00 A. E. Verrill — Relations hetxrieen Bermuda and the 



visit of Mr. St. George Tucker to Bermuda, from June, 1775, to 

 November, 1776, was only in part to secure gunpowder. It may 

 have been more particularly to promulgate the revolutionary ideas 

 of the American Colonists. 



It is not improbable that he was also instructed to ascertain the 

 disposition of the people in regard to the plan for the capture of 

 Bermuda, and its practicability, and to enlist their aid and sympathy 

 in other wavs. He came back with a cargo of salt, which was then 

 much needed. After he returned to America he joined the Conti- 

 nental army. He became a Lieutenant Colonel in 1789, and M'as 

 wounded in the battle of Guilford Court House. He was appointed 

 Professor of Law in 1789, and Judge of U. S. District Court in 

 1815. (See biographical sketch below.) 



It is certain that Bermuda was at that time very j)oorly fortified 

 and feebly garrisoned. St. George's was the only town and principal 

 harbor, for Hamilton was not made the capital till 1812. But the 

 irarrison was greatlv increased in 1778 and 1779. Gen. Sir Henry 

 Clinton, writing to Lord George Germain, Oct. 8, 1778, stated that 

 he had sent 300 men to garrison Bermuda; and in a later letter, 

 Nov., 1779, he says, "I have sent an additional force to Bermuda. 

 That place is of the greatest consequence." 



Probably some of the old and more or less ruined forts, built long 

 before about St. George's harbor and on Castle Island, etc., were 

 repaired and garrisoned at that time.* 



Mr. Silas Deane, a member of Congress, who was sent as a secret 

 agent to the Court of France in 1776, stopped, on his way, at Ber- 

 muda and there purchased a fast sloop in which he sailed to Bor- 

 deaux, arriving June, 1776. In a letter from Bermuda, April, 1776, 

 he described the destitute condition and distress of the inhabitants 

 and said that a famine was inevitable unless they could live entirely 

 on fish or get food from America. f He also described the harbors 

 and channels, and advised the Congress to take possession of the 

 islands and fortify them at both ends, and thus make a safe harbor 

 for the building and fitting out of vessels to destroy the British, 

 commerce with the AVest Indies. In another letter, dated Paris, 

 Aug. 18, 177C, he referred to the same subject and said that the; 

 English government intended to fortify the islands during the fol-j 



* See The Bermuda Islands, vol. i, pp. 449-463. 



f See above, p. 51. This letter was apjiarently the one there referred to, andj 

 acted upon by Congress. 



