One of the island’s top marksmen, who continued representing Bermuda overseas in old age, was part of a group who broke barriers and challenged inequality as the founding members of the Coral Reefs Rifle and Pistol Club.

Nelson Simons, whose twin passions were fishing, with rifle and pistol shooting, was credited with two mantras: “never give up” and “never be out of bullets or bait”.

Mr Simons was a key member of the Bermuda Target Shooting Association as well as the Blue Waters Anglers Club.

Mr Simons, whose initiation to shooting came through military service when he was 18, specialised in the full-bore calibre rifle fired from various ranges.

He competed at the Commonwealth Games in 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006 and 2010.

In Melbourne in 2006, he was the oldest competitor at 73, and in 2010 in New Delhi, India, he was again the most senior out of more than 7,000 athletes.

In 2011, he took part in the NatWest Island Games at the Isle of Wight and then the 2013 games hosted by Bermuda.

Mr Simons was a longstanding employee at the Bermuda Bakery on Pitts Bay Road in Pembroke, which closed down in 2004.

He rose to colour sergeant in the Bermuda Regiment Band and was fondly known by the nicknames “Cap” and “Captain Tired”.

In an online tribute, Coral Reefs said: “All of us who knew him are better for it and his passing will be felt not just here in Bermuda but around the world.”

The club’s eulogy for Mr Simons stated that in the year of its founding, it was “exceedingly difficult for all men and women to be seen and accepted as men and women”.

While the island had up to ten rifle, shotgun or pistol clubs, Mr Simons was among the aspiring Black marksmen who were consistently denied membership.

He joined a group that included the late S. Walter Trott and Alan "Boopsie" Burrows, who met the Governor, Sir Julian Gascoigne, for help in either joining a club or beginning their own.

Sir Julian’s push against segregation in Bermudian life included starting the Governor’s Cup golf tournament in 1964, which helped integrate the sport.

The Governor directed the group of marksmen to apply to police to start a club and monitored their progress through two applications that went nowhere.

The club said that on March 20, 1963, Sir Julian intervened and brought a completed application for the Commissioner of Police to sign — and the Coral Reefs Rifle and Pistol Club was founded.

A statement added: “Shortly after its founding, the CRRPC became the dominant firearms club in Bermuda, accepting members that had an interest in progressing the sport of target shooting in its many forms.”

The club established its own shooting range on the Simons estate in Warwick and also met at the police shooting range in Prospect.

Competitions, including international contests, were held at both.

The club said its early members “acquitted themselves so well” that they were recognised by the US military based at the Naval Air Station Bermuda as “the only real source of local competition for them, and as such participated in every event they held from the late 1960s until the last pistol shoot in 1995” — when the CRRPC pistol teams came in first and second, followed by the US Marine Corps team.

The club’s influence was also felt overseas.

Mr Simons was among members who helped found the The West Indies Fullbore Shooting Council, the regional governing body for full-bore shooting.

The CRRPC also competed regularly in rifle and pistol shoots overseas.

The club stated: “Little Bermuda's participation in these worldwide events were and are due in no small part to the wanderlust that Nelson possessed in spades and the sacrifices that he freely gave to a sport he loved.”

As a fisherman, “Cap” was a keen, award-winning member of Blue Waters Anglers Club, and enjoyed a record-setting catch in 1968 with fishing companions, including the late Eddie Dawson.

His family said he passed on fishing to his sons, Cole Simons, a former government minister and Leader of the Opposition, Raoul Simons and Delbert Doars.

“These trips were great family adventures and events, which brought us all together despite the occasional bad weather and seasickness,” the family said.

Nelson Chesterfield Simons, a top marksman who competed internationally, was born on August 6, 1932. He died in December 2024, aged 92