[5] Long before the fort was built, the first settlement was established here in 1666, when Nassau was known as Charles town, which had developed in a haphazard manner lined with brothels and taverns visited by pirates, cheats and vagabonds.

[6] In 1900, the land was purchased by Henry M. Flagler, responsible for the Breakers Hotel in South Florida.

[7] The Bahamian government gave a loan to the Munson Line, which purchased the land and built a brand new seven-story hotel, The New Colonial,[8] on the site within six months.

The old hotel building was gradually closed up over the course of the 1990s, with rooms eventually operating in only a small portion of the complex.

[16] They completely gutted and modernized the interiors, but retained its façade of towers, galleries, and molded reliefs.

It was renovated in June 2009 at a cost of US$15 million,[17] The hotel was sold on October 24, 2014 to the China State Construction Engineering Corporation.

[18] From 2016-2019, the group constructed a $250 million complex, originally known as The Pointe, adjacent to the British Colonial, located on the hotel's former parking lot.

[19] The hotel and condominium towers of The Pointe have since been branded as Margaritaville Beach Resort Nassau.

It reopened on December 15, 2020,[20] but closed again on February 15, 2022, due to continued low bookings during the ongoing pandemic from its clientele primarily of business and convention travelers.

[2] The character Fatima Blush (Barbara Carrera) waterskis in front of the resort and onto the end of the pier, into James Bond's arms, to the hotel’s old gazebo bar (located on the left of the picture in the infobox).