The Legend of Sheila NaGeira

Sheila NaGeira’s story has everything: romance, ship battles, and just enough mystery to keep people telling it for centuries. It starts with an Irish noblewoman and ends on the shores of Conception Bay—and like the best Newfoundland stories, it’s lasted not because it’s proven, but because it means something to those who tell it.

Sheila NaGeira

In the early 1600s, Newfoundland was little more than a patchwork of seasonal fishing ports and fog-covered coves; just a rough, wind-blasted outpost where cod was currency and life was hard. It wasn’t the sort of place you’d expect to find a noblewoman.

But according to tradition, that’s exactly what happened.

Sheila NaGeira was born into an aristocratic Irish family, No one is sure what her family name was but it certainly wasn’t NaGeira; that came later, layered on in legend, perhaps because it sounded noble, or because someone believed it meant “the beautiful.”

Sheila was destined for a life of refinement. Her family arranged for her to travel to France, where her aunt was abbess of a convent. Sheila was to join her for a life of study, service, and dignity.

But somewhere aboard a ship in the North Atlantic, her story was rewritten.

An Unexpected Journey

As Sheila’s ship cut through the waves, a dark shape loomed on the horizon — it was a Dutch warship, and it was closing in on them. Sheila stood on deck, her heart pounding as the enemy vessel bore down on them.

Panic rippled through the crew. Shouts echoed across the deck, ropes groaned under strain, and the air thickened with tension. Sheila gripped the railing, eyes wide, as men scrambled to ready the ship for battle. The clash was sudden and brutal. Wood splintered, men shouted, and though they fought back, they were outmatched. The Dutch overwhelmed them, and soon Sheila and the other passengers were taken as prisoners.

As quickly as the Dutch ship had appeared, three more masts appeared on the horizon. They belonged to British warships, and they were closing in fast. Sheila watched the drama unfold again — this time the Dutch ship was being pursued by the British.

Read more about Peter Easton

The British ships moved with precision, hemming in the Dutch vessel. The sea roiled beneath the speed of the chase. Despite the Dutch crew’s desperate fight, they were forced to surrender. Sheila and the others were taken aboard the British fleet.

The fleet was commanded by Peter Easton. Easton would soon command attention all along the Newfoundland coast as a formidable pirate but, when he encountered Sheila he was still working for the British Crown. He had been tasked with protecting English fishing interests in Newfoundland.

And that’s where he — and now Sheila — were headed.

Gilbert Pike

Among Easton’s officers was a young lieutenant named Gilbert Pike. He was from a respectable family in the West Country of England. On any other voyage, he might have slipped quietly into history but fate had other plans — and Sheila was at the center of them.

As the cold Atlantic spray lashed the ship’s hull, Sheila felt adrift in a world that was no longer her own. She was surrounded by strangers and had no idea what awaited her at the end of the voyage. Fear was a constant companion — though she never let it show. Her face was calm, even resolute, but inside, her thoughts were as turbulent as the waves beneath her feet.

It was during those long, endless days at sea that Lieutenant Pike first noticed her. There was something about the way she carried herself — confident and composed. She was clearly someone who, despite being in a difficult situation, was equal to the challenge. For Pike, a man accustomed to order and discipline, Sheila was a welcome surprise — someone who challenged and intrigued him in ways he hadn’t expected.

She caught him watching her more than once, and although she kept her guard up, she found herself drawn to him too. In his eyes, there was warmth and kindness that seemed rare among the hardened faces of the other men. He didn’t treat her like a prize or a prisoner — but like a person.

Slowly, cautiously, they began to talk. At first, it was small things — a question about the weather, a shared glance at the endless sea — but soon, conversation bloomed into something more. Time lost meaning. Hours slipped past in laughter and whispered stories, their words bridging the distance between their pasts.

For Sheila, the romance was unexpected — a fragile spark amid the uncertainty. But in that fragile spark, she found hope.

According to tradition, in the space between the old world and the new, under endless skies and on restless seas, Sheila and Gilbert made a promise — to face whatever came, together.

Their bond was sealed by a ship’s chaplain, who married them at sea, before the first landfall.

Difficult Choices

 

When the fleet arrived in Newfoundland, they made port in Harbour Grace.

Sheila and Gilbert found themselves at a crossroads. The life they had left behind — full of family, friends and societal expectations was across the ocean.

Returning to Europe meant stepping back into a world they both knew, but it was a world that would bring challenges for their relationship.

There was another option, of course: to stay in Newfoundland. It was a place with no guarantees, where survival depended on courage and resilience.

It couldn’t have been an easy choice but in each other, they found the strength to embrace the uncertainty and make a new life in Newfoundland, side by side.

Sheila and Gilbert settled in Mosquito — a small community in Conception Bay that would later become known as Bristol’s Hope. At the time, it boasted some of the best houses on the coast and would soon serve as an extension of John Guy’s colony at Cupids. By some accounts, their children may have been among the earliest born to European settlers in what is now North America.

The Carbonear Princess

In time, the couple moved to Carbonear, where they lived out the rest of their lives, with Gilbert working as a fisherman.

Sheila was held in high regard by the community. Irish fishermen are said to have bowed their heads when they passed her, calling her the Princess of Carbonear. It wasn’t just respect for her station, but for her story as one of Newfoundland’s early female settlers.

Sheila’s story was passed down for generations but it didn’t appear in writing until the 1930s. Since then, it has been printed again and again. Princess Sheila NaGeira became an emblem of the early female settlers who helped to create modern Newfoundland, but were rarely afforded space in the history books.

Fact and Folklore

As for the truth of the tale, well we know that Peter Easton was real. He arrived in Newfoundland in 1602. He later became a pirate and left a lasting mark on the island’s early colonial history.

We know, too, that the Pike family has deep roots in Conception Bay. Their name is older than many on this island, especially in and around Carbonear.

• She Stands For More

  The legend of Sheila NaGeira might read like a high-seas romance — but look a little closer, and it starts to feel like something more. For many, it works as a kind of allegory for the settlement of Newfoundland itself.

  Start with the characters: Sheila, the Irish noblewoman; Gilbert Pike, the English officer. Two different backgrounds, two different traditions — yet they meet, find common ground, and start a life together in a strange, rugged place. It’s not hard to see how they’ve come to represent the cultural roots of much of Newfoundland: Irish and English settlers shaping a shared identity, often by necessity.

  Then there’s the journey. Sheila’s route to Newfoundland isn’t direct — it’s disrupted, unexpected, and at times terrifying. Captured, rerouted, and thrown into uncertainty, she ends up choosing to stay in a place she never planned to go. That story — of being pushed off course and choosing to make the best of it — sounds a lot like the broader experience of early settlers.

  Their decision to remain in Newfoundland, to put down roots in a wild and unforgiving place, mirrors the courage and grit it took for so many others to do the same. It wasn’t easy. But people stayed, adapted, and made lives from the sea — just like Sheila and Gilbert.

  And finally, think about how this story has survived. Not through ship logs or birth records, but through oral tradition, local memory, poetry, and fiction. It’s passed from one generation to the next — not because it’s proven, but because it matters. And that, too, feels familiar. Newfoundland’s past isn’t just found in the archives — it lives in the stories people choose to tell.

As for Sheila? Whether she was a historical figure or not, may never be known.

There are no letters, no records, no official trace of her life. A gravestone in Carbonear is said to mark her resting place, though her name cannot be read on it.

Still, she is remembered.

She appears on the Carbonear coat of arms, and a theatre in the town bears her name. And her story continues to inspire—told and retold in poems, plays, and fiction. In fact, much of what is believed about her today has been shaped by these imaginative retellings, especially P.J. Wakeham’s 1958 novel Princess Sheila, which helped transform the local lore into bona fide legend.

Now, more than 400 years after she supposedly lived, the historical record is almost beside the point. What matters isn’t whether Sheila NaGeira actually walked the shores of Newfoundland, but that so many believe she did — and kept her story alive for generations. Clearly, it struck a chord.

Perhaps, in telling her story, Newfoundlanders found a way to understand their own.

Sheila is history made human—a symbol of hope, struggle, and the blending of cultures. Her story endures not because of records or proof, but because it touches something deeper: our need to make meaning.

Or perhaps Sheila is simply a comforting thought on a cold winter night. After all, one could do far worse than imagine a brave, resourceful Irish princess lingering somewhere in their family tree.

• Sources & Further Reading

  1. The Carbonear Princess, The Book of Newfoundland

  2. Princess Sheila, P.J. Wakeham, 1958

  3. Sheila NaGeira, The Canadian Encyclopedia

  4. The History of Harbour Grace, W. A. Munn, The Newfoundland Quarterly, Dec. 1934

  5. A Perfect Princess: The Twentieth-Century Legend of Sheila na Geira and Gilbert Pike, Philip Hiscock, Newfoundland & Labrador Studies, 18(2), 2002

  6. Pike, Family Names of the Island of Newfoundland, E.R. Seary, 1998

  7. Princess Sheila NaGeira Theatre, Carbonear