History Of Salt Making in Bermuda
Example of an early Iron Salt Kettle
Harvesting sea salt is a practice that goes back to the dawn of civilisation.
Salt has always been essential to human survival, chiefly because it could
preserve food before the days of canning and refrigeration. But Bermuda
Artisan Sea Salt is also reviving an early Bermudian tradition. According to
Governor Lefroy’s Memorials of the Bermudas, Bermuda’s first official settlerssent aboard the Plough from the UK in 1612 to start the colony included salt maker Ralph Garner. Governor Richard Moore “imployed his service for the makinge of Salt in the Summer Islands”. Garner was told to notify the Virginia Company if no suitable material for making salt pans was available. No doubt upon arrival Garner used Bermuda cedar to make the pans and caulked their seams with lime and tortoise or whale oil. Pans are mentioned in a 1623
proclamation when “there are dailie complaints made of the greate want of salte” to preserve fish during a time of food scarcity. Two carpenters,“Thomas Py of Brackish Pond and John Askew of Spanish Pointe”, were required to “fit and furnish” two pans at Crawl Point. The Memorials also mention a complaint by the Reverend Lewis Hughes that a pan had been removed from Crow Lane and taken to St. David’s. So it is likely that salt was made throughout the island. The salt was created by letting the salt water in the pans naturally evaporate in the sun. The place name Salt Kettle suggests the brine solution was then boiled in large iron bowls or kettles. The “Boylinge thereof” is mentioned in the 1623 proclamation. But the cedar used for boiling vast quantities of water proved too expensive and the process too long because of Bermuda’s humidity and cooler winters. By 1678 Bermudians were sailing south to rake the natural salt pans in the Caribbean sea, particularly the pans surrounding Turks and Caicos Islands.
Salt has always been essential to human survival, chiefly because it could
preserve food before the days of canning and refrigeration. But Bermuda
Artisan Sea Salt is also reviving an early Bermudian tradition. According to
Governor Lefroy’s Memorials of the Bermudas, Bermuda’s first official settlerssent aboard the Plough from the UK in 1612 to start the colony included salt maker Ralph Garner. Governor Richard Moore “imployed his service for the makinge of Salt in the Summer Islands”. Garner was told to notify the Virginia Company if no suitable material for making salt pans was available. No doubt upon arrival Garner used Bermuda cedar to make the pans and caulked their seams with lime and tortoise or whale oil. Pans are mentioned in a 1623
proclamation when “there are dailie complaints made of the greate want of salte” to preserve fish during a time of food scarcity. Two carpenters,“Thomas Py of Brackish Pond and John Askew of Spanish Pointe”, were required to “fit and furnish” two pans at Crawl Point. The Memorials also mention a complaint by the Reverend Lewis Hughes that a pan had been removed from Crow Lane and taken to St. David’s. So it is likely that salt was made throughout the island. The salt was created by letting the salt water in the pans naturally evaporate in the sun. The place name Salt Kettle suggests the brine solution was then boiled in large iron bowls or kettles. The “Boylinge thereof” is mentioned in the 1623 proclamation. But the cedar used for boiling vast quantities of water proved too expensive and the process too long because of Bermuda’s humidity and cooler winters. By 1678 Bermudians were sailing south to rake the natural salt pans in the Caribbean sea, particularly the pans surrounding Turks and Caicos Islands.
