The which work the governor accounted for his masterpiece and was earnestly affected to have it carry his name and to be called Moore's Mount, although it proved not long lived, being turned up by the roots with a hurricane or whirlwind.

SO it was that the first Governor of Bermuda, one Richard Moore, was much occupied in March 1613 in raising a timber watchtower 'on a hill overtopping the town of St. George's to the westwards, to serve for the discovery of shipping upon the coast'.

From that tower, signals would be sent to the town below about sails on the horizon, reinforced one way or the other as soon as the ship was gleaned to be friend or foe.

Signals have been continuously sent out from that hill, where Fort George (Harbour Radio) now stands, for nigh on 400 years. In that sense, it is the only military site in continuous occupation since the first days of the settlement of Bermuda in the late summer of 1612.

Governor Moore was also intent on sending signals, in this case into the future by the naming of his Mount, his watchtower. That telepathy survived less than a decade, for the third Governor, Nathaniel Butler, renamed the site in honour of Sir Nathaniel Rich, one of the leading lights and major shareholders of the Bermuda Company.

Better to send a signal to the powerful of the present than the passive of the future, no doubt. A couple of other forts were named for such worthies, but of the great later works, such as Fort George, only one signals for generations to come the name of its builder, Capt. Thomas Cunningham. Everyone would like to be remembered, but most of us are like Governor Moore, our best efforts upended by some capricious twist of the tornado of fate.

Amid the chatter from Harbour Radio, which was imposed as an ugly concrete block atop Fort George some decades ago, there are new signals being emitted from the site.

ONE of the major locations of Bermuda's World Heritage Site, so designated in late 2000, Fort George was last rearmed in the 1870s. Two of the guns from that period have survived and after a century of neglect, they were recently cleaned and painted, under the energetic supervision of Andrew Pettit, the Government Parks Planner.

All things in the army are regulated and the painting of guns is no exception. The carriage of these Rifled Muzzle Loaders should be a dark grey and the 25-ton barrels solid black. Details, such as the serial numbers, the makers and dates of manufacture, are to be picked out in white.

Here the Parks Department has conformed with regulations, following information from an old friend of the island, the cannon expert, Austin Collin Carpenter, or 'Guns', as he is known in the Bermudian vernacular.

The history of Fort George Hill is complex, beginning with the erection of the watchtower and placement of a signal gun at its base. Unlike the undercover air-conditioned comfort of Harbour Radio, some poor souls would have soon been turned brown or burnt to a crisp as they sat in the crow's nest day after day, awaiting the occasional sail on the horizon.

Being tipped over by a hurricane, Moore's Mount was rebuilt just after Easter 1620 by Governor Butler as a triangular work shown in the illustration published by Captain John Smith in 1624. This tower, being absolutely finished and perfected . . . hath already stood stiffly in many a terrible storm, without the least damage that can be discerned and may be hoped to do so in many more, was given the new name of Rich's Mount.

Unfortunately, such hope was dashed in 1629, as Butler's watchtower was thrown down the hill by a passing hurricane, signalling the dangers of overbearing pride in one's earthly productions.

It is likely that the signal gun was maintained at the site for the next century or so and that the Mount was rebuilt several times over. By the mid-1700s, there must have been a small redoubt on the hill, as the locals of the town referred to a 'Fort St. George'.

SIMON Fraser, RA, an Ordnance Storekeeper who made a private fortune by building Ordnance Island out of two primeval islets, seems to refer to the site as 'Fort Clinton' in his survey of 1783 at the end of the American war.

In 1788, the Royal Engineers appeared on a permanent basis in the person of Captain Andrew Durnford, RE, later the first Mayor of St. George's. Sometimes maligned by modern writers, Durnford spent an energetic ten years remodelling the old and building new fortifications, in addition to raising a second family parallel to that he had back in England.

Durnford refers to the Mount as 'St. George's Redoubt' and he rebuilt the existing fort, though no detailed plans of such have survived.

Fort George, as it was named and as we know it, came into being in the 1830s, upon approval by the Duke of Wellington, the Master General of Ordnance in 1826. It mounted four cannon on the outer walls and a square three-storey Keep was surrounded by a deep ditch in the centre of the work.

In the 1870s, the fort was rearmed with two great Rifled Muzzle Loaders, which are among the very few world-wide left in place on their original mountings. They fired shells weighing some 600lbs or more, with a diameter of 11 inches and protected Murray's Anchorage and St. George's Harbour.

The uniqueness of Bermuda forts and cannon are now signalled to the world at large as a vital part of the island's World Heritage Site.

Photos show:

1. Illustration of Rich's Mount published in 1624. 2. Panorama of Fort George in 1857, Fay and Geoffrey Elliott Collection. 3. Plan and section of Fort George in the 1870s. 4. Aerial view of Fort George in 1989. 5. Repainted RML made in 1871 at Royal Gun Factory, Mark II, serial No. 12. 6. Detail of Fort George in 1857, Fay and Geoffrey Elliott Collection.

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Dr. Edward Harris, MBE, JP, FSA, Bermudian, is the Executive Director of the Bermuda Maritime Museum. The views expressed here are his opinion, not necessarily those of the trustees or staff of the Museum. Comments can be sent to drharrislogic.bm, to PO Box MA 133, Sandys MABX, or by telephone at 799-5480.