With the 250th anniversary of the United States imminent, I feel compelled to highlight the important role our small island has played in that history. It started shortly after the earliest English settlement of Jamestown was founded in 1607. Two years later, a fleet of nine ships set sail from England with cargoes including settlers and needed resupplies for the Colonists. However, two ships never arrived, thought to have sunk after encountering a storm.

After months of waiting, all hopes were dashed, failing to arrive and presumed lost. However, one, The Sea Venture, had foundered on our treacherous shores. Luckily, all 150 passengers, 140 of them men, survived, along with one dog. These survivors, including John Rolfe and his first wife with child, salvaged everything they could from the wreck. They remained on Bermuda, building two smaller boats, over the ensuing year.

During their stay, they found ample sustenance along with the island’s amenable climate to make their lives tolerable. Once the vessels were completed, they continued to Jamestown the following May carrying with them supplies that were vital for the survival of the colony. Their story quickly spread as the news reached back across the Atlantic to England. The tale inspiring Shakespeare himself to write his famous play, The Tempest, about their ordeal. Bermuda was now claimed by England, through the Virginia Company. By mid-1612 the first settlers had arrived.

On that ship was a young seaman named Thomas Outerbridge, who was so taken by the island he returned a few years later with his wife. Those are the first members of our family to arrive over 400 years ago. They were the founding inhabitants as there were no indigenous people on the island. All alone, forging a new life along with our kindred neighbours in the New World. We were a small speck in the middle of the Atlantic, with strategic opportunity yet to unfold.

The years following proved very difficult for the settlers in Jamestown, with harsh frigid winters, Indian attacks and a lack of food in the cold months. Bermuda, only three days’ sail away with three growing seasons and temperate weather all year, came to their rescue. We provided support to those early settlers who may very well have perished without our aid. Over the ensuing years Bermuda and Virginia and the other colonies enjoyed a warm relationship, becoming our primary trading partners in many ventures, developing strong bonds and business relationships. Although we were a British colony, some Bermudians were sympathetic to our colonial neighbours with their growing discontent over British rule.

Bermudian St George Tucker, a Major in the Virginia militia serving under George Washington facilitated a plan. It was a covert appeal to Bermudian business partners to steal gunpowder from the English who kept a large magazine of reserve on the island, now referred to locally as the ‘Gunpowder Plot’. In simple terms a traitorous act, stealing Crown gunpowder to donate to Washington’s campaign, with an ultimate desire to effect victory against our King. History informs us that we did in fact steal and deliver on that promise. I now include the copy of Washington’s Bermuda Address:

Address to the inhabitants of Bermuda, September 6, 1775 General George Washington.

Gentlemen

In the great Conflict which agitates this Continent I cannot doubt but the Assertors of Freedom & the Rights of the Constitution are possessed of your most favorable Regards & Wishes for Success. As the Descendants of Freemen & Heirs with us of the same glorious Inheritance we flatter ourselves that though divided by our Situation we are firmly united in Sentiment. The Cause of Virtue & Liberty is confined to no Continent or Climate it comprehends within its capacious Limits the wise & the good however dispersed & separated in Space or Distance.

You need not be informed that the Violence & Rapacity of a tyrannick Ministry have forced the Citizens of America your Brother Colonists into Arms. We equally detest & lament the Prevalence of those Councils which have led to the Effusion of so much human Blood & left us no Alternative but a Civil War or a base Submission. The wise Disposer of all Events has hitherto smiled upon our virtuous Efforts, those mercenary Troops a few of whom lately boasted of subjugating this vast Continent, have been checked in their earliest Ravages, & are now actually encircled in a small Space their Arms disgraced & suffering all the Calamities of a Siege.

The Virtue & Spirit & Union of the Provinces leave them nothing to fear but the Want of Ammunition: The Applications of our Enemies to foreign States & their Vigilance upon our Coasts are the only Efforts they have made against us with Success. Under these Circumstances & with these Sentiments we have turned our Eyes to you Gentlemen for Relief.

We are informed that there is a large Magazine in your Island under a very feeble Guard. We would not wish to involve you in an Opposition in which from your Situation we should be unable to support you, we know not therefore to what Extent to sollicit your Assistance in availing ourselves of this Supply: but if your Favour & Friendship to North America & its Liberties have not been misrepresented I perswade myself you may consistent with your own Safety promote & favour this Scheme so as to give it the fairest Prospect of Success. Be assured that in this Case the whole Power & Exertion of my Influence will be made with the Honourable Continental Congress that your Island may not only be supplied with Provisions but experience every other Mark of Affection & Friendship which the grateful Citizens of a free Country can bestow on its brethren & Benefactors.

Powerful words in a time of change. This was the latest example of Bermuda helping the Americans to survive. Thus, Bermuda should be duly recognised in the upcoming 250th anniversary. We helped win a war that created the United States of America, and that is a big deal! Certainly, Ronald Reagan was impressed when Sir John Swan presented a copy of that very same letter to promote his US Tax Treaty stating: “It is time for some payback.” He charmed them into submission and pushed the Treaty through Congress.

Perhaps even more compelling as Bermudians, our branch of the Outerbridge family is closely related to George Washington. It could even be conceivable that our branch may be the reason he was born. Space does not allow a full explanation of my family’s history, but my Washington ancestor took in his nephew Augustine Washington, later the father of George Washington, who would otherwise have been raised in England and may never have returned to Virginia.

So here in Bermuda are part of George Washington’s family who played an integral role before he was even born.

Most recently, my cousin Brantley Bolling Knowles visited Bermuda as governor-general of the Jamestown Society. He and other members are descendants were retracing the footsteps of family members who were shipwrecked in Bermuda on the Sea Venture. Mr Knowles’ great-grandmother and my great-grandfather were siblings. Her line married into the Bolling family which includes the granddaughter of Pocahontas and John Rolfe. There is so much connective history that emanates from our small island.

So congratulations to all our American friends on their 250th anniversary of the United States of America. We were more than spectators, and undoubtedly a significant part of that US history.

Most importantly, we share a history to be proud of and some aspects for which we share deep regret. We need to learn from the past to build a better future for all. Sir John Swan would have certainly liked to see us move in that direction to include all and uplift those who need a helping hand.

That is the real Bermudian way, to be kind and help others in need like we did when George Washington sought our help … and we delivered.

• Andrew Outerbridge is an architect and novelist. He is the author of The Vigilant, a novel set in Bermuda