From politics and activism to trade unionism and the football pitch, Bermuda mourned prominent community figures in 2023.

The island also bid farewell to several of its notable journalists.

• Arthur Hodgson (1940-2023): A former environment minister in the Progressive Labour government as well as the island’s first Black Rhodes scholar, a lawyer and former magistrate, Mr Hodgson died on February 6.

David Burt, the Premier, hailed him as a social justice champion, and the PLP paid tribute to a stalwart whose support dated almost to the founding of the party.

Mr Hodgson was remembered for his candour in expressing his views.

• Bryan Darby (1939-2023): Synonymous with journalism in Bermuda, Mr Darby, who died in February, was a classic old-school reporter from print to broadcast.

His career took in stints in public relations — including as a spokesman for the Bermuda Government.

Mr Darby was best known for his time at VSB Radio and Television. Colleagues recalled him as a tenacious and good-humoured journalist with an unfailing eye for a story,

• Marco Warren (1993-2023): The death on the roads of a gifted footballer who became a mentor to young people cast a pall of shock over the community.

Mr Warren, 29, played for PHC Zebras and Bermuda, and worked as a programme co-ordinator with the Department of Youth, Sport and Recreation.

He had recently become a father and was also skilled as a graphic artist, contributing designs to government sports programmes.

• Ottiwell Simmons (1933-2023): Lionised in the labour movement, Mr Simmons presided over the Bermuda Industrial Union from 1974 to 1996, also serving as a Progressive Labour Party MP from 1976 to 2007.

His leadership of the BIU included the historic general strike of 1981, and the union’s headquarters has carried his name since 2019.

Inspired by a speech at Bernard Park given by E.F. Gordon, then the president of the BIU, Mr Simmons also bridled at early experiences of racism and workplace injustice. He joined the union at age 25.

He was hailed as the father of the island’s modern labour movement.

Mr Simmons’s death on June 16 was marked on what would have been his 90th birthday with a packed funeral, and tributes to a visionary for Bermuda’s workers.

• Martha Dismont (1956-2023): A self-described “eternal optimist”, Ms Dismont founded the Family Centre charity that became a lifeline for Bermuda’s vulnerable — children in particular.

Against the odds, Ms Dismont built the organisation from a tutoring service out of her own home into a leading helping agency.

She was appointed a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 2016 for her decades of service to the island

Just 66 when she died in July, Ms Dismont, a counsellor and teacher as well as a social worker, continued to address Bermuda’s social problems from the helm of Catalyst Consulting after retiring from Family Centre in 2020.

• Joyce “Dolly” Pitcher (1932-2023): A St David’s community icon, Ms Pitcher, who died in July, was a master chef with a flair for seafood whose cooking was sought at public events, Cup Match particularly, over decades.

Ms Pitcher, who was 91, was emblematic of the rural, close-knit roots of St David’s. She hailed from the East End community’s early days before the building of the US Base displaced many of the islanders.

• Gerald Harvey (1923-2023): The Progressive Group made history with its boycott campaign against racial segregation that targeted the island’s cinemas in 1959 — and shamed the island’s establishment into relinquishing racial divisions in its restaurants and hotels as well.

Mr Harvey and his wife, Izola, played a pivotal role in the Theatre Boycott: the two printed posters and campaign literature in their home, which Mr Harvey then covertly distributed in Hamilton.

He died in September just shy of his 100th birthday.

• Walter Roberts (1933-2023): A former Sandys South MP and deputy leader of the PLP, Mr Roberts left a teaching career for politics and was first elected in 1963 as an independent, joining the party in 1968 and leaving politics in 1998.

Mr Roberts, who died in October, began his political career under the skewed voting system before universal adult suffrage was introduced in 1968.

He was a leading member on the Boundaries Commission, redrawing the electoral rules for constituencies, which came into effect in 200

Mr Roberts was a political strategist who drafted a formal method for canvassing, and his business became a hub for PLP brainstorming.

The party credited him with securing longstanding support for the PLP in the West End.

• Sidney Stallard (1926-2023): A transport minister under the United Bermuda Party government, Mr Stallard, who died in October, was a St George’s MP from 1976 until his retirement from politics in 1993.

Public Service roles included chairing the Board of Tourism, the Bermuda Hospitals Board and St George’s Parish Council.

Mr Stallard was popular in the East End as a congenial representative who served his constituency regardless of political persuasions.

• David Pugh (1951-2023): A prominent chief financial officer at health insurers Argus Group, Mr Pugh shared his aptitude for accounting as a director and chief financial officer for the Bermuda Hospitals Charitable Foundation, and a member of the Bermuda Hospitals Board.

He also helped to launch the Crime Stoppers Bermuda service in the 1990s.

He played a key role in salvaging Argus after the company suffered serious losses from the recession of 2008.

Mr Pugh had recently retired as chairman of the board at Bermuda Aviation Services. The father of three’s death in October was mourned across the island.

• The Royal Gazette lost three of our own in 2023: former chief photographer Tony Cordeiro in January and Ivan Clifford, a former Assistant Editor at the Mid-Ocean News, in May. Also mourned that month was Warren Dyer, a production manager for the Gazette.