. According to Oviedo, in 1543, 30 Portuguese men en route back to Europe from the West Indies found themselves victims of the rocky waters of the Bermudas and had to spend two months ashore in Bermuda while they worked to build a new boat to replace their lost ship. Upon their return home the men reported the abundance of food on the desolate islands. However, their stories of earlier shipwrecks further contributed to the dreaded image of the Bermudas held by an increasing number of Europeans. In 1544 the Venetian explorer SEBASTIAN CABOT referred to the Bermudas as the Islands of Devils on his mappae mundi.

During the second half of the 16th century, two separate French ships wrecked on the reefs of the Bermudas. In the latter case, the ship’s captain, Barbotiere, thought himself safely past the rocky Bermudan waters when the ship unexpectedly hit a rock to the north of the islands on December 17, 1593. Twenty-six of Barbotiere’s men rowed seven leagues to shore while more than half the crew drowned. During May 1594 the surviving men finally departed for France on a boat built from the scraps of their wrecked ship. The surviving chronicles of Barbotiere’s experience on the islands come to us from the only Englishman aboard the ship, Henry May. May’s account, later published by Richard Hakluyt the Younger, represents the first real description of the islands and in part explains why historians typically refer to the experience of the French ship as “Henry May’s shipwreck.” During the 17th century the successful colonization efforts of England in the Bermudas ended the abominable image of the islands.

Further reading: Terry Tucker, Bermuda: Today and Yesterday 1503-1980s (London: Robert Hall Limited, 1983); Henry C. Wilkinson, The Adventures of Bermuda: A History of the Island from Its Discovery until the Dissolution of the Somers Island Company in 1684 (London: Oxford University Press, 1958).

—Kimberly Sambol-Tosco