This is the latest in a series of occasional articles on the shared histories of Bermuda and the United States, which celebrates the 250th anniversary of its independence this year. The articles, by Heritage Matters author Edward Cecil Harris, will run throughout the year.

A great boom echoed across St George’s Harbour and the crash reverberated off the hills of the surrounding islands on Saturday, September 27, 1862: the irascible Rear Admiral Charles Wilkes so loudly pronounced his arrival on his flagship, USS Wachusett, a vessel of the Union forces of the North in the expanding Civil War in the once-United States.

Perhaps taking a cue from our national bird, the Bermuda petrel (Pterodroma cahow) that has survived allcomers, the esteemed sailor was known as the “Stormy Petrel”, as “rarely sailing in calm seas … blunt, highly opinionated and always self-righteous”.

Ten months earlier, the then Captain Wilkes, in command of the USS San Jacinto gunboat, had intercepted the neutral British RMS Trent and removed two Confederate diplomats, causing Britain to consider war against the Union in the infamous “Trent Affair”.

President Lincoln released James Mason and John Slidell, thus avoided such a conflict, as he had his hands and forces full of the southern Confederacy. Bermuda thus also escaped a direct war with America and the interruption of its very lucrative transshipment trade, an unintended consequence of the Civil War.

Hence, when Wilkes and his fleet, including the Tioga and Sonoma warships, swanned (“to move or travel around in a carefree, aimless, or relaxed way, often without a care for responsibilities or other people's schedules”) into the harbour at St George’s through the original ships’ channel, he woke up the town with the shots and got into arguments with the Bermuda governor, Sir Harry Ord (Harry, a military man, won!).

Wilkes’ cannonfire probably also aroused the somnolent artist, Edward James (1820—1877), who rose to the commercial opportunity for his artwork occasioned by the advent of the Union fleet in a harbour infested (“infected” in opinion of some, no doubt) with Confederate vessels.

At present, four James images are known of the Wilkes “invasion”, all centred on the firing of the cannon from the Wachusett, which the good admiral declared was a “salute” to Governor Ord and the folk of the town.

One, in the collections of the Bermuda National Trust, is from the hill by the British Army barracks to the east of the town, looking westward towards the harbour with white smoke billowing out from the Union ship’s guns. This was published in the BNT’s booklet Rogues & Runners, a title perhaps foreshadowing the invasion of political correctness, etc, into our culture. Given the dichotomy of the Civil War, Wilkes might count as a rogue, as there are plenty of runners in the James images.

Thanks to Kevin Foster, once a student archaeologist here, Andrew Baylay of the Bermuda Archives, and a 2020 article by curator Jeanne Willoz-Egnor of the Mariners’ Museum, three almost identical paintings of the Wachusett scene by James are here published together for the first time. Two are presented as a combo panorama and upon the third the names of the ships have been added.

As the eminent Bermudian art historian, Jonathan Land Evans, has written: “Then, in the 1860s, the Englishman Edward James made his brilliant but more shambolic and disreputable appearance on the local scene, managing somehow to combine the roles of Town Drunk and Chief Artist for the colony.

“In his work, a more complex and human (and rather less imperialist) ethos was apparent. Although James’ paintings were highly detailed and representational — and, indeed, quite often panoramic in nature — they had more the flavour of reportage than of anything propagandistic or imperialistic.”

Before we end with details of what James was reporting on in these pictures, an overview may be helpful. The left image in the combo is that discovered in 2020 by Foster at the Mariners’ Museum and Park, Newport News, Virginia. It is perhaps the best of the bunch as the depictions of the vessels are exquisite: note what appear to be a rowboat of six oarsmen with a coxswain in a red uniform, possibly an officer of the Corps of Royal Engineers.

The picture on the right is in the collections of the St George’s Historical Society and it is appropriate that they have an image that reflects the “saluting” guns of USS Wachusett on September 27, 1862.

Hopefully that honour was made with blank cartridges, otherwise Wilkes would have taken out most of Ordnance Island and Bermuda would have been at war with the Union!

This picture is not as detailed as that of the Mariners’ Museum, but all the ships seem to be carrying the correct flags, whereas in the latter, the Confederate ensign has been replaced with a possible Swedish flag.

The third image, with titles added, is from the Bermuda Archives and the names of the ships could be added because that painting had a captions-block with such data and is dated 9 October 1862. This is likely the date of the captions, presumably added by James, as on October 1, the USS Tioga “headed out of port and the Wachusett and Sonoma followed soon after”. As USS Sonoma is not identified in the picture, we may assume that James was depicting the saluting day of September 27, when that ship was on patrol off the east end of St George’s Island.

In her 2020 article for the Mariners’ Museum, Jeanne Willoz-Egnor noted that:

“Interestingly, James also sold copies of his sketches to the crews of the runners themselves thereby increasing his profits and ‘proving’ his status as a neutral party in the conflict (at least in his own mind!).”

Thus, Edward James’ commercial bent and “sleight of artistic hand” can be seen in the Bermuda Archives painting, wherein the rowboat of seven apparent British military figures has been summarily replaced with a boatload of nine, all in blue uniforms and boasting the Union Flag of the North!

• Dr Edward Harris is the founding executive director emeritus of the National Museum of Bermuda