IT MAY BE WELL OVER 150 YEARS AGO,
BUT THE FAMOUS NOVELIST’S IMPERTINENT
IMPRESSIONS OF BERMUDA STILL STING!
In Britain, literature lovers note that 2015 marks the bi- centennial of eminent novelist Anthony Trollope, perhaps best known for his Barset- shire and Palliser novels. For Bermudians, of course, the year also marks the City of
Hamilton’s 200th birthday. While these two
anniversaries appear to be unconnected,
there is a link between them. Anthony Trollope was one of the few Victorian novelists who had a paid occupation other than
writing—he spent many years working for
the General Post Office—and it was in his
capacity as a post office inspector that he
visited Bermuda for two weeks at the tail
end of his visit to the West Indies in 1858.
The London post master general mistakenly
believed that the British government was
paying the salary of the Hamilton postmaster, who would have been William Bennet
Perot at the time. Trollope’s report on the
Bermuda Post O;ce apparently led to Bermuda’s 1859 Postal Act which transferred the
control of the Bermuda Post O;ce entirely to
the Bermuda government. From then on all
the post o;ce’s salaries, including that of the
St. George’s postmaster, were to be paid out of
Bermuda’s treasury.
Now, many of Trollope’s novels show
sensitivity towards and compassion for those
of his characters caught in the snare of ;nancial
di;culty, but he shows no such qualities in the
Bermudas chapter of his ;e West Indies and the
Anthony Trollope:
BY ELIZABETH JONES
1872 ILLUSTRATION
BY FREDERICK WADDY
