This is, Mr. Editor, an appropriate time for reflection: the close of one year and the start of another, 400 and counting for Bermuda, and yet I can't help thinking that the more things change the more they stay the same.

Here's what got me thinking this way:

There have been repeated recent calls for more unity in the community – and for good reason, not just because of the season. There is no question that Bermuda could benefit from a little more peace and harmony. However, it may be a bit of a stretch to suggest, as some have done, that we should rally together like the original settlers who were shipwrecked and stranded on these shores in 1609. There is growing evidence to suggest that they not only had to struggle with the elements, but with each other to make progress.

Two relatively recent books gave me a greater appreciation and a reminder of the way things really were. They are: "The Shipwreck That Saved Jamestown (The Sea Venture Castaways and the Fate of America)" by Lorri Glover and Daniel Blake Smith (2008) and "A Brave Vessel (The True Tale of the Castaways who saved Jamestown and inspired Shakespeare's Tempest)" by Hobson Woodward (2009).

The titles may be mouthfuls, but the volumes are relatively slim. They are certainly scholarly works, but each was written in an easy to read, almost entertaining style. You could knock one off on a plane ride up to New York and the other on the way back, depending on what new restrictions are about to be put in place for air travellers.

Each book reminds us that those who first settled on these shores, by accident and not by design, were a potentially volatile mix of people: a blend of gentlemen, sailors, soldiers, artisans and labourers. While understandably relieved to have landed safely ashore without loss of life or limb, there was apprehension and disappointment as well. This was not their destination. They had signed on for Jamestown, enticed, rich and poor alike, by an expedition that offered them escape and economic promise in the New World.

However, it didn't take them long to realise what they had discovered by chance, and for volatility to find expression. An isolated but comfortable life soon developed. There was a plentiful supply of food: hogs, turtles, fish and birds.

There was even strong drink to be made from ripe palmetto berries. There were those who were soon torn between the obligation to continue on to Jamestown on the one hand or to colonise their new-found paradise on the other. Some soon grew to like it where they were, thank you very much.

Rival factions also soon emerged. There were apparently four mutinies in total in ten months, none of them successful.

The first sign of discontent came with the construction of the first rescue pinnace. The small vessel could only take so many. Those who were ordered to undertake the work were concerned that they might be abandoned. Their response? A work stoppage.

Shortly after this first rescue attempt failed, the decision was made to built the Deliverance and this time everyone soon realised it would only be able to take about half of the castaways. The response? A second vessel, Patience.

A third vessel was apparently unnecessary. There was room for everyone in the first two – save for the three who elected to stay behind.

The first lot were principally comprised of soldiers and settlers labouring for Sir Thomas Gates, the second lot sailors and artisans who favoured Admiral Sir George Somers. Division among the two groups were long-standing and suspicions ran deep.

If that wasn't enough, there was also among the ship-wrecked a Dissenter, who was stoked in a strain of extreme Protestantism, which rejected direction from any church or civil authority and relied instead on that of the individual believer, and who helped fan the flames of discontent. This brand of belief was known as "Brownism", so named after the intransient separatist leader Robert Browne. I kid you not.

I'm sure that somewhere in all this is a moral to the story. I may be coming on to it, Mr. Editor.

It wasn't long after the successful return of the Deliverance and Patience that the spin out of London began. Bermuda was put in a better, more promising light. The expedition and adventure soon became the subject of one of Shakespeare's plays, The Tempest, that very quickly made it way on to the stage for the entertainment of theatre goers. It was exciting stuff, yes, which didn't always sit well with those in the church who preferred to interpret the tale as evidence that God, if not English, intended Englishmen to succeed. Again, I kid you not.

Yet it was also a Protestant Minister who, upon learning of the shipwreck and survival, ventured to predict that Bermuda would one day "prove a matter of greater consequence than most men think of, and of more worth than any islands or continent discovered in our age". (The Shipwreck That Saved Jamestown, p. 237).

Whether foresight or oratorical flight of fancy is neither here nor there. There are those among us who still believe Bermuda can be of greater consequence – whether it be in business or in commerce, in sport or in politics, or in human or race relations. I am one.

What we can do, what we must do, in this and each succeeding year, is re-affirm our commitment one to another and to do better.

Happy New Year everybody.

Comments welcome. Write jbarrittibl.bm.