“Son of Bermuda” St George Tucker, the law professor who alerted American patriot leaders to a store of gunpowder in Bermuda, has been commemorated at a ceremony in Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia.

The Bermuda-born American patriot was Professor of Law and Justice of the Virginia Court of Appeals from 1803 to 1811. He moved to Williamsburg as a young man to pursue a career in law. As tensions rose between the colonies and Great Britain, St George Tucker and his brother, Dr Thomas Tudor Tucker, informed the leaders that the unguarded magazine in St George’s, Bermuda contained a significant store of gunpowder (which was in short supply in the colonies).

With this intelligence, Benjamin Franklin and the Philadelphia committee of safety could convince the Tuckers’ father, Col Henry Tucker, to steal the gunpowder and have it loaded onto Bermuda whalers to carry to American sloops waiting offshore in exchange for an exemption for Bermuda from a trade embargo imposed by the Continental Congress.

These sloops delivered about 100 barrels to rebel forces in America. Some were used in the defence of Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina, in 1776, which prevented the early occupation of Charleston.

St George Tucker served in the Virginia Militia during the revolution and after the revolution, he went on to be a distinguished lawyer, professor and jurist in Virginia. He served as a judge on Virginia’s highest court, taught future lawyers and judges as professor of law at the College of William and Mary, and was appointed by President James Madison as a justice of the United States District Court.

Ms Cheryl Packwood attended the ceremony as a Bermuda Overseas Representative. The ceremony was part of series of events to commemorate Bermuda’s role in the American Revolutionary War.

“Bermuda values its friendship forged over 400 years ago with the United States,” Ms Packwood said. “This ceremony in Colonial Williamsburg at the home of St George Tucker served as a way to honour the life of a great man, a son of our soil and patriot of the United States, who truly embodied our collaboration with America from the very beginning. We look forward to working together, the United States and Bermuda, for another 400 years when we can accomplish even more greatness.”

The ceremony was part of a series of events to commemorate Bermuda’s role in the American Revolutionary War. The Gunpowder Plot series will continue in the spring of 2015 with ceremonies in Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with a final three-day celebration in August 2015 in Bermuda to commemorate the 240th anniversary of the event.