We do not know the names of the first generation
of settlers who came from St Christopher in the year 1650. We do not know for certain whether they met
anyone living on the island when they arrived, and, if they did, who they were. We do not know how many, or which of them,
died in the Amerindian raid of 1656. Nor
do we know the names of those who survived the raid. We can only speculate that not all the first
settlers were killed in the 1656 raid.
Most survived to build up the growing settlement. While Abraham Howell[1] and his men were defending
the settlement during the ‘Carib raid’, many of the women and children escaped
into the forest. This was then virgin
forest, even more impenetrable than the thorny scrub that now covers the
island. These first settlers knew places
such as caves to hide in on the island that a casual Carib raiding party from
the distant Windward Islands would not easily find. It is not likely that Pere Du Tertre is right
in assuming that they were almost all wiped out in the Carib attack.
By ‘the first generation’ is meant those
who arrived in Anguilla in 1650 together with those who were born here in the following
thirty years. The period 1650 to 1680
appears to have been free from drought, and agriculture prospered. This early productive period was followed by
40 years of drought. The crops
repeatedly failed, and the islanders were driven to extremes of poverty. Abraham Howell was the undoubted hero of this
first generation of Anguillians. The
records show that he was one of the most propertied of the planters. He held title to several parcels of land, all
of which he must have granted to himself.
This is to be expected of the man who was for nearly three generations
the most powerful person in the community.
We see his name cropping up repeatedly right up to the early part of the
next century. It is likely that he was
one of the original settlers on the island who arrived in 1650, as they elected
him to be their leader only sixteen years later in 1666.
Within a few months of the Carib raid of
1656 the ruined homesteads of those colonists that survived the raid were rebuilt. Restoring their houses was not particularly
difficult. There are contemporary
descriptions of these first West Indian tobacco farmers' houses in other
islands.[2] We have a good idea of how these early
Anguillians lived. Their houses were
simple huts, framed by four or six forked stakes, walled by reeds coated in mud,
and thatched by palm leaves. Furnishings
of the best tobacco planter houses, typically, consisted of no more than an old
chest, a few hammocks, some empty barrels, a broken kettle, an old sieve, some
battered pewter dishes, two or three napkins, a glass bottle, and,
occasionally, a book or pamphlet.
Not only did they rebuild their houses,
but their numbers continued to grow. The
first Anguillian settlers of 1650 arrived from St Kitts. Their relationship with that island continued
through the ensuing years. We know from Charles
de Rochefort that Anguilla was not occupied as a result of any public encouragement.[3] No one was given a commission to settle
it. It was not settled under any plan or
design. They could have come only from
other islands, as Anguilla had no direct communication with England or
Africa. The bulk of them likely consisted
of freed indentured servants and ex-slaves looking for land of their own. In the islands of St Kitts, Nevis and
Antigua, land was already in short supply.
Among them were small holders from the greener islands to the south, who
sold their cotton and provision grounds to the growing class of sugar
planters. Some were run-away debtors and
criminals. There was also the occasional
successful planter from St Kitts or Antigua taking a grant of land in Anguilla
from the Governor in Chief. These rich
planters did not reside in Anguilla.
They were probably only collecting additional plots of land in the island
to add to their already substantial holdings.
Some of the new arrivals came from among
the St Kitts-based Sir Tobias Bridge’s Regiment, disbanded after the Treaty of
Breda in 1667. In order to encourage the
men to settle in the islands, instead of all returning to England, land was
allotted to two companies of the King's regular troop in the West Indies in
proportion to each person's rank. That
is, the amount of land that each soldier received depended on his rank in the
regiment. The Captain General and
Governor in Chief, Sir Charles Wheeler,[4] received detailed
instructions from London on how much land the men were to be awarded in the
Leeward Islands.[5]
Private
|
35 acres
|
Corporal or Drummer
|
50 acres
|
Sergeant
|
79 acres
|
Ensign
|
160 acres
|
Lieutenant
|
200 acres
|
Captain
|
400 acres
|
Table 1: Land entitlement of the
decommissioned men of Sir Tobias Bridge’s Regiment. (UK National Archives
CO.153/1.)
It is unlikely they received this land
entirely free of cost. No deputy
governor of Anguilla, right up to the last one, William Richardson who served
from 1805 to 1825, ever received one penny from the Crown or from local
government in payment for his service. Anguillian
deputy governors were all forced to make their own income by selling Crown land
and pocketing the customs duties and powder money collected at the harbours. Until close to the end of Anguilla’s separate
existence in 1825 there was no Treasurer appointed for Anguilla. There was no system for accounting for public
revenue or its expenditure. No public
works or buildings were built throughout this early period of life in
Anguilla. The one public building we
know from the eighteenth century is the courthouse at Crocus Hill. This was no more than the private home of a
deceased governor, perhaps deputy governor Benjamin Gumbs and subsequently
deputy governor William Richardson, turned over to public use sometime after
1825 until it was destroyed by hurricane Alice in 1955.[6]
We see from table 1 that a Captain was to
be awarded the most land, four hundred acres.
An ensign got one hundred and sixty acres. A private could claim no more than thirty-five
acres. Most of the men obtained land in
St Kitts. We know from a patent that
survives in the Anguilla archives that at least one officer settled here. In the year 1673, six years after the
regiment was disbanded, deputy governor Abraham Howell gave Ensign Thomas
Rumney a grant of ‘Blown Point Plantation’, no doubt in exchange for a payment. This document is the earliest Anguillian land
title to have survived. This fact alone
makes it worth reproducing in full. But
additionally, it sheds valuable light on social conditions on the island at the
time. It reads,
Abraham Howell, Deputy Governor
and Commander in Chief over all His Majesty's Forces, Officers and Soldiers in
Anguilla:
(LS) Whereas his Sacred Majesty Charles the Second,
By the grace of God of England Scotland France and Ireland with the territories
and dominions thereto belonging, King, Defender of the Faith, has by his
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of England bearing date the 10th day of [ .
. . ] 1671, Reposing special trust hath authorised and empowered and
commissioned his servant William Stapleton to be Captain General and Chief
Governor of all His Majesty's Leeward Islands in America as by his Commission
may more at large appear
and Whereas His Excellency hath
commissioned and empowered me Capt Abraham Howell Deputy Governor and Commander
in Chief as above said to give, grant, sell and assign over grants or patents
for lands situate, lying and being in the Island of Anguilla aforesaid as to me
shall seem meet and convenient, Provided always it be not prejudicial to any
former grants or patents
THEREFORE KNOW YE that I the
said Abraham Howell for diverse considerations me hereunto moving have given
and granted and by these presents do give and grant unto Ensign Thomas Rumney a
certain parcel of land or plantation situate, lying and being in a place that
is known and called by the name of Blown Point Plantation it being in breadth
two and thirty men's land, that is to say all what land is at head and foot in
the same breadth, at the head bounded with the rocks and at the foot joining
with the Rendezvous Pond with all and every of the appurtenances thereto
belonging or appertaining, to have and may hold, all former grants excepted, to
him the said Ensign Thomas Rumney his heirs and assigns for ever the above
specified land yielding and paying unto our dread Sovereign all such taxes
according to the custom of the country.
Given under my hand and seal
this 18th day of July anno. 1673.
Abraham Howell (LS)
The name “Blown Point” Plantation was
subsequently to evolve into Blowing Point.
The original spelling in this patent has an authentic ring to it. To this day, the residents refer to their
village as “Blown Point”. The plantation
is thirty-two men's land in breadth. The
exact meaning of this description is not clear.
We only know that the plantation bounded at the head (presumably the
east) with the sea rocks and at the foot (presumably the west) with Rendezvous
Pond. If this was a regimental grant,
and if it conformed with the instructions given to the Governor, then thirty-two
men’s land would be close to 160 acres.
Abraham Howell does not make it clear whether the land was granted in
accordance with Wheeler’s instructions from London or whether it was a purely
commercial transaction. It seems
unlikely it was a regimental grant. It
may well be that Ensign Romney sold his regimental grant of 160 acres of land
in another island and was using some of the proceeds to purchase a smaller and
cheaper parcel of land in Anguilla.
Three years later, in 1676, preserved in
the St Kitts Archives, is another patent to land given by Abraham Howell.[7] He records a grant of land in The Valley
Division he made ten years previously in 1666, the year he was informally
elected deputy governor by his fellows, to Humphrey Lynch. The patent reads,
By the Deputy Governor
Anguilla
These may certifie whom it doth or may concern that in the year
1666, I being then chosen by the inhabitants of this island to be Governor
& Commander in Chief under his Sacred Majesty until Commission from a
higher power did appear upon said island, I did by virtue of said power give
and grant to Humphrey Lynch & to his heirs forever all former grants only
excepted a certain parcel of land lying and being in the new Valley Division
beginning at the head line joyning with the southernmost corner of the land
which Walter Perkins did dwell upon & so running to the sea side & to
the borders [of] the neighbouring plantations in breadth be it more or less . .
[Given ] under my hand this 7th of Xber 1676.
Signed: Abraham Howell
From these two patents, it becomes
apparent that one of the principal benefits of government in Anguilla was
having some recognised authority to confirm title to land by those that had
settled it. Granting titles to land was
one of the main functions of a deputy governor, and doubtless one of his
principal sources of revenue.
Civil War broke out in England in 1642 and
lasted off and on for eighteen years. In
1649, King Charles I was tried and executed by order
of Parliament under Oliver Cromwell. The
Monarchy was abolished, and Cromwell ruled as ‘Lord Protector’. In 1650, Charles II landed in Scotland, which
was then invaded by English forces. The contest between the Parliamentary
Forces and the Royalists spilled over into the West Indies, particularly in
Barbados. Civil
War broke out in Barbados, lasting to 1652.
It did not
end until the year 1660 with the death of Oliver Cromwell and the restoration
of King Charles II. War and conflict
produce refugees. We must not be
surprised that distant little Anguilla was viewed as a place of sanctuary for
those wishing to escape from the dangers that affected the richer islands
during the Civil War. The
possibility remains that some of the earliest settlers of Anguilla were
refugees from the contest between Parliament and the King in England.
In 1660, after the restoration of the
Monarchy in England, Charles II gave Francis Lord Willoughby (see illus 1),[8] a Royalist supporter,
letters patent to the revenue of the Caribbee Islands.[9] He was appointed Captain General and Governor
of the properties included in the Carlisle Grant of the West Indies.
In other words, Willoughby bought the
right to develop and to exploit the islands of the West Indies as best as he
could. Specifically included in his 1660
grant were the islands of "Angilla
also Angvilla and Sembrera also Sembroa also Essembrera." At least the King’s secretary came close to
spelling the name of Anguilla correctly.
1. Governor Francis Lord Willoughby
Both the spelling and etymology of the
island’s name are of some interest and controversy. The word ‘Anguilla’ is the old Latin and modern
Italian word for eel. ‘Anguille’ with an
‘e’ is the French, and ‘Anguila’ with one ‘l’ is Spanish. From the earliest topographies to the most
modern tourist literature, one finds the legend repeated that the name is
derived from the French or Spanish word for eel. There is no truth in it. No early map or travel account spells the island’s
name as either ‘Anguille’ or ‘Anguila’.
The name does not go through an evolution from one form of spelling to
another. It was always the Italian
spelling, ‘Anguilla’,[10] from the earliest
recorded mention of it up to the present day.
It is more likely that some forgotten Italian navigator or cartographer
amongst the early Spanish explorers gave the island its name. The Italian Christopher Columbus does not
mention or name the island and does not appear ever to have seen it. Perhaps the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci
himself first set down the name of the island in ink. In any event, whoever named it, the correct
account for the name of the island is that it is neither French nor Spanish,
but the Italian word for eel.
Once the island was successfully occupied,
it was only intermittently and ineffectively brought under the protection of
the English Crown. In the year 1660,
Governor Francis Lord Willoughby appointed William Watts,[11] a planter of St Kitts, to
be lieutenant governor of both St Kitts and Anguilla. This date was only four years after the Carib
raid. It may seem promising that already
the settlement had a lieutenant governor.
But Watts never lived in Anguilla and was lieutenant governor of it in
name only. There is no evidence he even
visited it before he died in St Kitts fighting the French in 1666.
In the year 1665, an anonymous memorandum
was prepared for the use of the Committee for Trade and Foreign Plantations.[12] It is a magnificently written document
titled, The General Description of America or the New World. Anguilla merits just two sentences in it (see
illus 2).
2. Extract
relating to Anguilla taken from A Generall Description of the New World.
(UK National
Archives®)
The Generall Description’s analysis
of Anguilla reads:
Anguilla
is the next which hath ten leagues of length and is 18 degrees. It hath some few English on it with an
excellent salt pit and a good road for ships.
There is no mention of any commercial or
agricultural activity at this early date, fifteen years after settlement. The ‘salt pit’ can only be the Road Salt Pond. Its mention shows the role the early salt
industry already played in Anguilla’s economic life. A roadstead is another name for a
harbour. The ‘good road’ must refer to
what came to be known as ‘Road Bay’. Any
Anguillians growing tobacco and keeping small stock were not considered strategically
important enough for mention in this memorandum.
The following year, 1666, the French in St
Kitts under Robert Lonvilliers de Poincy defeated the English forces in that
island. De Poincy expelled some 1,300 of
the English and those he deemed to be vagabonds, probably the Irish. The French landed some 300 of them, known to
history as the ‘Wild Irish’, on Anguilla.
These caused the settlement much damage.
We shall examine this invasion in more detail in a subsequent chapter
dealing with Anguilla's involvement in the wars between the Europeans.[13] What seems inescapable is the conclusion that
several of the Irish names of Anguilla appear to date from this early
period. There is Wild Irish blood alive
in the Anguillians of today.
Francis Lord Willoughby made Barbados the
centre of government for his holdings in the West Indies. He did not last long, and there is no
evidence he ever visited Anguilla. In
1666 he and his entire fleet were lost at sea in a hurricane. He was succeeded to his title and his lands
by his nephew Henry.[14]
Henry Lord Willoughby[15] took active steps to
repopulate the Leeward Islands which were devastated during the war. The following year 1667, he sailed from
Barbados with a party of colonists for the stated purpose of resettling
Antigua, Montserrat, Saba and Anguilla.
How many, if any, of them came to Anguilla is not known.
Major John Scott was a notorious trickster,
who spent a mottled career as an international spy and counterspy, peddling
dubious maps and military information to the English, Dutch and French
authorities.[16] In a dispatch back to London he recorded that
he left Anguilla in September 1667 in good condition.[17] If anything that Scott wrote can be taken
seriously, that would certainly suggest that the island quickly recovered from
the French/Irish attack of the previous year.
We can speculate that it is likely that the island benefited from Willoughby’s
deliberate policy to plant settlers on it.
There is no firm evidence one way or the other.
The following year, 1668, we see
Under-Secretary Joseph Williamson receiving a dispatch from the new Governor,
Henry Lord Willoughby, concerning his responsibilities in the Leeward Islands
(see illus 3).[18] Anguilla is included in his remit. About this island he writes,
Anguilla. Far to the Leeward of St Christopher. 200-300 Englishmen fled thither during time of
war. Not worth keeping. Makes tobacco. Inhabitants poor and would move to Antigua. Governor Abraham Howell.
So, Governor Willoughby informs Mr
Williamson that these first Anguillians fled there in time of war. That would be the English Civil War. In his opinion, the island was not worth
keeping. The people there grew
tobacco. This crop soon lost much of its
value on the world markets, and sugar cane early replaced it in Barbados, Antigua,
Nevis and St Kitts. The inhabitants were
poor, he writes, as we would expect of homesteaders who were still planting the
unprofitable tobacco crop. He opines
that they would happily remove to Antigua.
He confirms that Abraham Howell was then the deputy governor. This was just two years after he was elected
by the inhabitants to be their deputy governor.
His informal appointment was subsequently legalised or at least
recognised by Governor Willoughby.
Under-Secretary Williamson and his
successors in office enthusiastically take up Lord Willoughby’s opinion about
Anguilla. We have no corroboration that
the Anguillians of 1668 wished to abandon the island and transfer themselves to
Antigua. Since there was by this time no
spare land in Antigua with which to compensate the Anguillians for the loss of
their properties, it is highly unlikely that the assertion is correct. What is more informative to us is the
statement that there were settlers on Anguilla who fled there during the Civil
War in England and in Barbados.
3. Part of Henry
Lord Willoughby’s description of Anguilla in 1668. (CO.1/23.
National Archives®).
The Royal Navy Captain and author, Thomas
Southey, recorded, but without citing a source, that in 1668 several planters removed
from Barbados to Anguilla.[19] Needless to say, we have no idea who the
Barbados planters were or what their names were. There, he wrote, they found conditions so
favourable that they were able to soon prosper.
But, he wrote, they managed without any of the trappings of government
or religion. These twin themes of a lack
of any institution of government or of a church are to recur repeatedly in the
colonial reports of the conditions of life on Anguilla.
The surviving evidence suggests that,
commencing with Abraham Howell, the deputy governor of Anguilla was always
elected by the islanders and recognised in an informal way by the Governor in
Chief of the colony of the Leeward Islands.
This is a marker of Anguilla’s poverty and insignificance to the
colonial power. This procedure is to be
compared with the appointment of the deputy governors of the richer
islands. These received letters patent
granted by the King. As we shall see,
the deputy governor of Anguilla ruled the island by the weight of his personal
power and authority rather than any official appointment. The deputy governor of Anguilla was
informally elected by the settlers, not formally appointed by Royal Patent. The only support for his position was the
consent of the most important of the Anguillians and the subsequent informal
confirmation of his appointment by the Governor in Chief. He was not backed by any legal
infrastructure. There was no legislature
to make law. Anguilla in this early
period was the most perfect example of a community ruled by a man as compared
with the rule of law. Rough justice was
the best that the inhabitants could hope for throughout the one hundred and
seventy-five years that passed until Anguilla was joined to St Kitts in
1825. After that date, the laws of the
Legislative Council of St Kitts were one by one applied to Anguilla. It is important to repeat that prior to that
date the Anguillians lived without any semblance of a formal legal system.
As for religion, occasionally, a minister
of religion would spend a few years among the people. More often, a visiting cleric, such as the
Quaker missionary, Thomas Chalkley, would drop in if only for only a short
visit.[20] Such visits would be interspersed by decades
when no clergyman touched on the island.
The residents gave each other their hands in marriage with no more
formality than if they lived on a desert island. The truth is that the island was too poor to
support a permanent cleric. The marvel
is that despite these hardships, the settlement persisted and was never
abandoned from that first unknown day in the year 1650 when Abraham Howell and
those first intrepid adventurers landed on Anguilla with the intention of
making a new home for themselves.
Although Anguilla was ill-defended
throughout the seventeenth century and beyond, being so poor, it was not
destroyed by enemy action as often as the richer of the Leeward Islands
were. Refugees from neighbouring
islands, attacked by the French or Spanish in time of war, filtered into
Anguilla throughout this century, adding to the numbers, as we have seen. The island clearly offered some sort of
sanctuary to refugees from other English islands attempting to escape attack.
As we have seen, less reputable elements
contributed to the stream of early settlers on Anguilla. There were retired buccaneers, runaway
debtors, convicts and prostitutes deported from England, and the Wild Irish
harboured by the French in St Kitts and later banished to Montserrat by Sir
Thomas Warner. Except for the last, the
Wild Irish, there is little or no hard evidence of the source of the early
European settlers arriving in Anguilla.
It is likely that there were African
residents at this time as well.[21]
Warner brought the first 60 African slaves to St Kitts in 1626, the
first of the countless thousands to be transported to slavery in the Leeward
Islands. We have seen the record of the
African prisoner taken from Anguilla who was mortally wounded in the Carib
pirogue, and who preferred to commit suicide rather than be rescued by Pere Du
Tertre’s ship in 1656.[22] Some of the Africans living on Anguilla in
this early period were free men, and some were slaves. Sugar cultivation does not appear in the
records of Anguilla until some one hundred years after it began to flourish in
Barbados in 1640. West Indian sugar's
handmaiden, African slavery, did not reach its peak in Anguilla until the
mid-eighteenth century. Slave imports
into the West Indies during the seventeenth century reached high numbers, as
Professor Phillip Curtin shows:
Years
|
Barbados
|
Jamaica
|
Leewards
|
Total
|
1640-1650
|
18,700
|
0
|
2,000
|
20,700
|
1651-1675
|
51,100
|
8,000
|
10,000
|
69,200
|
1676-1700
|
64,700
|
77,100
|
32,000
|
173,800
|
Totals
|
134,500
|
85,150
|
44,100
|
263,700
|
Table 2: Estimated English Slave Imports, 1640-1700. (Curtin, Atlantic
Slave Trade, 52-64, 88-89, 119)
Table 2 indicates
that in the two generations between 1640 and 1700, 44,100 slaves were imported
into the Leeward Islands. We do not know
how many of them came to Anguilla, as compared to the richer and wetter islands
of Montserrat, Antigua, Nevis and St Kitts.
In
Governor William Stapleton’s census of the population of the Leeward Islands
taken in 1672 he records the numbers of the slaves found in each island.[23] He shows no slave being present in Anguilla
as of that early date:
Acres
|
Men able to bear arms
|
Armed
|
Horse
|
Negroes
|
|
St
Christopher
|
5,988
|
496
|
437
|
352
|
|
Nevis
|
22,000
|
1,411
|
1,330
|
80
|
1,739
|
Montserrat
|
28,000
|
1,175
|
700
|
50
|
523
|
Antigua
|
40,000
|
1,052
|
100
|
570
|
|
Anguilla
|
500
|
||||
Saba
|
40
|
||||
Statia
|
120
|
||||
Total English
|
95,988
|
3,582
|
3,679
|
230
|
3,184
|
Table 3: Statistics of Population in 1672.
In the
custom of the day, Governor Stapleton titles the slaves ‘Negroes’ a description
normally restricted to black slaves.
Throughout the records of that time, the word Negro is not used to
designate race specifically, but to designate status. Thus, we can say that in 1672 no black slaves
are recorded as being present in Anguilla.
It is unlikely, however, that there were neither pure Africans nor
persons of mixed blood on the island who were free persons. The island was a safe harbour for all kinds
of refugees and runaways. If there were
free Africans present on the island in 1672, it is unlikely that they were
counted among the Negroes. But, as with
so much about Anguilla in this early period, we cannot be certain. The description ‘men’ in the colonial records
of the period is normally restricted to free white men. White indentured servants would not be
counted as ‘men’, though they would likely be included as ‘men able to bear
arms’.
The earliest document to mention the presence of Africans in Anguilla is
Governor Walter Hamilton's 1716 List of the Inhabitants of Anguilla.[24] This can be called the first Anguilla
census. It records that there were then
820 Africans as compared to 534 Whites.
We can speculate from these figures, that Africans were among the first
generation of Anguillians, but we do not know either their names or their
numbers. We shall look more closely at
this document when we come to deal with the Anguillian attempts to settle Crab
Island and the population censuses that were taken at the time.[25]
References to Anguilla continue to crop up
occasionally in the seventeenth century dispatches from the Governor in Chief
to the Committee for Trade and Foreign Plantations. These references are usually no more than a
footnote, or a passing reference. Throughout the seventeenth century, Anguilla
does not appear to be the object of a single dispatch back to London based on
its own merit. These colonial reports
offer us but tantalizing glimpses of those distant days in Anguilla. Typical is the mention of the island in an
unattributed 1666 report:[26] "Anguilla
. . . Inhabited by a few English."
How few, and what were they doing, one wants to ask. Clearly, in the opinion of the Committee for
Trade and Foreign Plantations, they were not producing enough revenue to the
Crown to make it worthwhile going into any detail.
In the same year 1672, Col William
Stapleton replaced Sir Charles Wheeler[27] as Governor of the
Leeward Islands. With his dispatch of 17
July 1672, at the beginning of the Third Dutch War, Governor Stapleton enclosed
to the Council for Trade and Foreign Plantations a short account of the island
of Anguilla (see illus 4).[28] This simply related that Captain Abraham
Howell was still the deputy governor, and that Captain John Merewether, Captain
Richard Richardson and Humphrie Seward made up his Council. There were only 150 men available for the
island's militia. They possessed no
heavy guns or gun powder with which to defend themselves. As we have seen in table 2, he gives a rough
estimate of the population of the island as being 500. We have no idea who they were. Certainly, 150 men is a major increase from
the estimated 25 men of 1650, just 22 years before.
4. Stapleton’s
Account of the Island of Anguilla in 1672: (CO.1/29 National Archives®).
In 1676 Stapleton replies to enquiries
from the Committee for Foreign Plantations about the condition of the Leeward
Islands.[29] In
the whole colony of the Leeward Islands, he reports, there were only ten
churches. Four were in Nevis and two
each in St Kitts, Montserrat and Antigua.
There was neither church nor minister in Anguilla. Stapleton asks for six more ministers for the
islands. Six are eventually recruited. Two years later he reports to London that
five of the six ministers arrived to serve the colony of the Leeward Islands.[30] They were parsons Foster, Jones,
Molineux, Davis, Milward, and Lambert.
Two were sent to each of St Kitts and Antigua, and one to each of
Montserrat and Nevis. None of them was
sent to Anguilla.
Stapleton gives his estimate, which he
admits is a rough one, of the value of the plantations in the islands in 1676.[31] He includes Anguilla. He values the estates of the planters of
Anguilla in 1676 at £1,000 (see table 4). This must be compared to Nevis, the
richest of them all, which he valued at £384,660. He repeats that Abraham Howell was deputy
governor, with 60 ill-armed men available for the militia.
Island
|
Value in
£
|
St
Christopher
|
67,000
|
Nevis
|
384,000
|
Antigua
|
67,000
|
Montserrat
|
62,000
|
Statia
|
1,000
|
Saba
|
1,000
|
Anguilla
|
1,000
|
Barbuda
|
2,500
|
Table 4: Stapleton’s Estimate of the Value of the Estates of the
Planters of the Leeward Islands in 1676: CO.153/2 (UK National Archives®)
Stapleton takes the opportunity to
describe Anguilla in 1676. He is neither
complimentary nor hopeful for the future (see illus 5). Anguilla, he wrote, like Statia and Saba,
Dutch islands then held temporarily by the English, was never surveyed.
5. Stapleton on
conditions in Anguilla in 1676: CO.153/2. (UK National Archives®)
Thus, he could not give a detailed account
of Anguilla’s acreage and potential for development. Indeed, he advised, there was no need to
survey the island. It was so small, and
the land so poor, it would always be incapable either of holding many people or
of defending itself. It was fitter for
raising livestock than for planting any of the cash crops of the islands at
that time.
Colonel Philip Warner, Sir Thomas Warner’s
son and deputy governor of Antigua, was detained at the Tower of London for
several years. He was being investigated
on a charge of murdering the war chief of the Carib Indians of Dominica, his
alleged half-brother, Indian Warner. He
knew Anguilla well. He whiles away the
time spent in the Tower preparing a memorandum on the various Leeward Islands
for the use of the Committee for Trade.[32] He writes of Anguilla that it “is a barren, rocky island, ill settled by
the English, and of small consequence either for timber”. He did not attempt any estimate of the number
of the inhabitants. Nor did he give us
any description of conditions of life in Anguilla at the time. When on 25 April 1678 the Privy Council
advises the King on the state of the Leeward Islands Warner’s words above have
become the definition of Anguilla:
6. Philip Warner’s description of
Anguilla, CO.153/2. (UK National Archives®)
The first Anglican minister in Anguilla
for whom we have a record was a Parson Nelson.
We are never told his full name.
We learn about him from George MacDonnah nearly a hundred years later.[33] MacDonnah was an Anguillian cotton
planter. In 1774 he testifies in a trial
before members of the Anguilla Council.
This is just before the American Revolution, when Anguilla was at the
height of its short-lived, slave-made sugar prosperity. The members of the Council were appointed
Judges in Ordinary by the Governor in Chief.
Their authority was very limited.
There was no lawyer among them, and there was no Legislative Assembly to
pass any laws for them to apply.
The case was brought by the Council
against Thomas Hodge, himself a member of the Council. The lawsuit sought a declaration that the
land he occupied was in fact the Glebe Land.
The glebe land is land belonging to the Anglican Church. MacDonnah was permitted, in effect, by the
legally untrained Council of Anguilla to give what amounted to hearsay evidence. He testified as to what John Harrigan, then
deceased, told him about what one old lady named Eleanor Connor, then also
deceased, told him, John Harrigan.[34] It is evident from this litigation that in
the 1770s there was a hope to revive the Church in Anguilla and to recover the
land which was previously attached to it.
The affidavit reads:
Anguilla. Before the Honourable John Smith[35]
Esq, Lieutenant Governor of the said island and Ordinary of the same.
Personally appeared before me
George McDonough and deposed on the Holy Evangelists of Almighty God that the
said deponent is upwards of seventy years old, but cannot say exactly, that he
remembers he went to school at a church situated on the land now called the
glebe land in The Valley, in the time of the Wars of Queen Ann. That he believes one Parson Nelson, as he has
been told of old, was the first parson who came to Anguilla and that in the
time of Governor Leonard. John Harrigan
Esq one of His Majesty's council told him the said deponent that Governor
Leonard had recommended it to him the said Harrigan that it would be necessary
to show the younger people of the island the boundaries of the glebe land in
The Valley, in consequence of which one Eleanor Connor a very aged woman was
sent for who deposed, as the said Harrigan informed him the said McDonough,
that the Southern bounds of the said Glebe Land were a certain step of rocks, adjoining
a Grape Tree waterhole and a large loblolly tree, the Eastern bounds adjoining
the land of Lieutenant Derrick, the Western bound adjoining the lands of
Scully, and the Northern bounds with the head line of the Valley Plantation,
and that the said Harrigan showed these bound to him the said deponent George
McDonough, which said bounds at the request of the Reverend John Shepherd he
the said deponent hath lately shown to the Honourable John Smith Esq, John
Payne Esq and Captain Samuel Gumbs, and that he the said deponent verily thinks
and believes to the best of his memory and knowledge that the said land as
butted and bounded above has been always reputed as land left for the use of
the Church and the public ever since his time and as he has been frequently
told ever since a clergyman came first to the island, and further this deponent
sayeth not.
Sworn before me ]
this 29th day of ] (sd) George McDonough
November 1774 ]
(sd) John Smith
To summarise, in his affidavit, George
MacDonnah deposes that he was at the time of making it upwards of seventy years
of age, but he could not say exactly how old he was. This suggests that some of the planters of
Anguilla at that time were innumerate and probably illiterate as well. He says that he remembered that he was a
child in the time of the Wars of Queen Ann.
These wars lasted from 1702 to 1713, so he is speaking of the first
decade of the eighteenth century. He
says that at that time he attended a school at a church built on the Glebe Land
at The Valley. What is interesting about
this statement is that it is the first and only testimony of the existence of a
church building in Anguilla during the first generation of Anguillians. He then says that he believed, from what he was
told as a youngster, that Parson Nelson was the first parson who had come to
Anguilla. This was back in the time when
George Leonard was deputy governor (1689-1735).
At Leonard’s request, the old lady, Eleanor Connor, showed John
Harrigan, and other young men of the time, where the bounds of the glebe lands
were. John Harrigan then, at the request
of Rev John Shepherd, showed him, MacDonnah, where the boundaries were.[36]
This glebe land that was in dispute refers
to the Anglican Church lands at the Valley.
The St Mary's Anglican Church and its presbytery presently stand on the
glebe land. There was a church on the
site since at least the year 1700. The
result of this suit was that Thomas Hodge Esq was persuaded by his fellow councillors
to be a gentleman and to give up or quit his claim to the land. Hodge consented to an Order being made in
favour of the church. It was very rarely
that an island Council would make an Order in a disputed case against one of
its members. This 1776 case report is
significant because it records the oral history of that much earlier time in
Anguilla.
In about the same year 1678 that the five
Anglican ministers arrived in the Leeward Islands, Governor Stapleton reported
back to the Privy Council on the condition of the islands in his colony.[37] He listed all able men bearing arms, together
with the number of women and children.
There was a total of 550 white persons in Anguilla. This estimate is either too high, or his
estimate of ‘62 men capable of bearing arms’ made just two years before is too
low.
Nevis
|
Antigua
|
St Kitts
|
Montserrat
|
Statia
|
Saba
|
Tortola
|
Anguilla
|
|
White Males
|
||||||||
English
|
1,050
|
800
|
370
|
346
|
||||
Irish
|
450
|
360
|
187
|
33
|
||||
Other
|
34
|
76
|
138
|
33
|
||||
White Women
|
||||||||
English
|
700
|
400
|
409
|
175
|
||||
Irish
|
120
|
130
|
0
|
410
|
||||
Other
|
8
|
14
|
130
|
33
|
||||
White Children
|
||||||||
English
|
920
|
400
|
543
|
240
|
||||
Irish
|
230
|
120
|
0
|
690
|
||||
Other
|
9
|
14
|
120
|
13
|
||||
Total White
|
3,521
|
2,308
|
1,897
|
2,182
|
69
|
90
|
15
|
550
|
Black Males
|
1,422
|
805
|
550
|
400
|
||||
Black Women
|
1,321
|
868
|
500
|
300
|
||||
Black Children
|
1,106
|
499
|
386
|
292
|
||||
Total Black
|
3,859
|
2,172
|
1,436
|
992
|
Table 5: Population of the Leeward Islands in 1678: Governor Stapleton,
CO.1/42.
It is inconceivable that Anguilla became
so attractive a destination for settlement that the population nearly tripled
in such a short period of time.
We do know that immigrants were continuing
to trickle into Anguilla from neighbouring islands. By the year 1680, the Barbadian authorities
were complaining about the high rate of emigration from that island. Freemen, that is, property-holders in
Barbados with less than ten acres, many of them lately indentured servants,
were not able to vote or to play any part in Barbados's political and social
life. There was no more available land
in Barbados, and no future there for the small aspiring planter. Those planters with sugar estates tended to
swallow up the land of the small tobacco farmers, adding to the number of
landless persons. Most of those that
left Barbados to make a new start, turned to the mainland colonies of Boston,
Virginia and Carolina, or returned to live in England. But some moved to the other islands to the
north of Barbados. Of the 593 persons
reported[38]
by Governor Atkins as leaving Barbados in 1679, fully 73% were described as
‘time out’, suggesting that they were recently indentured servants.
Caribbean
|
North America
|
England
|
Other
|
Antigua
- 65
|
Boston
- 68
|
London
- 151
|
Holland
- 1
|
Nevis
- 14
|
Rhode
Island - 3
|
Bristol
- 39
|
|
Montserrat
- 1
|
New
England - 25
|
Liverpool
- 8
|
|
Leeward
Islands - 15
|
New York
- 34
|
Beaumaris
- 3
|
|
Jamaica
- 35
|
Virginia
- 62
|
Topsham
- 3
|
|
Bahamas
- 12
|
Carolina
- 38
|
Poole
- 1
|
|
Tortuga
- 3
|
Newfoundland
- 3
|
||
Suriname
- 5
|
|||
Bermuda
- 4
|
|||
Totals
- 154
|
233
|
205
|
1
|
Table 6: Destinations of 593 persons leaving Barbados in 1679: Dunn, Sugar
and Slaves, Table 11.
Table 6 shows that nearly one-sixth of the
total emigrants from Barbados in 1679, or 95 of them, hoped to set themselves
up as planters somewhere in the Leewards.
Some of them may well have settled in Anguilla where there was land
available for those that cared to work it.
A list of the tickets granted to immigrants from Barbados to Antigua and
other places reveals several names that are significant in this early period of
Anguilla's history.
April 10, 1679
|
Howell, Sarah in the barque Providence
for Bermuda
|
April 17
|
Bushell, William in the ship Pearle for Antigua
|
August 28
|
Lloyd, John in the ship Barbados, Merchant, for the Leeward
Islands
|
December 4
|
Maden, Patrick in the sloop Friendship for Antigua
|
December 24
|
Downing, John in the ship Laurel for Nevis
|
Table 7: List
of persons with Anguillian names shipping out of Barbados in 1679: Dunn, Sugar
and Slaves.
All these surnames extracted from Governor
Atkins’ list of persons shipping out of Barbados are Anguillian family
names. They crop up in the Anguillian
Archives from time to time in subsequent years.
Sarah Howell claimed she was shipping to Bermuda. It is more likely she got off the boat in
Anguilla.
Picking through the documents, it is just
possible to assemble a list of the names of the first generation of Anguillians
who we believe lived in the period 1650-1680.
A few of them were to survive, we cannot say prosper, until the end of
the century. Most of them appear to die
in the many violent conflicts to which the island was subject and from disease
and accident. Those we can be relatively
sure of include:
Mentioned in
|
|
Burrose,
John
|
John
Lake’s 1684 certificate.
|
Carty,
Owin
|
Thomas Connor’s
1689 certificate.
|
Blake,
Valentine
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Bryan,
Daniel
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Bushell,
Thomas
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Call,
Thomas
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Connor,
Thomas
|
Certificate
in 1695.
|
Derrick,
David
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Derrick,
Leo
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Derrick,
Thomas
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Edney,
Peter
|
Jacob
Howell’s 1698 patent.
|
Floyd,
Samuel
|
David
Derrick’s 1708 deed.
|
Gallway,
Richard
|
John
Lake’s 1684 certificate.
|
Green,
John
|
Jacob
Howell’s 1698 patent.
|
Hackett,
Ann
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Harrigan,
John
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Harris,
John
|
Jacob
Howell’s 1698 patent.
|
Howell,
Abraham
|
Elected
deputy governor in 1666.
|
Howell,
Jacob
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Howell,
Ruth
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Jones,
Lewis
|
Jacob
Howell’s 1698 patent.
|
Huntington,
Richard
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Lake,
Edward
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Lake,
Jacob
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Lake,
Joan
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Lake,
John
|
Certificate
in 1684.
|
Leonard,
George
|
Deputy
governor in 1689.
|
Lockrum,
Robert
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Lynch,
Humphrey
|
Patent of
1676 from Abraham Howell
|
Mereweather,
John
|
Member of
Council in 1672.
|
Perkins,
Walter
|
Humphrey
Lynch’s 1676 patent
|
Pickering,
Abednego
|
Purchases
from Jacob Howell in 1699.
|
Richardson,
Jeremiah
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Richardson,
John
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Richardson,
Richard
|
Member of
Council in 1672.
|
Roberts,
William
|
Edward
Lake;s 1704 patent.
|
Romney,
Thomas
|
Patent in
1673.
|
Ruan,
Mary
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Seward,
Humphrie
|
Member of
Council in 1672.
|
Thomas,
William
|
Jacob
Howell’s 1698 patent.
|
Waters
|
Edward
Lake’s 1704 patent.
|
Welch,
Richard
|
Thomas
Connor’s 1689 certificate.
|
Table 8: The names
of the first generation of Anguillians known to us.
The only other document that provides us
with a list of the names of persons who were born into the first generation of
Anguillians is the Anguilla Census of 1716 taken by Governor in Chief Hamilton.[39] Although it was produced early in the period
of the third generation, 1711-1740, we can expect that many of the older
persons named on that list were present in Anguilla fifty years previously.
There are no further statistics available
in the National Archives in London for the population of Anguilla for the balance
of the century. We do know that numbers of
them began to leave after 1680 when a severe drought that was to last for 40
years began. The instability and hazards
of island life were aggravated by the Nine Years War (1689-1697) in Europe and
the Caribbean. But other settlers undoubtedly
came when conditions improved to replace those who left. The seventeenth century closes with war in
the region, the settlement destroyed, and the colonists temporarily evacuated
to Antigua, with large numbers of them emigrating to Crab Island, then, like
Anguilla, considered to be one of the Virgin Islands.
[1] Deputy governor of Anguilla, 1666-1689.
See Chapter 17: The Council.
[2] See Richard S Dunn, Sugar and Slaves:
The Rise of a Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624-1713 (1972).
[3] John Davies, History
of the Caribby Islands (1666), a translation of Charles de Rochefort, Histoire
Naturelle et Morale des Isles Antilles de L'Amerique (1658). See Chapter 3: The Carib Raid.
[4] Sometimes spelled “Wheler” in the
correspondence.
[5] CO.153/1, folio 27: Sir Charles
Wheler’s Instructions.
[6] Governor Richardson’s manager Mr Zagers
acquired a part of his estate in due course.
His acquisition, just west of the old courthouse, was known as “Zagers’
land” and is now mistakenly spelled “Sachassas” instead of “Zagers’.”
[7] Photographed by Martha Burrows and
transcribed by Heather Nielson in 2005.
[8] Francis
Lord Willoughby (1605-1666), Governor in Chief of the Leeward Islands
1660-1666. He was first appointed governor of Barbados in 1650, but surrendered
to Commodore George Ayscue of the Parliamentary force which took Barbados from
the Royalists.
[10] Rhymes with vanilla.
[11] Lieutenant Governor of Anguilla and the
Virgin Islands, 1660-1665.
[12] It is found at CO.1/19, folio 351: A
Generall Description of America or the New World.
[13] Chapter 6: War and the Settlers.
[14] Francis’ only son, William, is sometimes
named in the histories as his heir and successor. However, William died during Francis’
lifetime. Francis left his lands in the
West Indies to his daughters and to his nephew Henry who succeeded to his
titles.
[15] Henry Lord Willoughby, Governor in Chief of
the Leeward Islands, 1666-1668.
[17] CO.1/21, No 46, folio 289: Scott to
Williamson.
[18] CO.1/23, No 103, folio 212, Willoughby to
Williamson.
[20] Thomas Chalkley, The Journal of Thomas
Chalkley (1808). Chapter 5: The Second Generation.
[21] Pere Du Tertre, in his account of the 1656
attack on Anguilla quoted in full in Chapter 3: The Carib Raid,
describes the French attempt to rescue the prisoners of the Caribs. One of them
was an African who was mortally wounded by the French canon fire on the Carib
pirogue. Du Tertre describes his last
moments with these words, “A Negro who had lost both his legs by our shot refused the hand,
which was held out to save him, he threw himself head foremost into the
sea. But his feet not being quite
separated from his legs, he hung by the bones and drowned himself.” It is likely that this
man was a prisoner from Anguilla, but we cannot be certain.
[22] See Chapter 2: The Carib Raid.
[23] Thomas Southey, A Chronological History
of the West Indies (1827, Vol 2, p.104).
[24] CO.152/11, No 56: Hamilton to the Committee on 3 October 1716,
enclosure: The 1716 List of the Inhabitants of Anguilla.
[25] Chapter 9, The Lure of Crab.
[27] Spelled “Wheler” in the correspondence.
[28] CO.1/29, No 14, folio 22:
Stapleton to the Committee on 17 July 1672, enclosure 3: Account of the
Island of Anguilla.
[30] CO.153/2, folio 265. Stapleton to the
Committee on 24 January 1678.
[32] CO.153/2, folio 76: Warner to the Committee
on 3 April 1676: An Account of the
Caribbee Islands.
[33] Anguilla Archives: George MacDonnah’s
affidavit. Maybe Parson Nelson was the Anglican clergyman sent by Governor Parke in
1709, as he sarcastically put it, “to
make Christians of the Anguillians”.
[34] We
see this John Harrigan appearing in the records as a member of Anguilla’s
Executive Council between the years 1735 and the 1750s.
[35] John Smith served as deputy governor of
Anguilla for several years, 1771-1776.
[36] We have in the archives a copy of Rev John
Shepherd’s 1774 patent to be minister of Anguilla from Governor in Chief, Sir
Ralph Payne.
[39] Chapter 10: Crab Island Revisited.
