Chapter D: O. M (9)

Not more than a mile to the west of St. Ann’s Bay is the site of the first capital of the island, =Sevilla Nueva=, or “Sevilla d’Oro,” as it was afterwards called. This town was founded by Juan d’Esquivel, the first Spanish governor of Jamaica, he having been commissioned and sent over by Diego Columbus (Christopher’s son), the hereditary viceroy of the New World, to establish a colony there. Esquivel arrived in Jamaica in November 1509, accompanied by a number of the viceroy’s friends. “Bringing with them the refinements of taste and the means of displaying it, they assisted in the foundation of Sevilla Nueva, whose fame long attested its superiority over every other town which has since been built here.” The town contained many buildings worthy of note, amongst which were a monastery, a cathedral, a theatre and many palaces. Sevilla did not long, however, continue the capital, having been abandoned for St. Jago de la Vega. The reason for the change is not quite agreed upon; some say that it was owing to the Spanish inhabitants of Sevilla having in their wars with the natives been suddenly and entirely cut off, and others assigned the desertion to “a visitation of innumerable ants” that destroyed all the provision grounds of the people and compelled them to find a home elsewhere. Bridges, however, attributes the abandonment to the depredations of the French filibusters, and states that “the northern coast of Jamaica afforded frequent spoils to this bold band of corsairs.”

No property in Jamaica has perhaps been handed down in the same family for so many years as =Cardiff Hall=. The first Blagrove to settle in Jamaica was a regicide. Land in St. Ann was early taken up—about 1665; and before the middle of the eighteenth century Cardiff Hall was a place of note. The earliest patent of land to a Blagrove of which a record has been discovered is to John Blagrove of 700 acres in St. James in 1689. On Orange Valley, near to Cardiff Hall, in the possession of the same owner, are the remains of a so-called Spanish residence; and, going further back, on “big pasture” is a series of Arawâk kitchen-middens of the usual type, from which a small modelled human head of greater naturalistic treatment than is usually met with was excavated in April 1914. Other middens are near this series, indicating a thick population in aboriginal times. It is conceivable that the residents were amongst the first to welcome Columbus on his landing at Dry Harbour, a few miles off. The present building of Cardiff Hall, which possesses more architectural features than most houses in the colony, of which the fine old mahogany staircase is not the least noticeable, probably dates from the middle of the eighteenth century. It displays details of a Renaissance character, such as a line of columns in the entrance hall, a three-light window in what was evidently the drawing room upstairs, and an ornamentation over the doorways dating from about the closing years of the century. The hospital and other buildings are also of a character superior to those usually met with. The first named has Corinthian pilasters of considerable beauty. Guns, too, that formerly protected the property from buccaneers, are still _in situ_. In front of the house is a vaulted chamber, half dug out of the rock, which is said to have been designed as a place of refuge in case of hurricane. It measures some 7 feet by 20 feet, and is 10 feet high, with walls some 2 feet thick. The house attracted the attention of Hakewill, who included it in his “Picturesque Tour” (1825), the drawings of which were made in 1820–1.

John Blagrove, who was proprietor shortly before Hakewill visited the island, was born at Cardiff Hall, but was sent, like the majority of planters’ sons in those days, at an early age to England. He received his education at Eton, and afterwards passed a considerable time in travelling. On his return to Jamaica he occasionally took an active part in the discussions which occurred in the House of Assembly, to which he was returned by his native parish, St. Ann, in 1787. The only member of the family to sit in the Assembly before him was his father, Thomas Blagrove, who had represented Hanover in 1755. He (Thomas Blagrove) died in that year, when only 21 years of age, leaving a widow and one son. He was buried at Maggotty.

During the Maroon war John Blagrove was most actively engaged, and shared in its privations and dangers. He, Hakewill tells us, bestowed the greatest attention to improvement of the breed of cattle on his several pens. He imported into the island some of the best-bred horses England ever produced, and his liberality and public spirit were rewarded by the high price which his stock, particularly his horses, always commanded. He was a successful competitor on many occasions for the cup given at the races held in the parish of St. Ann; in fact, his horses for the most part beat the whole field. The Blagrove stables were successful in other races as well. On the flat land by Runaway Bay the memory of the old private racecourses on which the horses were trained is still preserved in the names of three pastures. In Palache’s “Jamaica Stud Book” John Blagrove is recorded as having imported for racing purposes Lurcher, a bay colt, bred in 1789, and Buzzard, imported in 1809. For many years previous to his decease John Blagrove was resident in England. He died at Great Abshot, near Titchfield, in Hampshire, in 1824.

At this period, when the whole system of colonial slavery was being severely criticized, Blagrove was always considered by his slaves as a most kind and humane master. His will states:

And, lastly, to my loving people, denominated and recognized by Law
as, and being in fact my slaves in Jamaica, but more estimated and
considered by me and my family as tenants for life attached to the
soil, I bequeath a dollar for every man, woman and child, as a small
token of my regard for their faithful and affectionate service and
willing labours to myself and family, being reciprocally bound in one
general tie of master and servant in the prosperity of the land, from
which we draw our mutual comforts and subsistence in our several
relations (a tie and interest not practised on by the hired labourer
of the day in the United Kingdom), the contrary of which doctrine is
held only by the visionists of the puritanical order against the
common feeling of mankind.

Henry John Blagrove sat for St. Ann for a short time in the middle of the nineteenth century. In the library of the Institute of Jamaica, which inherited the library of the House of Assembly, is a series of twenty-five bound volumes of the “St. Jago de la Vega Gazette,” ranging from 1791 to 1840, “presented to the Library of the Hon. House of Assembly of Jamaica by Henry John Blagrove, Esq. Representative in Assembly for the Parish of St. Ann. 1851.” He soon afterwards left the colony, never to return.

CARDIFF HALL
]

The view by Hakewill is “taken from the great interior road, and represents, seen through the pimento grove, the south or entrance front of the house. On the right is the barbecue or plaister floor, on which the pimento is spread out to dry. The excellence of the house, the delightful variety of the grounds and the contiguity of the sea, render Cardiff Hall one of the most desirable residences in the island of Jamaica.”

A sketch of a photograph taken recently from the same point of view is shown on this page.

Near the house is a private burial-ground with five tombs. Three are unnamed; of the other two one is inscribed as follows:

Here lyeth the body of Thomas Williams, Esqr., who departed this life
the 7th of June, 1746, aged 66 years.

Here lyeth the body of Mary Williams, who departed this life on April
14, 1753, aged....

The arms are those of the Williams of Herringstone, county Dorset. Argent a greyhound courant in fess between three Cornish choughs proper, a border engrailed gules charged with crosses pattée or and bezants alternately. Crest, a man’s arm couped at the elbow, habited sable charged with a cross pattée or the hand proper holding an oak branch vert, fructified gold. Neither the motto, _Nil Solidum_, nor the tinctures are given. The second tomb is inscribed:

In the memory of Peter Blagrove, Esq., son of John Blagrove, Esquire,
and Ann, his wife. Born at Cardiff Hall in this parish, 21st May,
1789, and died there 10th August, 1812.

The wife’s name was Shakespeare.

The following account of this Peter Blagrove is taken from the “Jamaica Magazine” for 1812.

At Orange-Valley Pen, in St. Arm’s, on the 9th inst., aged 24 years,
Peter Blagrove, Esq., third son of John Blagrove, of Cardiff Hall. In
spite of the best medical skill and experience, he fell on the eighth
day a victim to one of those insidious fevers so fatal to many young
men from Europe. Detained with an elder brother in France, which he
visited after the peace of 1802, for the purpose of gaining a
knowledge of mankind, he endured, for seven years, an exile from his
family and friends—which as it was inflicted on himself, and his
unoffending countrymen, during a profound peace, will continue to
stamp with infamy the despot and government that sanctioned it as long
as the laws of nature and nations shall be understood. Impelled by his
attachment to liberty and his country, he adopted the disguise of one
of the meanest of the French peasants to effect his escape; and with a
perseverance the most extraordinary, he encountered scenes and
hardships to which his earlier years were not accustomed. Unappalled
by the danger of the attempt such were the vigour of his mind and his
resources, amidst the hazard of hourly detection, that for many months
he eluded the vigilance of the most active police, employed by any
barbarian; and, having traversed the greater parts of France,
Switzerland and Germany he reached Trieste in safety, and soon after
repaired to his native country.

Amongst evil-doers mentioned in Jamaica history, Lewis Hutchinson of =Edinburgh Castle= holds a high place. Some of the accounts of him are based on that given by Bridges in his “Annals of Jamaica”; others, more fantastical, on the imagination of their writers. But the following account taken down in 1897 by Miss A. E. Cork, from her great-aunt Miss Potenger, kindly contributed by the late Miss Robinson, of Trafalgar, St. Ann, is based on better tradition, and is more likely to be correct. Miss Cork is great-great-granddaughter of Dr. Hutton, mentioned in the narrative.

“About the year 1768 there lived at Edinburgh Castle, in the Pedro district of St. Ann, Jamaica, a desperado called Lewis Hutchinson. He owned the property on which he lived, and was said to have been a man of some education, but he was the terror of the neighbourhood, and it was not infrequent for a white man to disappear mysteriously, and it would then be said that Hutchinson had made away with him by shooting him as he passed the ‘Castle,’ which was furnished with loopholes and overlooked the road. But these stories were hard to verify, and such was the unsettled and lawless state of the Island in those days that people preferred to leave Hutchinson alone, rather than attempt to have him arrested.

“A few miles from Edinburgh Castle was Hutton Bonvil, or Bonneville Pen, as it is now called, which, with Lebanon Pen, adjoining, belonged to Dr. Jonathan Hutton, an Englishman. Dr. Hutton was a retired naval doctor, and also owned property in Lincolnshire, his native county. He spent his time between England and Jamaica, sometimes remaining in the latter place a year or two at a time.

“During one of these visits he got into a dispute with the redoubtable Hutchinson about a boundary-line between their properties, Hutchinson claiming some portion of land which Dr. Hutton asserted was his own. This caused great bitterness of feeling on Hutchinson’s part towards Dr. Hutton; and one evening as the doctor, who was colonel of militia for the parish of St. Ann, was riding home from muster at Moneague with his black servant man following on foot, carrying his sabre and other accoutrements, Hutchinson overtook the man and took away the sabre from him, saying, ‘You can give my compliments to Dr. Hutton and tell him I have got his sabre.’ Dr. Hutton appeared to have taken no notice of this. Some months later Dr. Hutton made arrangements to go to England. His wife and one of his children—a little girl of about eight years of age—were in Jamaica with him, and Mrs. Hutton went to the adjoining parish of Clarendon on a visit, intending to meet her husband in Kingston, and return with him to England. The little girl, Mary Hutton, was left with her father at Bonneville; and Dr. Hutton set out one morning on horseback on his journey to Kingston, little Mary being carried by one of his servants in attendance before him on horseback.

“Dr. Hutton intended to pursue the route now usually taken from Pedro through Moneague and St. Thomas-ye-Vale to Spanish Town, and on to Kingston; with this exception that the public road from Pedro to Moneague in those days lay across the hill from Grier Park, where they were met by Hutchinson and a following of his slaves. He rode up to Dr. Hutton, who was unarmed, and attacked him fiercely, the weapon he used being Dr. Hutton’s own sabre which he had stolen. He struck the doctor such a severe blow on the head with this sabre that the latter fell senseless from his horse. Hutchinson made off with his servants, and Dr. Hutton’s terrified servants carried him back to Bonneville, where he stayed for a few days until he partially recovered, when, without venturing to travel by the same road he had at first intended to take, his servants took him across the hills to join his wife in Clarendon and they and their little girl went on to Kingston together. Dr. Hutton laid information there about Hutchinson; but as he was unable through the cruel blow he had received to remain in the Island to prosecute the matter, no steps appeared to have been taken. Dr. Hutton proceeded to England still suffering much from the wound in his head, and when he got there had to undergo the operation of trepanning, and wore a silver plate in his head until the day of his death. Dr. Hutton remained in England for about a year or more, and on his return to Jamaica tried to get Hutchinson arrested; but such was the terror he inspired, that the doctor found it hard to get anyone to take the warrant. At last a white soldier named Callender agreed to go, and with some others proceeded to Edinburgh Castle. As soon as Hutchinson found what was their errand, he fired at Callender and shot him dead on the spot. The others fled, and Hutchinson was again left unmolested for a short while. But this crime committed before white witnesses could never be passed over, and a strong body was sent to arrest him for the murder of Callender. He was overpowered and taken to Spanish Town jail. The castle was searched and forty-three watches were said to have been found there, besides quantities of clothing and many other articles, showing that Hutchinson had committed most, if not all, of the murders with which he was popularly credited. His unfortunate slaves, to whom, as may be supposed, he had been friendly, came now gladly and told all that they knew about his proceedings, and showed what he used to do with the bodies of his victims, which had hitherto been a puzzle.

“Not far from Edinburgh Castle House, in a small wood, was a sink-hole with a large mouth and supposed to be bottomless. To this sink-hole the bodies of Hutchinson’s victims were carried by the slaves on a plank in the dead of night, and one edge being placed at the edge of the hole, the other was raised and the body shot down never to be seen again by human eyes. Many of his victims were persons against whom he had no grudge, and murder was evidently a mania with the wretched man. Edinburgh Castle overlooked the road, and it was Hutchinson’s playful little practice to stand at one of the loopholes and fire at any solitary white traveller who might be passing. As he was a dead shot they never lived to tell the tale. His negroes would then bring the body to the house, where after being rifled of whatever valuables might be on it, it was kept until night and then disposed of in the manner already stated. It was said by these slaves that once a young man—a stranger to his reputation—being ill in the road, called up and asked for hospitality, which was at once accorded to him; Hutchinson showing him every kindness and administering remedies kept him for some time until the young man was able to proceed on his journey. Hutchinson then took his station at his loophole, and as the young man turned into the road, shot him dead and disposed of his body as usual. Many such tales were related by the slaves, but a coloured person’s evidence was not admitted in those days; and so Hutchinson was tried, convicted and hanged for the murder of Callender only.

“This story of Hutchinson and his crimes and connections has been variously told. In Mr. Bridges’ ‘Annals of Jamaica,’ another version will be found. This was owing to Mr. Bridges having sent for an old Bonneville slave and obtaining from him the story as it was current among slaves. But as I have told it, I think it is fairly correct, allowing for the lapse of years. The little Mary Hutton—who was an eye-witness of Hutchinson’s attack on her father, married in England, and was Mrs. Potenger—lived afterwards at Bonneville for many years. One of her daughters was my grandmother, and from my late great-aunt, Miss Elizabeth Potenger, another of her daughters, I have often heard the story related to her by her mother.

“ANNIE E. CORK.
“Great-great-grand-daughter of Dr. Hutton.

“_December 1897._”

George Wilson Bridges was rector of St. Ann from 1823 till 1837, when, on losing four daughters by a boating accident in St. Ann’s Bay, he left Jamaica never to return. In his story he appears to have confused Callender with Dr. Hutton, and makes him manager of a neighbouring property. The statement in the account given above, that Hutchinson was “overpowered and taken to Spanish Town jail” is incorrect. Hutchinson, when he saw that the authorities were determined to arrest him, escaped south to Old Harbour and put out to sea in an open boat, where he was captured by one of Rodney’s officers, acting under his directions. He was hanged in Spanish Town on March 16, 1773.

Bridges states that Hutchinson left a hundred pounds to erect a monument to his memory, and that he (Bridges) saw the following autograph writing:

Lewis Hutchinson—hanged in Spanish Town, Jamaica, on the sixteenth
morning of March, in the year of _his_ Lord one thousand seven hundred
and seventy-three.—Aged forty years.

Their sentence, pride, and malice, I defy;
Despise their power, and, like a Roman, die.

Of his life little is known. In the St. Ann Vestry Records (February 5, 1768) his name appears on the jury list for the parish. In 1771 he was called upon to supply slave labour for mending the road passing Edinburgh Castle to Pedro River. In 1773 the “Estate of Lewis Hutchinson” was returned at twenty-four slaves and ninety-three head of stock; but it does not appear whether he had heirs or whether it went to the Government.

On December 2, 1773, the House of Assembly resolved: “That the thanks of the House be given to Sir George Brydges Rodney, baronet, rear-admiral of Great Britain, vice-admiral of the red, and commander-in-chief of His Majesty’s squadron on this station, for the essential service rendered to this Island by his ready and effectual assistance of the civil power, at the instance of his Majesty’s Attorney-General, in apprehending Lewis Hutchinson, since executed for murder, and that Mr. Speaker do transmit the same to the Admiral, in the most acceptable manner.”

And it was further resolved: “That as a testimony of the approbation of the House, respecting the behaviour of Mr. George Turnbull (an officer in his Majesty’s Navy, employed by the Admiral to take and secure the said Lewis Hutchinson), and of the spirit and address with which he executed that charge, the Receiver-General to pay to the said Mr. George Turnbull, or his order, the sum of £50 sterling, to be laid out in the purchase of a gold-hilted sword; and this or any future assembly will make the same good; and that the admiral be desired to signify, to the proper department of state, the sense the House entertains of Mr. Turnbull’s merit on that occasion.” An account—basing his undoing on a quarrel with a neighbour named Callender over a jackass—is given in the “Columbian Magazine” for June 1797, published in Kingston.

The ruins of Edinburgh Castle still stand on a rising piece of ground near the main road, which it commands, running from St. Ann’s Bay to the south side of the island. It was a small two-storeyed rectangular building with two loopholed towers, circular in plan, at diagonally opposite corners. A doorway was at one side of the front angle, and another at the side to the east near the front tower. There are evidences of there having been a fireplace on each story of the front tower, and of a series of spiral steps in the back tower. The adjacent ruins to the west are said to mark the site of the slave quarters.

Mr. R. F. Perkins, who went down the sink-hole some years ago, wrote as follows:

“Sir Henry Blake with two or three others, I among the number, went down it. It is 265 feet deep from its edge to the point where a stone dropped down would first strike, and it slopes down for another ten feet or so, where it stops. The ground around the top of the hole slopes rapidly down to its edge, and the bottom is wider than the top; the sides of the hole are of nearly vertical rock.

“All this refers to the hole known as ‘Hutchinson’s Hole,’ which local tradition connects with the murderer. Hundreds of people have visited the place and rolled down stones, so it is possible that any remains might well have been covered. We did not find a vestige of anything connected with the atrocities. From more recent investigations I believe that ‘Hutchinson’s Hole’ is not the hole at all. It is about a quarter of a mile away from the castle, to the south; and there is another far less formidable one quite close, that, I should not be surprised to find, has some hidden entrance from the castle.”

Sir Henry Blake wrote as follows:

I had, of course, heard the accounts of the various murders committed
by the notorious Hutchinson, and I determined to ascertain the depth
and details of the cave, which is in limestone formation, and to see
if any remains of bones, arms, &c., could be found.... On July 22,
1895, I was lowered to the bottom and examined the cave, or “Swallow
Hole,” carefully. The opening at the surface was 15 feet by 8 feet.
The cave was, in shape, somewhat like a champagne bottle, 270 feet
deep, and 70 feet by 50 feet at the bottom, which was formed by a
level mass of stones of all sizes. There were no bones to be seen; but
remembering the time that has elapsed since the notorious Hutchinson
held the country in terror, bones, if any, may well have been covered
to a considerable depth by the stones flung down by curious visitors,
and the stones and rubbish from the adjacent fields flung into the pit
by the inhabitants.

The old tavern at =Moneague=, which was represented by Duperly in 1844, has been succeeded by the Moneague hotel. A reference to the early taverns of Jamaica will be found in the Introduction.

As we have seen in the Introduction, in the eighteenth century there were many forts around the coast of Jamaica, as protection against privateers. St. Ann had her fair share of such forts, of which remains still exist. There was one at =Mammee Bay=, two miles east of St. Ann’s Bay, where the St. Ann volunteers repelled an attack by pirates in 1795; another between Roaring River bridge and =Ocho Rios=, close to the main road, dating from the eighteenth century; two at =St. Ann’s Bay=—one, erected in 1777, now used as a slaughter-house; =Windsor Fort=, erected in 1803; and Dry Harbour, existing in 1777. In 1737 an Act was passed to enable the inhabitants of the parish of St. Ann to build a barrack at or near the head of the Rio Bueno, which divides the parish of St. Ann from the parish of St. James. Other places of historic interest in the parish are: =Priory=, nine miles west of St. Ann’s Bay, where are the ruins of an old church, the oldest tomb being dated 1750; best known during the incumbency of Bridges the historian, who resided at one time at =Tydenham=, which was purchased by the vestry as a rectory in 1817. At =Dixon Pen=, in the Pedro district, there are remains of a very old building said to have been the residence of a Spanish governor of the island. At =Green Park=, near Claremont, is said to be the house mentioned in Scott’s “Cruise of the Midge.”

At =Geddes=, about five miles from Claremont, there is a curious slave punishment cell, with holes in one wall, through which it is possible the hands of the prisoner were fastened.

MONEAGUE TAVERN IN 1844

From a daguerreotype by Adolphe Duperley
]

At =Rio Hoe=, properly Rio Hoja, two miles south-east from Moneague, was the last settlement of the Spaniards prior to their departure from the Island. At =York Castle=, in the Pedro district, was held from 1576 to 1900 the Wesleyan High School for boys, which during that period contributed eight of the Jamaica scholars. The =Dry Harbour Caves=, on Hopewell and Cardiff Hall, are about a mile and a half from the village of Dry Harbour. They inspired a poem entitled, “The Grotto of Melancholy,” in “A Short Journey in the West Indies,” published in 1790. =Moseley Hall Cave=, on Guy’s Hill, on the border of St. Mary and St. Ann, has fine stalactites, which were much visited in former times. =Llandovery Falls= are natural waterfalls on the Llandovery; a view of them is reproduced on one issue of the Jamaica penny postage stamps.

PUNISHMENT CELL, GEDDES
]

=Metcalfe Ville= is named after Sir Charles Metcalfe, mention of whom has been made in the chapter on Kingston.

=Walton=, near Moneague—where a lake appears at intervals after very heavy rains, is the site of an old military barracks, also the original site of the Jamaica High School, now the Jamaica College at Hope, in St. Andrew. Here also is a lake which appears at intervals after very heavy rains.

Charles Drax, by will dated 1721, directed

that a charity school should be established in the said parish of St.
Ann for maintaining and educating eight poor boys and four poor girls
belonging to the said parish as well as for other charitable purposes:
And, as an endowment to the said charity, the testator made subject
and liable all that his estate in the said parish of St. Ann, called
Shelton; and if that estate be found insufficient, his will was, that
all his, the testator’s, other estates should be made liable for the
deficiency.

It appears from the report that William Beckford, the well-known author of “Vathek,” had obtained possession of Drax Hall, the principal property, in a manner “that excited the indignation of every honest man who became acquainted with the transaction.”

Protracted legal proceedings resulted in Beckford having to disgorge £5200. A free school, commenced by the vestry of St. Ann in the old court house in that parish in 1795, was in 1802 by an Act of the legislature (43 George 3, c. 32) endowed with the sum obtained from the Drax bequest and called Drax’s Free School; and trustees, consisting of the president of the Council, the speaker of the Assembly, and representatives of St. Ann, were appointed. In 1806 the trustees of this school purchased Walton, the buildings on which had originally been erected as barracks. In 1807 they expressed their willingness to surrender their charge for the public good, and new trustees (embodying many of the old members) were appointed (by 48 George 3, c. 25), and the name of the school was changed to the Jamaica Free School. At its formation the school was thrown open to the island, ten nominations to the school being reserved for the parish of St. Ann in view of the bequest, and thirteen being for the other parishes on the nomination of the Governor, this privilege being transferred by Sir John Peter Grant in later days to the custodes of the thirteen parishes; and on the school being removed and merged into the Jamaica High School, which was opened in the newly constructed buildings at Hope in 1885, after a short sojourn in Barbican great house hard by, the same course was followed, the thirteen open scholarships being awarded by the Jamaica Schools Commission, as the trustees and board of management of the College.

The old Jamaica Free School, like other schools in the island at that period, was somewhat overweighted by trustees, consisting as they did of the Governor, the president and members of the Council, the speaker and members of the Assembly, the chief justice, the Attorney-general and others. In the case of the Jamaica Free School their duties were not onerous. The law enforced their meeting only “once in every year, during the annual session of the Legislature of this Island, in the town of Saint Jago de la Vega, for the purpose of examining into the state of the said free-school, &c.”

When Bridges wrote his Annals, he said of it:

The total income of the establishment is now about £1700 per annum,
which educates, maintains and clothes ten boys, nominated by the
parish, and six named by the Governor. In the session of 1825, a grant
of £1500 displayed the liberal desire of the public to extend the
means of instruction, and dissemination of Christianity, by the
addition of a chapel to the establishment. The master’s salary is
£300; and he is allowed to appoint an under-master with £150 per
annum. Under the management of the late master, the establishment rose
to be the first in the Island; public examinations took place twice a
year; and besides the objects of the foundation, thirty-one boys were
educated there at £70 per annum each. The present master is permitted
to hold the curacy of the parish; but the chapel being thirty miles
distant, he is under an engagement to the Trustees, not to quit the
school, but to pay half the salary of his cure to an officiating
curate.

It is a curious record, that the estate of Drax Hall still remains
charged with the sum of £500, payable to the same fund, whenever the
old Spanish Abbey at Seville d’Oro shall be rebuilt.

In the Wesleyan church, Brown’s Town, are two recently erected memorials to the Rev. W.C. Murray, D.D. (d. 1909), for fifty-one years a minister, and for eighteen years Governor of York Castle, which school, while it existed, did much for secondary education in Jamaica—in the church a mural tablet, in the churchyard an obelisk of granite.

IX
TRELAWNY

The parish of Trelawny derives its name from Sir William Trelawny, the Governor, who died in Jamaica in 1772. It was taken out of part of St. James in 1770.

=Falmouth= was a town of considerable importance, and is more regularly laid out than any other town in the island, except Kingston. The court house, a building erected in the days of Jamaica’s extravagance, is lofty and spacious and affords accommodation for nearly all the parochial officers. It contains full-length portraits of General Sir John Keane, lieutenant-governor from 1827 to 1829, and of Sir Charles Theophilus Metcalfe, Governor in 1839–42, the former being a replica of the portrait by Sir Martin Archer Shee in the possession of the family. The =Parish Church= contains monuments to John Hodges, who died in 1787, and James Blake (d. 1753), and to James Stewart (b. 1762, d. 1828), custos of Trelawny, and member of the Assembly for the parish from 1794 to 1822, and from 1826 till his death. The spacious Baptist chapel was erected under the auspices of William Knibb.

=Martha Brae=, one and a half miles inland from Falmouth, is supposed by some to have been the site of the old Spanish settlement of Melilla (which, however, was probably in St. James), which was abandoned soon after its establishment owing to the depredations of the French filibusters. “The secret gold mine” of the Spaniards is said to be in the neighbourhood of Martha Brae. The origin of the name has puzzled antiquaries, but Mr. G. F. Judah a few years ago discovered it in Rio Matibereon recorded in a patent of the year 1674. In the map in “The Laws of Jamaica” of 1683 the Para Mater Tiberen Rio is marked where the Martha Brae now flows.

=Bryan Castle=, where Bryan Edwards’s “History of the British West Indies” was written, was, together with the neighbouring estate of Brampton (now called Brampton Bryan), acquired by him from Zachary Bayly in or before 1792. It is within three miles of the port of Rio Bueno. It afterwards became by purchase the property of Alexander Donaldson, whose estate went into bankruptcy, and is now in the possession of the heirs of Mr. A. W. Gordon. A view of the great house is given in James Hakewill’s “Picturesque Tour of the Island of Jamaica” (London, 1825), the most artistic work ever published on the island. In 1825 the property contained 1402 acres of land, 300 of which were in sugar-canes, 600 in pasture and pimento, and the remainder was occupied by negroes and their provision grounds. The crops had then averaged during the previous twelve years 300 hogsheads of sugar, with the usual proportion of rum, and, in good seasons, 300 bags of pimento. There were employed 165 estate negroes, with the addition of extra labour.

BRYAN CASTLE
]

The great house is a typical Jamaica house of the period, solidly built, but without any pretensions to architectural beauty, and surrounded on all four sides by the usual verandah. When Hakewill wrote, Edwards’s books and furniture were still preserved in his study upstairs, where he compiled his history. His writing-table is now all that remains. From the only window of the room that was his study an extensive view is obtained across the Bryan Castle works and cane-fields in the foreground, and more cane-fields and woodlands in the distance, to the open sea in the neighbourhood of Falmouth.

Bryan Edwards, the son of a gentleman of Westbury in Wiltshire, who tried not very successfully to add to his patrimony by dealing in corn and malt, was born at Westbury in 1743. On his father’s death in 1756, his widowed mother, who had great difficulty in maintaining her six children, was taken under the protection of the elder of her two brothers, Zachary Bayly, a liberal-minded man of considerable wealth, custos of St. Mary and St. George, and a member of the Council, who had come to Jamaica from Westbury. After acquiring some education and a love of letters at two schools in Bristol, and after spending a few months with his younger uncle, Nathaniel Bayly, with whom he disagreed, young Bryan was in 1759 sent out to his uncle, Zachary Bayly. The epitaph on the monument of the uncle in Halfway-Tree church is from the pen of the nephew. In Jamaica Edwards resided under the care of his “great and good uncle,” continuing his studies under the Rev. Isaac Teale, who was specially engaged by his uncle for this purpose—the T—— of Edwards’s “Poems.” They evidently lived on one of Zachary Bayly’s properties in St. Mary, on the banks of the Agua Alta (Wag Water); and the chief outcome of the instruction seems to have been a love for literature, and a propensity for writing poetry. In his “Elegy on the Death of a Friend” Edwards says:

Enamour’d echo bade each mountain hear,
And pleas’d Agualta smoother flow’d along.

Oft round thy banks, sweet stream (now sacred made)
Together we explor’d the classic page.

Teale, who died in 1794, was at his own request buried on its banks.

In 1769, Edwards was left heir in tail male to his uncle’s properties, and four years later he acquired by bequest the great possessions of Benjamin Hume, of Jamaica, a friend of his uncle’s, and became a merchant. Hume, it may be mentioned, had been removed from the post of receiver-general on its being proved that he had embezzled upwards of £20,000 of public money. In 1765 Edwards had been elected a member of the House of Assembly for the parish of St. George, now merged in Portland. In February 1770 he resigned his seat on the plea that his ill-health necessitated a change of climate, but he apparently did not leave the island, and in December 1771 he was again elected for St. George, but in 1772 he was called up to a seat in the Council. As a member of the Assembly he attacked the restrictions placed by the British Government on trade between Jamaica and the United States.

In 1782 he returned to England, where he tried, without success, to enter Parliament as member for Chichester against the Duke of Richmond’s nominee, losing by eight votes only. In 1787 he came out again to Jamaica, and in the Assembly which first met in the October of that year he sat as member for Trelawny. In 1788 he received in his place the unanimous thanks of the House for his reports on the slave trade.

Soon after the revolt of the negroes in 1791 he paid a short visit to San Domingo, in the welfare of which island he took a deep interest, endeavouring to obtain for it a loan from Jamaica. This was recommended by a Committee of the Assembly; but the matter met with public opposition, and the loan did not pass the House. In a long letter from his pen which appeared in the “Royal Gazette,” April 21, 1792, he says:

For myself, I propose shortly to quit the island, and probably shall
never return to it; but my wishes for its happiness, freedom and
prosperity shall never be suppressed, so long as I have life and
recollection. I have exerted myself in its service for the last five
years with unabating zeal and perseverance, and, I hope, on some
occasions, with success.

In 1793 his seat in the Assembly was declared vacant, he having gone to England the previous year.

While in the Assembly he was often called upon to assist in drawing up addresses and reports, and he now and then acted as chairman of committees.

In England he settled permanently at Southampton as a West Indian merchant and banker. After contesting Southampton in vain in 1794, he was in 1796 elected M.P. for Grampound. He supported the slave trade with certain restrictions, and was admitted by Wilberforce to be a powerful opponent to abolition. He was, however, not unmindful of the great hardships done in Africa, and he had stated in Jamaica “that if all the nations of Europe would concur in a determination to relinquish the slave trade altogether, it ought to be relinquished.”

In 1797 he succeeded Sir Joseph Banks as secretary of the Association for promoting the discovery of the interior parts of Africa, and he edited some of Mungo Park’s contributions to its Proceedings. He died at his residence in the Polygon at Southampton, in July 1800. He was buried in the catacombs of the church, but there is no recording tablet. His wife, whom he married in 1774, was Martha, daughter of Thomas Phipps, of Westbury. His vast wealth was inherited by his only surviving son, Zachary Hume Edwards, who was not of age when his father died; but he died on board the _Montague_ packet on his passage from Jamaica to England in 1812. An elder son had died at Winchester College in his seventeenth year, in 1794, of a “nervous malignant fever.”

Bryan Edwards’s elder brother, Nathaniel Bayly Edwards, died in 1771, aged 19, and lies buried at Halfway Tree; his younger brother, Zachary Bayly Edwards, of Dove Hall, Jamaica, was member of the Assembly for St. Andrew in 1785–90. He married Catherine, daughter of Rowland Otto-Baijer, of Antigua and Ffarleigh Castle, Somerset, England. Their son was Sir Bryan Edwards, chief justice of Jamaica from 1855 to 1869, and their daughter Eliza married her cousin Samuel Otto-Baijer, a member of the Council of Antigua. A genealogical table of the Edwards family will be found in Mr. Oliver’s “History of the Island of Antigua.” What relation to the historian the Bryan Edwards, special stipendiary magistrate for the parish of Westmoreland, who died in 1835, aged 29, was, it is difficult to say. He could not have been a son of his brother Nathaniel Bayly Edwards (who died at Cheltenham in September 1800). He may have been a son of his cousin William mentioned below. We know that the historian was one of a family of six, and that he had two brothers; whether the remaining two were brothers or sisters is not recorded; but it would seem from his will that he left but one brother, who only survived him two months.

That Bryan Edwards was, to some extent at all events, a patron of the arts, is evident from the following extract from the second codicil to his will:

I give and devise to my wife, Martha Edwards ... the full length
portrait of herself, drawn by Pine,[12] now in my drawing-room in
London, if she thinks proper to accept it. I give and devise to my
brother the portraits of my mother and brother, Nathaniel McHume; and
my own portrait now in London and any six other pictures in my
collection which he may make choice of.

Footnote 12:

Robert Edge Pine, the painter of the picture of Rodney in the
Institute of Jamaica.

One wonders whether the fact that Edwards had employed Pine to paint his wife’s portrait had any influence in the purchase by the people of Kingston of that artist’s celebrated portrait of Rodney on board the _Formidable_.

In an obituary notice of him, a writer in the “Gentleman’s Magazine” said: “He exercised his literary talents in a memorable way in Jamaica; for, by the strokes of his pen, he drove Peter Pindar from the Island, and the bitter satirist never dared to attack his character while he remained in this country.”

The first time Wolcot left Jamaica it was in order to take Holy Orders, so that he might be presented to a living in Jamaica by his kinsman the governor, Sir William Trelawny; the second time he left—never to return—it was to accompany Lady Trelawny, his patron’s widow, to whom he was deeply attached. Moreover, Edwards never in his writings, at all events, gave evidence of satire equal to Wolcot’s; and the latter, one would think, was too pachydermatous to be driven anywhere by anybody against his will.

Four later members of the Edwards family have also been famous. Sir Bryan Edwards, chief justice of Jamaica, died in December 1876. Dr. William Frédéric Edwards, who was born in Jamaica in 1776, was the son of a rich English planter—William Edwards by name (a cousin of Bryan)—who afterwards settled at Bruges, where the younger William was educated. In early life he became a Frenchman, and won for himself much fame as a physiologist, dying at Versailles in 1842. William’s younger brother, Henri Milne Edwards (born at Bruges in 1800 and died in 1885), the zoologist, and Henri’s son, Alphonse Milne Edwards (born in Paris in 1835 and died in 1900), successively held the post of professor of zoology at the Jardin des Plantes, Paris.

In 1793 Bryan Edwards published in London, in two quarto volumes, “The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in the West Indies,” with plates and maps, which has remained the standard work on its subject—the history of the British West Indies till the close of the last century—till to-day. A third volume was added in 1801.

He evidently took much pains to collect all the trustworthy information available, especially about current affairs. But he wrote more as a politician than as an historian, and the chief value of the work lies in the large amount of light it throws on the condition of affairs in the West Indies at his time. The arrangement, it must be admitted, leaves a good deal to be desired; and it partakes rather of a collection of essays and articles than of a connected history, and is sadly in need of editing; but the nature of the subject makes it difficult to treat it as a whole while at the same time going into details. Edwards himself only visited San Domingo, and the information about the British islands other than Jamaica is scanty. For instance, Barbados is dismissed in thirty-five pages.

The fifth edition was published in London in 1819, many years after the author’s death. It contains (as did the third and fourth editions) a “prefatory advertisement” by his friend and collaborator, Sir William Young, Governor of Tobago, and a brief “sketch of the life of the author, written by himself a short time before his death.” It also contains descriptions of colonies ceded after Edwards’s death, a “History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade,” and later particulars of the West Indies generally, which would have been more useful had they been put in their several places in the work, instead of at the end.

The following is a list of Bryan Edwards’s publications:

1. (_a_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. In two volumes. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., of the Island
of Jamaica. _London_, 1793. 4to. [With plates and preface to 2nd
edition added afterwards.]

(_b_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. In two volumes. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., of the Island
of Jamaica. _Dublin_, 1793. 8vo.

(_c_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. In two volumes. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., of the Island
of Jamaica, F.R.S., S.A., and Member of the American Philosophical
Society at Philadelphia. The second edition, illustrated with maps.
_London_, 1794. 4to.

(_d_) List of Maps and Plates for the History, Civil and Commercial,
of the British Colonies in the West Indies. In two volumes. By Bryan
Edwards, Esq., of the Island of Jamaica, F.R.S., S.A., and Member of
the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia. _London_, 1794.
4to. [Issued in order that owners of the 1st edition might add to
their copies the map and plates included in the 2nd edition.]

(_e_) An Abridgment of Mr. Edwards’ Civil and Commercial History of
the British West Indies. In two volumes. _London_, 1794. 8vo.

(_f_) Beschreibung der Brittischen Kolonien in Westindien. [Translated
from the English of Bryan Edwards by Matthias Christian Sprengel in
“Auswahl der basten ausländischen geographischen und statistischen
Nachrichten zur Aufklärung der Volker und Länderkunde.” _Halle_,
1794–1800. 8vo.]

(_g_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies: To which is added a Survey of the French Colony in
the Island of St. Domingo. Abridged from the History written by Bryan
Edwards, Esq. Illustrated with a map. _London_, 1798. Small 4to.

(_h_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. To which is added an Historical Survey of the French
Colony in the Island of St. Domingo. Abridged from the History written
by Bryan Edwards, Esq. Illustrated with a map. _London_, 1799. Small
4to.

(_i_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. Vol. 3. Edited by Sir William Young. [Issued to be
added to the two volumes of the 1st edition of 1793.] _London_, 1801.
4to.

(_j_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., F.R.S., S.A. In three
volumes. Third edition, with considerable additions. Illustrated with
Plates. _London_, 1901. [With “Prefatory Advertisement,” by Sir
William Young, Bart.; a brief “Sketch of the Life of the Author,
written by himself a short time before his death”; and “A Tour through
the several Islands of Barbadoes, St. Vincent, Antigua, Tobago, and
Grenada, in the years 1791 and 1792.” By Sir William Young, Bart.,
M.P., F.R.S., &c.] 8vo.

(_k_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in
the West Indies. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., F.R.S., S.A. Fourth edition,
with considerable additions. Illustrated with Plates. In three
Volumes. _London_, 1807. [With “Prefatory Advertisement” by Sir
William Young, Bart., and a brief “Sketch of the Life of the Author,
written by himself a short time before his death.”] 8vo.

(_l_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British in the West
Indies. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., F.R.S., S.A. Illustrated by an Atlas
and embellished with a portrait of the Author. To which is added a
general description of the Bahama Islands by Daniel M’Kinnen, Esq. In
four Volumes. _Philadelphia_, 1805–6. 8vo.

(_m_) Another edition. 4 Vols. _Baltimore_, 1810.

(_n_) Another edition. 4 Vols, and Atlas. _Philadelphia_, 1810.

(_o_) The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British West Indies.
By Bryan Edwards, Esq., F.R.S., S.A. With a continuation to the
present time. Fifth edition, with Maps and Plates. In five Volumes.
_London_, 1819. Five Volumes of Text, 8vo, and one Volume of Plates,
4to. The title-page of the plate is as follows: “History of the
British West Indies. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., F.R.S., S.A. With a
continuation to the present time. Illustrated by Maps and Plates. In
four Volumes. _London._ Printed for the Proprietors, 1818.”

(_p_) Burgerlyke en Handelkundige Geschiedenis van de Englische
Volkplantingen in de West-Indiën. Door Bryan Edwards, Schildkn. Uit
het Engelsch. _Haarlem_, 1794–99. 6 Vols. 8vo.

(_q_) Extracto do livro quinto da Historia Civil e Commercial das
colonias occidentales Inglezias, por Bryan Edwards. [Translated by
José Mariano la Conceicao Velloso in “O. Fazendeiro do Brazil.”]
_Lisbon_, 1798. 8vo.

(_r_) Histoire civile et commerciale des Colonies Anglaises dans les
Indies occidentales: depuis leur découverte par Christophe Colomb
jusqu’a nos jours; suivie d’un Tableau historique et politique de
l’ile de Saint-Domingue avant et depuis la revolution française;
traduit de l’anglais de Bryan Edouard (_sic_), par le traducteur des
Voyages d’Arthur Young en France et en Italie. Orné d’une belle carte.
_Paris_, An. IX. [1801.] 8vo.

2. (_a_) An Historical Survey of the French Colony in the Island of
St. Domingo: Comprehending a short account of its ancient government,
political state, population, productions, and exports; A Narrative of
the calamities which have desolated the country ever since the year
1789, with some Reflections on their causes and probable consequences;
and a detail of the military transactions of the British Army in that
Island to the end of 1794. By Bryan Edwards, Esq., M.P., F.R.S., &c.,
Author of the History of the British Colonies in the West Indies.
_London_, 1797. 4to.

(_b_) An Historical Survey of the Island of Saint Domingo, together
with an Account of the Maroon Negroes in the Island of Jamaica, and a
History of the War in the West Indies in 1793 and 1794. By Bryan
Edwards, Esq., Also a Tour through the several Islands of Barbadoes,
St. Vincent, Antigua, Tobago, and Grenada in the years 1791 and 1792
by Sir William Young, Bart. Illustrated with Copper Plates. _London_,
1801. 4to. [Issued also as 1^i. of this list. Each sheet is marked
Vol. iii.]

(_c_) Geschichte des Revolutionskriegs in Sanct Domingo; von Bryan
Edwards, Esq. Aus dem Englischen. [_On title page of Vol. 2_: Nebst
einem schreiben: über Europens Interesse in Beziehung auf die
Wohlfahrt der Colonien in Amerika, von Herrn Malouet, und einer Rede
des Admiral Villaret Joyeuse.] _Leipzig_, 1798. 2 Vols., with map.
8vo.

(_d_) Geschiedkundige Beschouwing van St. Domingo, door Bryan Edwards.
Uit het Engelsch. _Haarlem_, 1802. 8vo.

(_e_) Histoire de l’île Saint-Domingue; extraite de l’Histoire civile
et commerciale des Antilles, de M. Bryan Edwards, et continuée
jusqu’aux derniers événemens. Contenant de nombreux détails sur ce qui
s’est passé dans cette importante colonie pendant la Révolution.
Traduite de l’Anglais par J. B. J. Breton, auteur du _Voyage dans la
Belgique_. Orné d’une carte de Saint Domingue. _Paris_, An. XI., 1802.
12mo.