The Great Sound is large ocean inlet (a sound) located in Bermuda. [1] It may be the submerged remains of a Pre-Holocene volcanic caldera. Other geologists dispute the origin of the Bermuda Pedestal as a volcanic hotspot. [2]
The Great Sound is large ocean inlet (a sound) located in Bermuda. [1] It may be the submerged remains of a Pre-Holocene volcanic caldera. Other geologists dispute the origin of the Bermuda Pedestal as a volcanic hotspot. [2]
The Great Sound dominates the southwest of the island chain and forms a natural harbour. It is surrounded on all sides by islands, except for the northeast, where it is open to the Atlantic Ocean. [1]
To the south, two small peninsulas jut into the sound separating it from the smaller Little Sound. [1] In the east, the Great Sound narrows to form Hamilton Harbour. Bermuda's capital, Hamilton, is on the northern shore of this harbour.
Numerous islands lie within the Great Sound, most of them on the southeastern side of it, including Darrell's Island, Hawkins Island, Hinson's Island, Long Island, Marshall's Island, and Watling Island. Most of these were obtained by the Royal Navy during the 19th Century and used for various naval purposes. Several were used by the army during the Second Boer War for a prisoner-of-war camp (Agar's Island was used by the army as a munitions depot).
During the Second World War Great Sound was the location several military installations: The United States Navy's Naval Operating Base, the Royal Naval Dockyard, on Ireland Island, RAF Darrell's Island, and Royal Naval Air Station Bermuda, on Boaz island.
While the defence of Bermuda remains the responsibility of the government of the United Kingdom, rather than of the local Bermudian Government, the island still maintains a militia for the purpose of defence.
Kindley Air Force Base was a United States Air Force base in Bermuda from 1948–1970, having been operated from 1943 to 1948 by the United States Army Air Forces as Kindley Field.
The Hamilton Princess & Beach Club, A Fairmont Managed Hotel is one of the grandest and most famous hotels in Bermuda, located in Pembroke Parish just outside the City of Hamilton. It also happens to be the oldest hotel in the Fairmont chains. One of the largest in Bermuda, it has over 400 rooms. It is one of two Fairmont Hotels on the island, the second being the Fairmont Southampton, which was originally opened as the Southampton Princess.
Pembroke Parish is one of the nine parishes of Bermuda. It is named after English aristocrat William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke (1580–1630).
Ireland Island is the north-westernmost island in the chain which comprises Bermuda. It forms a long finger of land pointing northeastwards from the main island, the last link in a chain which also includes Boaz Island and Somerset Island. It lies within Sandys Parish, and forms the northwestern coast of the Great Sound. It is regarded as one of the six principal islands of Bermuda, and part of the West End of the archipelago.
Darrell's Island is a small island within the Great Sound of Bermuda. It lies in the southeast of the sound, and is in the north of Warwick Parish. The island is owned by the Bermuda Government.
Hamilton Harbour is a natural harbour in Bermuda which serves as the port for the capital, the City of Hamilton. It is an arm of the Great Sound, and forms a tapering wedge shape of water between Paget Parish and the peninsula which forms Pembroke Parish, and upon which the capital sits.
Castle Harbour is a large natural harbour in Bermuda. It is located between the northeastern end of the main island and St. David's Island. Originally called Southampton Port, it was renamed as a result of its heavy fortification in the early decades of the Seventeenth century.
St. George's Harbour is a natural harbour in the north of Bermuda. It serves as the port for the town of St. George's, located on St. George's Island, to its north. To its south is St. David's Island. The harbour and both islands lie within St. George's Parish. It was for two centuries the primary harbour of the British Overseas Territory.
HMD Bermuda was the principal base of the Royal Navy in the Western Atlantic between American independence and the Cold War. The Imperial fortress colony of Bermuda had occupied a useful position astride the homeward leg taken by many European vessels from the New World since before its settlement by England in 1609. French privateers may have used the islands as a staging place for operations against Spanish galleons in the 16th century. Bermudian privateers certainly played a role in many English and British wars following settlement, with its utility as a base for his privateers leading to the Earl of Warwick, the namesake of Warwick Parish, becoming the most important investor of the Somers Isles Company. Despite this, it was not until the loss of bases on most of the North American Atlantic seaboard threatened Britain's supremacy in the Western Atlantic that the island assumed great importance as a naval base. In 1818 the Royal Naval Dockyard, Bermuda officially replaced the Royal Naval Dockyard, Halifax, as the British headquarters for the North America Station (which would become the North America and West Indies Station after absorbing the Jamaica Station in 1830.
The Royal Air Force (RAF) operated from two locations in the Imperial fortress colony of Bermuda during the Second World War. Bermuda's location had made it an important naval station since US independence, and, with the advent of the aeroplane, had made it as important to trans-Atlantic aviation in the decades before the Jet Age. The limited, hilly land mass had prevented the construction of an airfield, but, with most large airliners in the 1930s being flying boats, this was not initially a limitation.
Agar's Island is an island of Bermuda. Located in the Great Sound, near to the shore of the parish of Pembroke, it was owned by billionaire James Martin, and was historically a secret munitions store, part of the Bermuda Garrison of the British Army.
White's Island is an island located in Hamilton Harbour in Hamilton, Bermuda, the only island directly adjoined on all sides by the harbour.
The Bermuda Flying School operated on Darrell's Island from 1940 to 1942. It trained Bermudian volunteers as pilots for the Royal Air Force and the Fleet Air Arm.
The Western Redoubt, or Fort William, is a square fort built on a crest on the eastern side of Government Hill, and within the boundaries of the original main British Army camp in the Imperial fortress colony of Bermuda, St. George's Garrison.
The United States Naval Station Whites Island was a United States Navy (USN) facility located on White's Island in Hamilton Harbour, in the British Colony of Bermuda, 640 miles off the coast of North Carolina.
The Bermuda Base Command was a command of the United States Army, established to defend the British Colony of Bermuda, located 640 miles off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. It was created in April 1941 when United States Army troops were sent to the island.
Scaur Hill Fort, also called Scaur Hill Lines and Somerset Lines, is a fortified position erected in the 1870s at Scaur Hill, on Somerset Island, in Sandys Parish, the westernmost parish of the Imperial fortress colony of Bermuda.
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32°17′15″N64°50′13″W / 32.28750°N 64.83694°W
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