Sea Venture was carrying settlers and supplies to Jamestown when a hurricane drove it onto reefs at Bermuda in July 1609. Everyone aboard survived, and the castaways built two smaller vessels before continuing to Virginia. Reports of the storm, strange island and remarkable survival circulated widely in London.

Accounts of Sea Venture are widely regarded as important sources for Shakespeare's verse drama The Tempest. The wreck helped literature imagine Bermuda as a place of magic, providence and colonial possibility, although scholars debate precisely how Shakespeare used the reports.