Hamilton's long relationship with the sea did not come easily.

Its well-sheltered, deep water harbour seems ideal for the brief stopovers of cruise and container ships that provide so much of the Island's economic fuel.

But the city had to wrestle its way into existence, and only did so after battling for decades with St. George's, Bermuda's first settlement.

St. George's harbour helped the Old Town dominate the Island's early years as both the commercial and political capital.

But as Bermudians began to settle in numbers across the Island, pressures developed for another, more central marine centre that could more effectively serve them.

What brought the issue to a head was the Government's insistence that duties on goods brought in aboard Bermuda ships be declared and paid at the Customs House in St. George's.

It was a decree that did not sit well with ship owners and masters living anywhere from Flatts to Mangrove Bay.

Duties went unpaid. To staunch the losses, the Government appointed "Searchers'' whose job it was to meet homecoming ships, examine their cargo and collect the duty.

But independent characters and a resentment of Government interference created a legion of smugglers. The "searchers'' were seen as the enemy.

In the battle of wits and will that ensued, smuggling proved more successful than detection. And the public treasury paid the price. The pressure on Island finances eventually forced the government to recognise that something had to be done.

In 1790, legislation was passed "for effecting a collection trade at the west end of these Islands.'' Three years later, the House of Assembly approved the Bill creating Hamilton, which took the name of the new Governor who had supported the push.

King George III struck a coin to commemorate the development. It displayed the shape of a fully-rigged ship on one side -- an appropriate image for a town that would use ships and the sea to grow.

Hamilton wasn't the only site considered for a second town. Ely's Harbour in Somerset, Port Royal in Southampton, Salt Kettle in Paget and the north shore of Paget were also possibilities.

But the present site got a leg up on the competition in 1785 when a group of businessmen bought 50 acres of Pembroke's southern shore.

The people behind the familiar names -- Trimingham, Cox, Stowe, Smith, Butterfield and Dickinson, among others -- laid the foundation for the town's family-dominated commercial life that would last well into the late 20th Century.

One of the last practical obstacles to clearing the way for Hamilton's creation and development was to open the entrance to the harbour. Two Royal Navy engineers did just that in 1793. They developed a channel through Timlin's Narrows on the Granaway Deep side of the harbour.

Not until the latter part of the 19th Century did engineers blast a lane through Two Rock Passage, which remains the main entrance to Hamilton Harbour.

In the wake of Hamilton's creation, an enthusiast penned a poem that envisaged its water-borne commerce as the well spring to economic good fortune: "Pembroke shall rise adorned with all the arts/That cherished commerce and its wealth imparts;/Along its shores unnumbered ships shall place/The products rich that distant nations grace.'' Despite the progress, the future of Hamilton wasn't secured until the last years of the century when St. George's lock on the exclusive right for customs collection was broken.

In the years that followed, Hamilton began growing into the Island's commercial centre with Front Street becoming a great clearing house for all the goods brought to the Island.

Much of the town's early good fortune was due to Bermudian privateers whose cedar-built sloops ranged the open ocean to intercept and capture ships.

Almost always the targets were French vessels but sometimes they hit American ships as well.

The age of privateering came to an end in 1815 with the end of the Napoleonic Wars.

The next major developments affecting Hamilton and the sea did not occur until the last decades of the century.

In the 1880s, the Bermuda Government sought to capitalise on growing US demand for Bermuda onions. It contracted the freighter Canima to sail regularly between the Island and New York, thereby formalising a commercial link that would become the Island's most important.

The second development, which looms equally large in Bermuda's modern economy, was the arrival of the first passenger ship in 1874. More than ever before, the waterfront became the hub of Bermuda life.

Author David Raine's recollection of Miss Edith Ross Parker's 1899 visit as a passenger aboard the Trinidad gives some idea of the crowded and busy life along Hamilton's waterfront.

"On the dockside, barrels and sacks filled with produce were piled upon one another; supervisors in smart, white tropical trilbey hats directed the movement of carts and barrows.

"Men with packages balanced high on their shoulders walked from a warehouse.

Donkeys nodded tolerantly in the hot sun... waiting patiently whilst their carts were packed and loaded.

"Men in suits; ladies in bustled long frocks with lace underskirts...There were workmen in high-bibbed dungarees, fruit sellers crouched behind boxes of oranges and bananas, curiosity-seekers; time passers.

"They had all gathered at Shed Number One for the regular weekly arrival of the New York ship.'' The arrival of "tourists'' on the sleepy Island fostered the growth of tourist accommodations. New rooms were added as demand increased from year to year. Contracts were signed between shipping lines and local operators to house their passengers.

However, it wasn't until the end of the First World War when Furness, Withy & Co. began sailings to Bermuda that the tourism industry began to develop widely and along lines that fostered its image as a retreat for the well-to-do.

Furness, Withy's ships, the Monarch of Bermuda and Queen of Bermuda , set high standards for the local industry and helped the Island ride the back of the American boom during the Roaring Twenties.

Maritime painter Mr. Stephen Card, who has completed many works depicting Hamilton Harbour and the ships that have berthed there, says one remarkable aspect of the setting is how little it has changed over the decades.

"Hamilton has generally been the same right up to the 1950s when they started building the City Hall and the Bank of Bermuda,'' he said.

"But the docks are more or less what they always were. They've been extended east. The shoreline is basically the same.'' Other unchanging characteristics of the harbour are its relative serenity, its quaintness and its continuing use as a recreational area.

Sailboat races take place there as they always have. Ferries shuttle their passengers as they always have. And cargo ships bring in their cargo as they always have, albeit in the neater form of containers.

Today, Hamilton is one of the better run and cleanest small ports in the world. Last year, 259 ships visited, with three container ships accounting for two thirds and cruise ships the rest. Last year, the Island hosted nearly 135,000 cruise visitors. Next year, the tally could go beyond 150,000.

And in an ironic historic twist, the shipping scene has just seen St. George's win a contract for its own cruise ship to visit next year.

Townspeople for years had been complaining the East End was being ignored by cruise companies and Government in favour of the more preferable stopover -- Hamilton.

WATERFRONT -- This turn-of-the-century archival photograph shows Hamilton's busy waterfront and adjacent Front Street circa 1900. -- (Bermuda Archives).

DEPARTING -- The Queen of Bermuda leaves Hamilton in 1938. -- (Bermuda Archives, Dunscombe Collection).