Image: Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers camp at Tucker's Town, St. George's Parish, Bermuda in 1867

Description: The Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers tent camp at Tucker's Town, St. George's Parish, Bermuda in 1867. The soldiers were normally accommodated in barracks, which for the Eastern Military district that included St. George's Parish were at St. George's Garrison, on Barrack Hill above St. George's Town. Although a thousand miles north of the West Indies, fast mail boats periodically introduced Yellow Fever to the British colony, which caused various epidemics there during the course of the Nineteenth Century. Although the spread of the disease would be stopped by the cold winters, it would be introduced again periodically, with epidemics in 1843, 1853. 1856, 1864 that killed 13,356 people. The Royal Navy and British Army personnel assigned to the North America and West Indies Station's main base and the Bermuda Garrison, respectively, suffered far higher death rates from the infection than did the civil populace. As this was deemed partly due to being accommodated in crowded, poorly-ventilated barracks, the practice of moving soldiers into tent camps during the warmest months was adopted. In the Eastern Military District, the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers shared a tent camp at Tucker's Town, on Bermuda's Main Island. while the infantry had its own at Ferry Reach.[1]
Title: Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers camp at Tucker's Town, St. George's Parish, Bermuda in 1867
Credit: Photographed from "The Illustrated London News" of the 28 December, 1867
Author: Engraving based on a photograph: neither the engraver nor the photographer is identified.
Usage Terms: Public domain
License: Public domain
Attribution Required?: No