Dear Mr. Jeans,

Our official connection maintained in harmony during three years, has ceased-not so, I hope, our private intercourse and friendship-founded, on my part, not only on admiration of the able and assiduous performance of your complicated duties, but on your exertions to soothe enmities, and reconcile difficulties, which might have given me uneasiness on Public and private account. In thus taking official leave of you, I beg you will ever consider me, Your sincere friend,

Admiral Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald, HMS Wellesley at Bermuda, May 14, 1851

In the wonderful medium of the Internet, which is an historian's "dream machine" for research, a picture arrived on my desktop a few years ago purporting to be a building in Bermuda. Its long Georgian façade, accented in front by a bronze statue of a mounted cavalryman or heroic noble, suggested other localities, though it may have been intended for some official site in these islands, but never built. Upon asking why the writer was asking about the building, the answer opened up a significant Bermuda connection in the person of William David Jeans, CB, RN, Secretary to Admirals on the North America and West Indies Station in the mid-1800s.

Bermuda was the command centre for the North America and West Indies Station through most of the nineteenth century, with a northern base at Halifax and a southern at Port Royal, Jamaica. Needless to say, perhaps, the fleet wintered in the warmer climes of Bermuda and the West Indies in winter, but headed north to the Canadian Maritimes in the summer. The lines of those cruises defined an imaginary boundary of British control in the western North Atlantic, fronting the eastern seaboard of the upstart United States of America, formerly some of the great continental colonies of the English realm.

All of the magnificent buildings of the Bermuda Dockyard, including the Commissioner's House, the Casemate Barracks, the Great Eastern Storehouse and the fortifications built on the island in the 1800s, were the direct consequence of the independence of those former British possessions. Dockyard is now a major heritage and tourism asset, so we have to thank our American cousins for its creation, for, barring their secession, Ireland Island would likely have become the site of a hotel in the 1960s. The extraordinary buildings, which should be added to Bermuda's World Heritage Site, were built between 1809 and 1875 by teams of workmen, including freemen, slaves, convicts from Britain and Ireland, and the soldiers of the Royal Engineers.

In 1845, when William David Jeans arrived in Bermuda on board the flagship for the Station, HMS Vindictive, the central space of the Dockyard was bare of buildings, the area having been quarried down to within six feet of sea level over a 20-year period. Also on the Vindictive was the new commander of the Station, Vice Admiral Sir Francis Austen, brother of the famous English novelist, Jane Austen. One of the last to be allowed to bring his family on board, one of his daughters might have been described by way of the ship's name, by officers who found her overbearing presence almost intolerable!

Also on board was Flag Captain Michael Seymour, who painted a wonderful set of watercolours of Bermuda, now fortunately on the island in the Fay and Geoffrey Elliott Collection at the Bermuda Archives. Jeans and Seymour established a friendship on the Vindictive that would last until Jeans' death in 1878. W.D. Jeans and the Seymour paintings are the subject of a new exhibit in the Fay and Geoffrey Elliott Room at the Commissioner's House, which was opened on yesterday by Mrs. Patricia McAlpine, Jeans' great granddaughter, with His Excellency Sir Richard Gozney, KCMG, CVO, Governor of Bermuda.

After the Admiral, the Secretary was one of the more important persons on the Station, for he not only exemplified that "he who writes the Minutes controls the Board", but controlled access to the Admiral, the highest ranking official in the great North America and West Indies Station.

William David Jeans had several tours of duty on the Station and was the son of a naval man and progenitor to others. He served first as Secretary to the Flag Officer and then to the Admirals on the Station. In 1848 he was aboard HMS Wellesley as Secretary, first to Admiral Sir Francis Austen and then to his successor, the famous Lord Cochrane, the 10th Earl of Dundonald. His next tour of duty in 1853 was aboard HMS Cumberland, as Secretary to Admiral Sir George Seymour. During the periods of service, Jeans spent time in Bermuda and at Halifax; at the latter, he met and married the Nova Scotian, Elizabeth (Bess) Hartshorne.

Jeans went on to serve in the Crimea under Admiral Boxer, followed by duty in the China War under his close friend from Bermuda days, Admiral Michael Seymour. It was in the Crimea that the fourth of seven children was born to William and Elizabeth. The boy was named Francis Austen Jeans, indicative of the warm association his parents had with Sir Francis, who was also the boy's godfather. The Jane Austen Society also visited Bermuda for the occasion of the opening of the Exhibition on W.D. Jeans.

During the China War, Jeans was present at the taking of the Taku Forts and took charge of the treasure later captured at Canton and shipped to England, for the safe and trustworthy custodianship of which the English Treasury paid him the princely sum of £600 a few years later. Appointed CB in 1859, William David Jeans retired from the Royal Navy in 1871, but enjoyed only a short respite from a working life, mostly spent away from home and hearth in the way of service in the Royal Navy, and died of a stroke at his home in Pinner, Middlesex, seven years later at the age of 63.

Letters between Jeans and "Bess" capture some of the sense of like in Bermuda in the mid-1800s, as well as illustrating the sacrifices that naval men made through a service that included much separation from family and friends. A booklet on the life of William David Jeans has been produced by Mike George and Edward Harris for the National Museum of Bermuda, to coincide with the exhibition. An application to the Museum Director might obtain you, reader, a complimentary copy of the same, as might be said in Royal Navy terms, "while stores last".

The exhibition "W.D. Jeans: Admiral's Secretary at Bermuda" is open in the Fay and Geoffrey Elliott Room at the Commissioner's House, National Museum of Bermuda until October 31, 2010.

Edward Cecil Harris, MBE, JP, PHD, FSA is Executive Director of the National Museum of Bermuda, incorporating the Bermuda Maritime Museum. Comments may be made to drharris@logic.bm or 704-5480