August 4, 2014

Dear Sir,

They say that if you repeat something often enough it becomes fact and that is what Robert Davies Jr in his letter to you today seems to believe.

He says “it is (or rather should be) common knowledge that in the past lands were wrongfully taken in the Tucker’s Town area”.

To the contrary, I believe that a fair price was paid for all, and such evidence as I have heard so far supports that belief.

I have always heard that while initially some people did not want to move most were pleased with their new houses in the Devil’s Hole area and with the boost to the economy that the Mid Ocean and Castle Harbour Hotel provided.

But I have seen little proof either way.

So I think that instead of embarking on an expensive Commission of Inquiry the most sensible course of action would be to implement Dr Edward Harris’ suggestion reported in your paper a couple of weeks ago and employ a couple of PhD students to collect the facts as far as they can be ascertained.

They could start with the parish records to establish who actually paid taxes in Tucker’s Town, study all the surviving documents and interview members of all the families involved.

The cost would be reasonable and the findings unbiased.

Compulsory purchases are always upsetting for some — the Devonshire families whose lands were acquired for Prospect in the 1860s and the St David’s islanders who had to move in the 1940s had at least as much cause for complaint — but in all three cases I believe that the overall good for Bermuda far outweighed the individual sacrifice and expect that it would be found that in all cases the land owners were paid the full current value of their properties.

It is also being said that there are numerous other cases of land being improperly taken but these would be harder to investigate.

Certainly there are known cases of elderly people being financially supported by doctors or lawyers in exchange for an understanding, perhaps sometimes not documented, that on the elderly person’s death their land would go to the doctor or lawyer or other supporter.

And many people over the years have lost mortgaged property.

However there may well be more sinister cases of exploitation or theft, and these too could at least be collated by the PhD students so that more of a picture emerges.

MARGARET LLOYD