03/01/2024
Enjoy the Historical Walking Tour of Dockyard from April -October in 2024 from 9:45am, starting from the moongate. Learn about life in Dockyard, other architectural features and history. Schedule soon to be announced.
To get the National Museum of Bermuda, you must cross the moat.
Built in the 1820s, the Keep Moat, along with the original drawbridge, were built as a defense for the Dockyard Keep. A Keep is a strong defensive position within a larger defended area and it is the last refuge if the outer fortifications were taken by the enemy.
The original drawbridge was removed around the same time the South Yard was constructed, which was in 1901. The moat itself was the residual lagoon of a cave filled by the sea seeping through the rock. The moat was filled in the late 19th century and was excavated by the Museum in the early 1980s, when the present bridge was built using railings from the old Watford Bridge.
The Keep, Bermuda’s largest fort, was a proud symbol of British naval might, part of a ring of fortifications guarding the Dockyard against attack by land and sea. The fort, with its bastions and ramparts reinforced at intervals by casemated gun emplacements, was designed by the Royal Engineers to defend the channels and approaches to the Dockyard.
Since 1975, the Keep has been transformed from a derelict wasteland to an award-winning cultural and educational institution. The buildings — many of them former ammunition storehouses — have been converted into exhibit, storage, office and event spaces.
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