From whom, what or where did the influence
of the design come?
P. Ann
van B. Stafford
May 30, 2013
Houses in Miniature
1845 The burial-place took my attention as peculiarly neat and
simple. The graves were marked, not by mounds of earth and headstones, or great
massive tombs, but by houses in
miniature, just large enough each to cover one person; mostly about six
feet long, two feet broad, and one and a half high, with a sloping roof and
full gable end, in which was inserted a smallslab containing containing
the name of the occupant, his age, and the day on which he entered his narrow
home, "the house appointed for all living." They were well built,
white, and clean, and, of course, of all sizes. Sometimes a row of them close
to one another indicated a family place of sepulture. The want of sufficient
depth of earth for an ordinary grave, perhaps, led to the adoption of this
literal necropolis.
Rev. Hope Masterton Waddell, Scottish Missionary Society missionary, sailed from Jamaica Sat. Jan 11, 1845 and was shipwrecked on
the East End reef in February 1845. His book:
Twenty-Nine Years in the West Indies and Central
Africa: A Review of Missionary Work and Adventure, 1829-1858 was published in 1865.
Wrecks on the reef at East End, Grand Cayman.
The channel through the reef can clearly be seen.
The channel through the reef can clearly be seen.
There was no road between Bodden
Town and East End
until 1935.
House-shaped gravestones in Grand Cayman are thought to date from the early 1800's.
They were found in all Districts; those that still
exist are:
North West
Point Cemetery,
West Bay (2)
Elmslie
Memorial Church
yard – George Town
(8, including 3 very small ones)
Watler Cemetery, Prospect Point Road, Old Prospect (15)
Eden – Prospect
Cemetery, Prospect Point Road,
Old Prospect (13)
Spotts
Cemetery,
Spotts (10)
Pedro
St James Cemetery, Savannah
(1)
Bodden Town,
Webster United Church
Cemetery (several)
Old Man
Bay Cemetery, North Side (3)
North Side
Cemetery (2)
East End Cemetery (?)
Gun Bay
Cemetery (1 small)
From whom, what or
where did the influence of the design of the house-shaped gravestones in the Cayman Islands come? Perhaps there was no outside
influence.
The
coffin was buried in the sand. Sand was mounded over the grave. A structure was made over
the grave, which would support itself. A slab alone could not be cast, because
maybe the mortar was not sufficiently good.
Coral
rocks (and sometimes bricks from ships’ ballast) were piled on top of the sand,
the length and breadth of where the coffin was buried. (See
Elmslie Church,
Watler Cemetery
and Spotts Cemetery gravestones where part of the ‘roof’
is missing.) The structure needed a
WATER-SHED so that the rain water would run off and not destroy the DAUB with which it was faced. The
resulting structure was house-shaped. Length + breadth + sloping roof =
house-shaped gravestone.
Maybe
there was sentimentality in the design – a house for the repose of the departed.
PACT – acronym for what or where the influence of the
design came:
T Terrain sandy
beach ridge, not cliff rock or valuable arable soil
C Climate heat,
rainfall, hurricanes, burial within 24 hours
A Availability of materials coral rocks and limestone daub (made
from burned coral rocks).
Sometimes
bricks from ships’ ballast were also used.
P Practicality of design approx. 6ft x
2ft slab over the coffin (which was buried in the sand), and weighted with
coral rocks with sloping top (‘roof’) for watershed, so that water did not
settle on it and destroy the daub.
The
resulting structure looked house-shaped.
Who lies there?
Most
of the hardwood plaques with the names and dates have either disappeared or the
inscription on them is no longer legible. The living buried the dead, so who
was living at the time?
Family graveyards
rather than church graveyards
Families
had to bury their dead before there were churches in the Cayman
Islands.
To
try to find out ‘Who lies there?’ I have been making a Family Tree in my Family
Tree Maker Program, starting with the early settlers and their descendants, to
the best of my researched knowledge.
The
first ordained clergyman to lay the foundations of pastoral work in the Cayman Islands was Rev. Thomas Sharpe, Church of England,
who arrived on Dec. 23, 1831.
WATLER Cemetery (National Trust Property)
at Prospect Point:
There
are no discernible names or dates on the 15 house-shaped gravestones.
Watler Cemetery house-shap
Coral rocks, and sometimes red bricks from ship's ballast, were covered with limestone daub.
In Cayman the body was not contained in the actual tomb, but was buried in a coffin in the sand beneath.
The name and dates of the deceased were inscribed on a mahogany panel set into the wall of the "house".
Many of the markers have disappeare
Photo: Ann Stafford, Grand Cayman, Mar.25, 2012
In Cayman the body was not contained in the actual tomb, but was buried in a coffin in the sand beneath.
The name and dates of the deceased were inscribed on a mahogany panel set into the wall of the "house".
Many of the markers have disappeare
Photo: Ann Stafford, Grand Cayman, Mar.25, 2012
Watler Cemetery at Prospect - a typical family cemetery,
National Trust for the Cayman Islands.
The house-shaped graves date from the early 19th. century.
The house-shaped graves date from the early 19th. century.
www.nationaltrust.org.ky/#!watler-cemetery/c1s97
Settlers
first came to the Cayman Islands almost 300 years ago. It became the custom in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for people to set aside a portion of their
land for the family graveyard. There are a number of such plots around the
islands, and many are still used today.
The
wooden coffin lies buried in the ground underneath the stone slab supporting
the monument. This would have been sufficiently heavy to prevent all but the
fiercest of storms from disturbing them. The name of the deceased was inscribed
on a mahogany panel set into the wall of the "house". It is likely
that wood was chosen in preference to stone because the local people were
skilled carpenters, not stonemasons. Sadly, many of the markers have
disappeared and others have become illegible over the years.
EDEN Family
Cemetery at Prospect Point:
There
are names and dates on 3 of the 13 house-shaped gravestones:
Thomas
Knowles EDEN 1782-1843 and his wife
Elizabeth
Charlotte EDEN (née COE) 1783-1839
Charlotte
Matilda EDEN 1843-1853 (their 10
year old granddaughter)
Prospect (Old) - Eden cemetery: Thomas Knowles Eden (d.Oct.30, 1843) and his wife Elizabeth Eden (d.1839)
Photo: Ann Stafford, April 29, 2012
Photo: Ann Stafford, April 29, 2012
William
Eden* 1807-1879 (Custos), (son of Thomas K. and Elizabeth Eden) and his wife
Rachel Jane (nee ?) 1811-1901 are also buried in the EDEN Family
Cemetery at Prospect
Point, but not with house-shaped gravestones.
Charlotte Matilda EDEN was their 10 year old daughter.
SPOTTS cemetery, Spotts (10):
SPOTTS cemetery, Spotts (10):
Spotts cemetery house-shap
Photo: Ann Stafford, Mar.18, 2012.
Photo: Ann Stafford, Mar.18, 2012.
GUN BAY cemetery (1):
New
born child’s grave, 1874
Gun Bay cemetery - child's house-shap
Photo: Ann Stafford, May 6, 2012
Photo: Ann Stafford, May 6, 2012
OLD MAN BAY
cemetery:
Old Man Bay cemetery, house-shap
Photo: Ann Stafford, Feb.8, 2013
www.nationaltrust.org.ky/#!traditional-sand-cemeteries/c16if
(They)
are believed to be those of three Whittaker sisters, descendants of five
Whittaker brothers who came and settled in Old Man Bay around 1840.
NORTH SIDE
Cemetery (2):
William Grant Tatum b.
March 17, 1824, died
Mar.10, 1910, married on Sept.10, 1847 to
Mary L. Tatum née McLaughlin,
b. Mar.17, 1825, died Mar.11, 1919
(William
was not related to the original North Side Tatum family.)
ELMSLIE Memorial
Church, George
Town
Memorial stone laid by Rev.
R. C. Young, July 1, 1920. 90th. Anniversary
of the church - 1922-2012.
House-shaped
gravestone of Mary Catherine Page-Merren, died Sept.23, 1875, paternal grandmother of Veta
Merren-Bodden.
This was destroyed, along with others, to make way for a parking lot, some time
after 1973.
Traditional Sand
Cemeteries - extract from National Trust for the Cayman
Islands Information sheet
In days gone by, there were no community
graveyards in the Cayman Islands. It was the
practice for each family to be responsible for the safe burial of their dead.
During the eighteenth century people started to set aside a small portion of
their land to serve as the family graveyard.
As
good soil was scarce and needed to grow crops, it could not be spared for such
a purpose. Much of the remaining land was made up of very hard coral limestone
rock, which was extremely difficult to excavate with the simple tools
available. Fortunately, the answer lay on the shoreline, where the deep,
infertile, sandy soil had less value and was relatively easy to dig. It must be
remembered that it is only in the twentieth century that beaches have been seen
as an asset. The early settlers preferred to live away from the threat of flooding
which they represented.
FOUNDED UPON THE SEAS - A
History of the Cayman Islands and Their People by Michael Craton and the
New History Committee 2003
Page
236 has a drawing captioned ‘Graves in Grand Cayman
dating from the early 1800’s’
A Study of Church and State
in the Cayman Islands: THE DEPENDENCY QUESTION by Nicholas J. G. Sykes
Chapter
5 THE CAYMANAS CHURCH
UP TO 1839 p.53 - extract:
1820’s ‘ In the beginning’, the Caymanas Church
was a congregation of worshippers presided over by a ‘respectable Inhabitant’
and it is notable that Caymanas Governor’ William Bodden had a ‘house of
Public’ worship built for them. There is no question that the inhabitants took
it for granted that the Faith they practised was the Faith of the Mother
country, and they would have been within the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of
the Bishop of London. Later, the See of Jamaica was erected and the Rt. Rev.
Christopher Lipscomb was installed as the Church of England's first Bishop of
Jamaica.
1836 June 9 to 1837 June 9 p.67
Report
of the Rev. David Wilson Church of England
Stipendiary Curate of the Island
of Grand Caymanas
His
George Town
Congregation 280
His
Prospect Congregation 200
Number
of Baptisms
38
Number
of Marriages
11
Number
of Burials 9
Page
84 has two photographs of old tombs at the Watler
Cemetery, Prospect Point, and George Town church yard.
‘It is possible, though unlikely, that one or other goes back to Church of
England times.’
TIMELINE
1503 May 10 Columbus sighted Cayman Brac and Little Cayman on his 4th. voyage and named
them Las Tortugas. Over the next 100 years, the name Caymanas or Cayman became
common.
1586 Sir Francis Drake's fleet
of 23 ships stopped for two days at uninhabited Grand
Cayman. Crocodiles,
alligators, iguanas and numerous turtles were recorded.
1649 King Charles I executed
1653-1658 Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector, virtual
dictator
1655 Cromwell’s grand Western Design, English joint
army-navy force, captured Jamaica
from the Spanish
1655 The Maroons were the slaves of the Spanish,
who escaped into the forests and mountains of Jamaica, before and after the English arrived.
1656 Cromwell issued a proclamation in other
colonies, inviting settlers for the new colony of Jamaica. William BOWDEN, an early
settler from Nevis, arrived in December with Major Luke Stokes, Governor of
Nevis, in the Morant Bay area, St.
Thomas. (Within three months, by March 1657,
two-thirds of the 1600 settlers had died of fevers in the low-lying coastal
area.) Bowden is an area in St. Thomas
which takes its name from a former owner.
1661-71
The first recorded settlements were located on Little Cayman and Cayman Brac, during the tenure of Sir
Thomas Modyford as Governor of Jamaica. Muddy Foots, Little
Cayman is named after him. Because of the depredations of Spanish
privateers, Modyford's successor called the settlers back to Jamaica, though by this time Spain had recognized British possession of the Islands in the 1670 Treaty of Madrid.
1670 Under the Treaty of Madrid,
Spain recognized England's
sovereignty over Jamaica and
various other Caribbean islands, including
Cayman.
1734
First royal grant of land in Grand Cayman was made by the Governor of Jamaica. It
covered 3,000 acres in the area between Prospect and North Sound. A total of
five land grants were made between 1734-42. Mahogany
and logwood were exported to Jamaica.
Population perhaps 100-150.
1735 Isaac BAWDEN of Grand Cayman married Sarah
Lamar, widow, in Port Royal,
Jamaica
1765 William EDEN
from Wiltshire, England (b.1737-
d.1801), arrived in Grand Cayman from Jamaica
1773 Gauld survey map and notes, early settlers:
population 450
1773 Thomas THOMPSON, native of Penicuik, Scotland
arrived in Cayman sometime after 1773. He founded and settled PROSPECT. Prospect
is not marked on the Gauld map, nor are any houses marked in that location.
Shortly afterwards, he commenced cultivating cotton extensively, which he
shipped to England.
1775-1783 American Revolutionary War
1776 some time after this date – Fort at Prospect
built
1780 William Eden built Pedro Castle
1780’s Cotton, turtle,
sarsaparilla and wood exported to Jamaica.
1789 Mutiny on the Bounty - Capt. William Bligh
attempted to take breadfruit from Tahiti to the West
Indies
1789 French Revolution
1790 James Goodchild COE Snr (1769-1839) from Ipswich, England,
who went to Jamaica
when he was 12 years old (1781). He married Rachael Ann,
(daughter of William Eden) on Dec.25, 1790. He was captain of the Militia at
Prospect.
1790 Fort George in George
Town constructed at approximately this date
1793
Capt. William Bligh successfully took breadfruit, and many other plants, to the
West Indies
1794 "Wreck of the Ten
Sail": ten ships, including HMS Convert, the navy ship leading a convoy of
58 merchantmen, wrecked off East End.
1795–1801
Earl of Balcarres - Governor of Jamaica
1800 William Eden (Snr.) left Cayman for
Pearl Lagoon, Nicaragua. His son, William (Jnr.),
by his first wife, Dorothy, née Bodden, inherited Pedro St. James. He sold it
to his brother-in-law, James Coe, Public Recorder and Chief Magistrate. James
Coe left Cayman at some time and resold it to William Eden (Jnr)
1801 William Eden (Snr.)
builder Pedro Castle, died in Pearl Lagoon, Nicaragua.
1801-1805 Sir George Nugent Governor of Jamaica
1802
CORBET Report census: population 933, including 551 slaves
1802 Cotton – 30 tons per year exported from Cayman
1805 Aug. 28 Letter from William Bodden to Governor
Nugent of Jamaica.
In the beginning, a respectable inhabitant presided over the Caymanas church, a
congregation of worshippers. ‘Governor’ William Bodden had a house of public
worship built in Bodden
Town. The faith they
practised was the faith of the Mother Country.
1807 Abolition of the Slave Trade in the British Empire
1817 Registration of slaves were made by parish
offices in Jamaica
1824 July 24 Diocese (or See) of Jamaica established. Rt. Rev.
Christopher Lipscomb was installed as the Church of England’s first Bishop of
Jamaica
1825 The new Bishop communicated with the ‘Governor of
the Caymans’
1826 Bishop of Jamaica stopped off in Grand Cayman on
his way from Jamaica to Belize
1826 James Shearer Jackson imprisoned in Pedro St.
James
1831 Dec.10 Election
at Pedro St James for the first Legislative Assembly
1831 Dec.23 Church of England Rev. Thomas Sharpe arrives
in Grand Cayman. A church, a thatched wattle
and daub cabin, was built in George Town (on the
site of the present Elmslie
United Memorial
Church).
1831 Dec.10 & 31 Meeting
of Representatives and Magistrates of Grand Cayman to form a legislature at Pedro
St. James. The first Custos or Chief
Magistrate was appointed
1833 Abolition of slavery throughout the British Empire
1834
Bishop of Jamaica, Christopher Lipscomb, visited Cayman and consecrated the George Town church. Later
a second church was built at Prospect, both were wattle and daub cabins.
1834-1836 The Marquess of Sligo, Governor
of Jamaica
1834
Aug.1 Emancipation of British slaves. They became ‘Apprentices’
1835
May 2 Caymanas Apprentices set free, having been unlawfully apprenticed. They
were not registered in 1817.
1836-1839 Sir Lionel Smith, Governor of Jamaica
1836
Sept. 5. Memorial to His Majesty King William IV from the Inhabitants in the
Caymanas, (Custos, Magistrates and other Inhabitants………………. ….
occupied by descendants of British born subjects and professed of the Christian
religion…
petition
to Parliament via Governor of Jamaica, Sir Lionel Smith
1837
Jan.23. Reply from Lord Glenelg
1837
May first exploratory visit by Rev. James Atkins, Wesleyan Missionary Society
1837
June 20 King William IV died and his niece Victoria became Queen of the United Kingdom
1837
Sept. 28-29 Hurricane - Racer’s Storm, one
of the worst hurricanes of the 19th. century - Sept.28 to Oct.9
1837
Oct. 25 Hurricane
1838
March 29 Petition to 18 year old Queen Victoria: ‘The island
is inhabited by us, your Majesty’s attached subjects’ about compensation after
emancipation in 1834 and release of the Apprentices in 1835 and the devastation
caused by the two hurricanes in 1837, that destroyed the George Town church,
severely injured the Prospect church, reduced upwards of one hundred dwellings
to the ground, wrecked vessels, destroyed fields and brought them to a state of
starvation.
1838
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
published
1839
July Wesleyan Rev. Mark Bird, seconded from Jamaica,
arrived in Grand Cayman.
Over the next 5 years he was succeeded by 6 other
Wesleyan missionaries.
1839
July Church of England Rev. David Wilson
leaves Grand Cayman
1839
Elizabeth Charlotte EDEN (née COE) 1783-1839
– house-shaped gravestone, Prospect Point Eden family cemetery
1842
Wesleyan Rev. John Mearns – 9 month tenure in Grand Cayman.
He preached and administered communion in 5 places, riding 50 miles a week on
horseback. The first Wesleyan Chapel was built in West Bay
and another was started at PROSPECT.
1843
Thomas Knowles EDEN 1782-1843 – house-shaped gravestone,
Prospect Point Eden family cemetery
1844
The last Wesleyan missionary Rev. John Green left Grand
Cayman after a few months – ‘the soil of the country is so
impoverished, it won’t yield sufficient quantities of provisions’.
1845
Jan. Presbyterian Rev. Hope Masteron Waddell on his way from Jamaica to Scotland
via New Orleans was shipwrecked on the East End reef. He had to spend ten days in Grand Cayman before he could continue on his voyage. He
described the house-shaped gravestones in George
Town – houses in
miniature.
1846 July Rev. James Elmslie, pastor of Green Island, Hanover, Jamaica (born in 1786 in Aberdeen, Scotland)
offered to go to Cayman at the
age of 50. He established the Presbyterian church in Grand
Cayman.
1846
- 1863 Presbyterian Rev. James Elmslie
ministered throughout Grand Cayman
1853
Charlotte Matilda EDEN 1843-1853–
house-shaped gravestone, Prospect Point Eden family cemetery, (10 year old
granddaughter of Thomas K. and Elizabeth Eden).
-------------------------------------
1656 Jamaica – The Settlers From Nevis
By S. A. G. Taylor
p.14-16
Extracts:
When Cromwell heard of the capture of
Jamaica
he endeavoured to attract settlers to his newly won domain. He advised the
people of New England,
whom he declared had been driven from the land of their birth to a desert and
barren wilderness, to remove themselves to a land of plenty!
He wrote to the Governors of the
various West Indian Colonies and advocated a similar policy, but as these
Islands had been brought to the brink of ruin by the loss of four thousand
able-bodied men who had enlisted in Venables' Army, they did not look on this
suggestion with much enthusiasm and did little to further it, all save the
Governor of Nevis, Luke Stokes.
………………………..
The names of
some of the estates in the. district such as Bowden, Wards River, Stanton,
Stokes Hall, Stokesfield, Phillipsfield, Wheelersfield and Rolandsfield are
probably those of the first owners and there is another name here about which
it is interesting to speculate. Near Stokesfield there is a little stream known
as the River Styx. Perhaps it is connected in some way with the burial place of
the first settlers, if so, let us hope that the shades of the men and women
from Nevis rest in peace in the world beyond
its banks.
1773 Gauld survey map and notes: population 450
George Gauld spent ten days on and around the
island while making his hydrographic survey. He commented about the inhabitants
way of life. The settlers were very desirous of having a Clergyman and a
Surgeon to reside among them. A great quantity of cotton was grown for export along with
turtles.
East
End 3
families
Bodden Town (South Side) 21 families
Spotts
(Spot’s Bay) 2
families
Hogsties
(the West End) 13
families
Total 39
families, total population about 450
(whites, Negroes and Mulattoes)
Founded
Upon the Seas pages 53 and 112
1802 Cayman Census, Corbet Report: population 933, including 551 slaves.
Edward Corbet was instructed by Sir George Nugent, Governor of Jamaica (1801-1805), to go to the Cayman Islands and write a full report of the population, cultivation, soil, etc
1802 Cayman Census Corbet report
Governor Nugent Letters On The Cayman Islands Corbet Report June 3, 1802 Page 8-13 (p.11 of pdf)
Edward Corbet was instructed by Sir George Nugent, Governor of Jamaica (1801-1805), to go to the Cayman Islands and write a full report of the population, cultivation, soil, etc
1802 Cayman Census Corbet report
Governor Nugent Letters On The Cayman Islands Corbet Report June 3, 1802 Page 8-13 (p.11 of pdf)
The names of the families are included in Corbet’s
report
East End
North Side
Bodden
Town
Frank
Sound
Little
Pedro Wm
Watler and Thos. Knowles Eden (unmarried)
Spotts
Wm.
Eden, James Coe Snr. And Wm Bodden (the Younger)
Prospect
Waide Watler Junior and
Thomas Thomson
S.W. Sound
George Town J.
Drayton, Abraham Bodden, Sterling Rivers, Sarah Nixon, Wm. Jennett, Geo Bodden,
WS Prescott, Benj. Bodden, Eliza Conoir, Mary Savery, John Bodden, John Ed. Rivers,
James Thomson, Cornelia
Scott, Mary Wilson, John S. Jackson.
C. Parsons, James
Parsons, Wm Parsons. Lind
Rivers, Geo Barrow.
Wm Trusty, Catherine
Mitchell.
West
Bay
Boatswain
Bay
Little Cayman
and Cayman Brac were uninhabited.
1802 – Edward Corbet’s report to
His Excellency, Major General Nugent of Jamaica
explains “ At Bodden
Town there is a small
place of worship and in which they have divine service. The person who
officiates is not an ordained Clergyman, but a respectable inhabitant. Page 112 of “Founded upon the Seas”.
When
they wish to enter into engagement of marriage they repair to some port in this
Island chiefly I understand to Montego Bay.”
See page 7 of “Our Islands Past” Volume I
The British West Indian Philatelist
p.8-13 (p.11 of pdf)
The British West Indian Philatelist
p.8-13 (p.11 of pdf)
Cayman House-shaped
gravestones – P.
Ann van B. Stafford’s
online albums with pictures
North West Point
Cemetery, West Bay
Elmslie
Memorial Church,
George Town (8, including 3 very small ones)
Prospect
(Old) - Eden
cemetery, Prospect Point
Road:
Thomas Knowles Eden
(d.Oct.30, 1843) and his wife Elizabeth Eden (d.1839)
Prospect
(Old) - Eden
cemetery, Prospect Point Road:
William Eden 1807-1879
(Custos 1855-1879) (son of Thomas K. & Elizabeth Eden) – and his wife Rachel Jane
1811-1901 not
house-shaped gravestone
Watler Cemetery, Prospect Point Road: Property of the
National Trust for the Cayman Islands -
house-shaped gravestones
Spotts Cemetery, Shamrock Road: house-shaped gravestones, beside the graves
of Jane Merren (Mar.7, 1808 - Aug.7, 1887) and George Merren (Sept.13, 1813 -
Dec.21, 1895)
Pedro
/ Eden Cemetery, Pedro Castle Road: house-shaped gravestone opposite Pedro St.
James
Bodden Town
cemetery opposite Webster Memorial Church: house-shaped gravestones
Old Man Bay cemetery: house-shaped gravestones (3)
Old Man Bay cemetery: house-shaped gravestones (3)
CaymanCultural
National Trust for
the Cayman Islands - Information Sheets
Traditional Sand
Cemeteries
(They)
are believed to be those of three Whittaker sisters, descendants of five
Whittaker brothers who came and settled in Old Man Bay around 1840.
North Side Cemetery (2)
William Grant Tatum b.
March 17, 1824,
died Mar.10, 1910, married on Sept.10, 1847 to
Mary L. Tatum née
McLaughlin, b. Mar.17, 1825, died
Mar.11, 1919
It
is believed that William, of English or Irish decent, arrived in Cayman with
his brother, Moet, in the 1840's. Both married local girls, and William and
Mary eventually settled in North Side. They were not related to the original
North Side Tatum family, who were among the very first settlers, listed as
"Free people of colour" in the 1802 census.
Bodden Town United Church Cemetery
contains
several unmarked traditional gravestones
Gun Bay cemetery
lies
behind the church. It has clearly been in use for many years, as the
house-shaped gravemarkers under a Firecracker bush testify to its long use.
A History of
Elections in the Cayman Islands
According to our
records the first formal type of elected Government was first introduced in December 1831. However, prior to
this the Islands were administered by a number
of Magistrates and Senior Magistrates, and some times even by a Custos,
appointed by the Governor of Jamaica. This system of Government worked well
while the population remained relatively small but as the population increased
a number of problems were experienced because of weaknesses in the system. [See
“Founded upon the Seas” Chap. 5 “The Beginnings of Self-Government” By
M.Craton] The first Magistrates ruled with some references to Jamaican Law. In 1802, as Edward Corbet had noted
in his Report,”The Magistrates are understood to have the same power as those
in this island [Jamaica],
but when any new measure is to be adopted it is generally submitted by them to
the consideration of the population at large.” This seemed to have been a
very democratic manner of dealing with affairs of state, but not everyone was
pleased as this led to some confusion and conflict.
By at least 1823, the Chief Magistrate, James Coe Sr.,
and the other “Magistrates and principal inhabitants” of Grand
Cayman apparently felt they needed a more formal system of
lawmaking and set of laws. Accordingly, they asked for and got commissions for
several more Magistrates from Governor
Lord Manchester.
Then on 13 December 1823, the
Magistrates and “principal inhabitants” held a meeting at William Eden’s
residence at Pedro St. James. Their first decision was to lease the Pedro
property from William Eden for £5. 6s. 8d a year. It would be used as an animal
pound, court-house, and jail, with a daily payment of 2s. 11d authorized
whenever there was a prisoner.
Other laws were passed at
this time, which dealt with roaming livestock, duties on dry goods, provisions,
liquor, or any kind of merchandize sold by any non-inhabitant. Another law,
which prohibited the sale of liquors, wines, by any slave, was also passed at
this time.
Pedro St. James continued to
be the seat of Government, with regular meeting held at this location. On 5th
December 1831 a meeting was held at Pedro St. James to form a proper
legislative assembly with representatives and Magistrates from each district
appointed.- forming as it were two houses in imitation of the Council and
Assembly of Jamaica.
On 10th December 1831, 2
representatives of each were “elected” for the districts of West Bay, George Town, South West Sound, Prospect, and Bodden Town
the method of election is not known. These ten representatives later referred
to as the “Vestry” assembled for the first time on 31st December 1831 in George Town, and met again
on 2nd January 1832. The eight Magistrates met at the same time but in a
different room carefully preserving the classic British form of a bicameral
legislature. No law was “deemed valid” until it had received the assent of both
houses.
1832 January The names of the
Magistrates & Representatives at the 1832 meeting were:
Magistrates
John
Drayton
Robert
Stephen Watler
Waide
W. Bodden
John
S. Jackson
James
Coe Jr.
Abraham
O Feurtado
Elin
J. Parsons
Nathaniel
Glover
Vestrymen
George
W. Wood
James
Wood
James
Coe Snr.
W. Eden Jr.
John
Goodhew
James
Parsons Snr.
William
James Bodden
Howard
Lindsay Thompson
Samuel
Parsons
William
Bodden
1839 The following is a summary
of subsequent elections results.
George Town
Wm.
James Bodden
Thomas
S Thompson
Wm.
A. Thompson
James
E. Parsons
Bodden Town
Richard
Carter
Thomas
Greenwood
George
McCoy
John
B. Wood
J.
D. Watler
Joseph
Bodden Jr.
P.
McLaughlin
Spotts & Prospect
James
S. Jackson
William
R. Bodden
Tabulon
Farrell
South Sound
Shin
Parsons
John
Goodhew
West Bay
William
Brown
D.
J. S. Bodden
A
Study of Church and State in the Cayman Islands THE DEPENDENCY QUESTION by Nicholas J. G. Sykes
Chapter
5 (extract) www.churchofenglandcayman.com/DQA1CH5B.html
THE CAYMANAS CHURCH UP TO 1839
THE CAYMANAS CHURCH UP TO 1839
"In the beginning" the Caymanas Church
was a congregation of worshippers presided over by a "respectable
Inhabitant" and it is notable that the Caymanas "Governor"
William Bodden had a "house of Public worship" built for them. There
is no question that the inhabitants took it for granted that the Faith they
practised was the Faith of the Mother country, and they would have been within
the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Bishop of London. Later, the See of
Jamaica was erected and the Rt. Rev. Christopher Lipscomb was installed as the
Church of England's first Bishop of Jamaica. It should not be forgotten that
the Church of England had already existed in Jamaica before that time for over [one]
and a half centuries, but apparently had formed no ministerial connection with
the Caymanas Church from the time that it began independently.
The purpose of the Letters Patent issued in 1824 for the new
Bishopric of Jamaica was to "erect found ordain make and constitute the
Island of Jamaica the Bahama Islands and the Settlements in the Bay of
Honduras, and their respective dependencies, to be a Bishop's See".5.3
In 1825 the new Bishop communicated with the "Governor of the
Caymans" letting him know of his intent to establish the Church in
"that part of his diocese". At the same time Mr. James Coe Junior in
the Caymanas wrote a letter to the Rev'd Isaac Mann in Jamaica in which the feasibility of a clergyman
being sent to the Caymanas from Jamaica
was discussed. In December 1831 a Church of England clergyman arrived in the
Caymanas from the Bishop of Jamaica, and until 1839 the Church in Caymanas
manifested in practical terms its willingness to receive the Bishop of
Jamaica's pastoral oversight. All this came to a decisive end by the summer of
1839, when once again the Caymanas Church became ministerially disconnected from the
Church in Jamaica, and
documentary sources from 1845 to 1970 all without exception show that the Cayman Islands were not included in the Diocese of
Jamaica (see Ch. 6 sections 3 and 4 below).
-------------------------------
Cayman Chief
Magistrates or Custodes
* 1750 William Cartwright
* 1776 William Bodden William Bodden (Governor Bodden
I) 1776 – 1789
William
Bodden (Governor Bodden II) 1789 – 1823
* 1823 James Coe the Elder
* 1829 John Drayton
* 1842 James Coe the Younger
* 1855 William Eden
* 1879 William Bodden Webster
* 1888 Edmund Parsons
* 1829 John Drayton
* 1842 James Coe the Younger
* 1855 William Eden
* 1879 William Bodden Webster
* 1888 Edmund Parsons
Commissioners
*
1898 Frederick
Shedden Sanguinnetti, ISO
*
1907 George Stephenson Shirt Hirst
Note:
Custos rotulorum (plural: Custodes rotulorum) Latin for Keeper of
the Rolls, a civic post that is recognized in England,
Jamaica
and Cayman.
1845 Houses In
Miniature
Twenty-Nine
Years in the West Indies and Central Africa: A Review of Missionary Work and
Adventure, 1829-1858 by Hope Masterton Waddell,
book published 1865, Scottish Missionary Society missionary
(b.1804, went to Jamaica in 1829). Chapter X
1845. Missionary Work and Adventure. Sailed for New Orleans, Cayman: pages 212-217, p.216
The Grand Cayman is but a few feet above the level of the
sea) with a thin coating of soil on solid rock. There is pasturage for cattle,
but no farms. Even the bush, which can grow where man cannot labour, is
stunted. . Yams, cocoas, and plantains are unknown. "Sweet potatoes will
grow in some parts," said a good woman, "and we all go a fishing,
especially for turtle, to supply the English ships. But, to tell the truth,
sir, our main dependence is on the wrecks, and we all thank God when a ship
comes ashore." The Grand Cayman is a trap
for ships, and catches more, perhaps, than any other spot of equal extent in
the world. It is on the high road of all West India vessels, homeward bound,
and of all outward bound for New Orleans, Havannah, and other ports in the Gulf
of Mexico while the never-ceasing current varies, sometimes, with the
trade wind, both in force and direction, sweeping one time north and another
time south of the island. Seamen, who don't want to call there for turtle, give
it a wide berth but sometimes, as in our case, when they had reckoned
themselves thirty miles off it, find their ships crashing on its reefs. Anchors
and chain cables were lying all over the beach. Fragments of ships seemed to
form part of most of the common people's houses.
The burial-place took my attention as
peculiarly neat and simple. The graves were marked, not by mounds of earth and
headstones, or great massive tombs, but by houses
in miniature, just large enough each to cover one person; mostly about six
feet long, two feet broad, and one and a half high, with a sloping roof and
full gable end, in which was inserted a smallslab containing containing
the name of the occupant, his age, and the day on which he entered his narrow
home, "the house appointed for all living." They were well built,
white, and clean, and, of course, of all sizes. Sometimes a row of them close
to one another indicated a family place of sepulture. The want of sufficient
depth of earth for an ordinary grave, perhaps, led to the adoption of this
literal necropolis.
Rev. Hope Masterton Waddell sailed from Montego
Bay, Jamaica on
Sat. Jan 11, 1845 in a large, new schooner, the Weymouth, on his way back to
Scotland with his family and was shipwrecked on the East End reef at midnight on Sunday.
A few days after their rescue, there was a public sale of the
wreck of the Weymouth, which attracted parties from
other places, including ‘the owner of a small schooner from George’s Bay, at
the west end of the island’. They went first to ‘George’s Town’ and that is
where he described the burial place, the ‘houses in miniature’. There was a
church and a schoolhouse, but neither minister nor teacher, none on the island.
On the 22nd. they continued on their journey to New Orleans.
The following
year, in July 1846, Rev. James Elmslie, pastor of Green
Island, Hanover, Jamaica (born in 1786 in
Aberdeen, Scotland) offered to go to Cayman
at the age of 50. He established the Presbyterian Church in Grand
Cayman, where he ministered throughout the island from 1846 –
1863.
Dr Isobel
Rigol 2009 report (extract)
2.2 Watler Cemetery
Watler Cemetery is
part of a larger complex of coastal cemeteries developed in the Cayman Islands. This peculiar site is a family graveyard
dating back to the early 19th. century or perhaps before, responding
to the 18th. and 19th. century local custom of dedicating
a portion of their land to burials. The justification for these cemeteries’
particular location was the islands’ rocky and difficult to excavate inland and
the need to preserve the soils for agriculture.
Most of the tombs are
house-shaped, made out of red bricks and faced with a layer of burned coral and
limestone daub. The names of the deceased were originally inscribed on mahogany
markers set on the walls of the graves. The graveyard is enclosed within a
coral stone wall.
The beautiful, peaceful and
apparently undisturbed coastal setting, withsea grapes, almond trees and
eventually the sound of the waves, provides a peculiarly poetic experience. The
Watler Cemetery
is – without doubts – an exceptional
exponent of the Caymanian and Caribbean
cultural heritage. It is very important to point out that the Watler Cemetery
and the other coastal graveyards (Spott’s, Coe’s, etc) in Grand Cayman – are,
if not unique, at least rare in the Caribbean
sub region.
Though it has been stated
that: “Similar grave markers have been found in England and Wales dating from
mediaeval times, while others (dating from the early 1600’s) are to be found
elsewhere in the British West Indies:, the consultant has not found any
description or graphic evidence. She
knows several cemeteries – both Christian and Jewish – in the Caribbean and
thinks there are not any tombs like the ones seen in Grand
Cayman. While recently doing a preliminary exploration on this
topic she found out some strange coincidences: similar tombs at the Jewish
Cemetery in George Town, Penang,
Malaysia, others with a
similar shape in the Jewish Cemeteries of Fez, Morocco and Vilnius, Lithuania.
There are also some cemeteries on the Cuban Northeast coast at the Holguín
province that might have some similarities with those in Cayman. As far as the
consultant understands, a comprehensive and comparative research about the
origins of Cayman’s cemeteries has not yet been until this date carried out.
Further research on Cayman Islands coastal cemeteries is needed in order to
reveal their uniqueness or exceptionalty at least at a Regional level.
Considering the exceptional
values of this Cemetery (also the others in Grand Cayman
and the other islands), the threats it
faces and the challenge of its proper maintenance, it would be good to propose
it to be included in the World Monuments
Watch List of the 100 Most Endangered Monuments. This annual list – widely
published worldwide – can allow obtaining funds and the promotion of local and
international awareness.
Watler’s Cemetery
could be included in the World Monument Fund’s Watch List for 2014.
CaymanianCompass,
April 1, 2013
Prospect
Watler Cemetery Property of the National Trust for the Cayman Islands
www.nationaltrust.org.ky/?p=706
www.nationaltrust.org.ky/?p=706
The
wooden coffin lies buried in the ground underneath the stone slab supporting
the monument. This would have been sufficiently heavy to prevent all but the
fiercest of storms from disturbing them. The name of the deceased was inscribed
on a mahogany panel set into the wall of the "house". It is likely
that wood was chosen in preference to stone because the local people were
skilled carpenters, not stonemasons. Sadly, many of the markers have
disappeared and others have become illegible over the years.
The
whole area of Prospect is one of the most fertile on the island, and was among the
first on Grand Cayman to have contained a
settlement of any size. One of two forts
built to protect Grand Cayman from attack by Spanish marauders from Cuba
was built in Prospect. Although the fort was demolished many years ago, the
site of it is marked with a monument which can been seen further along the Old Prospect Road
on the way into George Town.
Focus
on Spotts and Prospect
Watler Cemetery, Prospect Point Road - 15 house-shaped
gravestones
Eden Family
Cemetery, Prospect Point Road - 13 house-shaped gravestones
Spotts
Cemetery,
Shamrock Road
- 10
house-shaped gravestones
William
EDEN from
Devizes, Wiltshire, England,
who arrived in Cayman in 1765, was married first to Dorothy (née Bodden) in Savannah-la-Mar, Jamaica, on December 25, 1765. They
had one son, William Eden II, and 3 daughters. They lived at Spotts, marked Edens on the 1773 Gauld
map.
After
Dorothy died in 1773, William married Elizabeth
‘Bessy’ Clark, who was born in Falmouth,
Jamaica. She
was the daughter of Thomas Knowles Clark and Mary (née Savory). William and
Bessy Eden had 5 daughters and one son - Thomas Knowles Eden.
In
1780 William built stone house at Pedro - Pedro St James Castle. His son
William Eden II (Jr), (by his first wife Dorothy), as William the Executor and
Heir at law, came into its possession and sold it to James Coe in 1800. James
Coe left the island some years later and resold it to William Eden, who
occupied it for some years. At his death he bequeathed it to 2 coloured boys
named Joseph and Samuel, who assumed the surname Eden and thus started a new family of that
name.
There
were a lot of his descendants called William Eden from both branches of this
family.
After
William Eden died in Pearl Lagoon, Nicaragua
in 1801, where he was buried, Elizabeth ‘Bessy’
married Thomas THOMPSON of Penicuik,
Scotland, who
settled in PROSPECT.
Thomas
THOMPSON
native of Penicuik, Scotland arrived in Cayman probably
after 1773, because Prospect is not marked on the 1773 Gauld map, nor are any
houses shown, (see link above). He founded and settled PROSPECT. He married
Elizabeth, widow of William EDEN and appears to have had but one child, Thomas
Knowles Thompson. Shortly after settling down at Prospect, he commenced
cultivating COTTON extensively, which he shipped to England. With one cargo he returned
home himself and brought back with him a cousin William Thompson who settled
down at Whitehall
and founded the family we now always call the 'Georgetown Thompsons'. Ref.
Hirst p.93.
Thomas
Thompson probably named PROSPECT. Hirst p.95.
Thomas,
together with one James Watler are said to have built the Fort at Prospect.
Hirst p.94.
1802
census Thomas THOMSON family of 13, owned 56 slaves.
Note:
Thomson/Thompson – sometimes it might be spelt one way or the other.
Note:
William Bodden – there were a lot of people with the name William Bodden.
-------------------------------------
REFERENCES
Booker
Kohlman, Aarona, Under
Tin Roofs p.48/49
Cayman Islands Government www.gov.ky/portal/page?_pageid=1142,1481082&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
Cayman Islands National Archive - Oral History interviews www.cina.gov.ky/portal/page?_pageid=3001,5870024&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
Corbet
Census report 1802 BWIP-06-04_195506 British West Indian Philatelist
Craton, Michael & the New History Committee Founded
Upon the Seas 2003
DaCosta,
Patricia L., The History of Pedro St.
James ‘Castle’ 2003
Ebanks,
S.O. “Bertie”, Cayman Emerges 1983
Fierst
Shai and Petuchowski, Sam, Jamaica: Hunt’s Bay and Orange Street
Cemeteries – March 2009 www.isjm.org/ISJMProjects/JewishCemeteryatHuntsBayJamaica/tabid/90/Default.aspx
Find
A Grave - Cayman Islands Cemeteries
Frankel,
Rachel, Houses
of Life: The Jewish Cemeteries of Jamaica
Gauld
map 1773 (zoom in to see where houses
are marked) www.heritagecharts.com/mapchart.php/305/5/the_island_of_grand_cayman_by_george_gauld
Hirst,
George S.S., Notes on the History of the Cayman Islands 1910
Kieran,
Brian L., The Lawless Caymanas A Story of Slavery, Freedom and the West India
Regiment 1992, p.173,4
Chapter 10 Compensation Claims at Rest
Petition Memorial to Queen Victoria 1837 CO 137/226, FF.121-124
Petition Memorial to the Queen in Council,
from the Custos, Magistrates and Inhabitants of Grand Caymanas
National
Trust for the Cayman Islands, Traditional Sand
Cemeteries and Watler Cemetery,
Denise Bodden
Pedley, Arthurlyn,
Old Prospect – Eden
Cemetery house-shaped
gravestones (personal communication)
Racer’s
Storm, 1837 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1837_Racer%27s_Storm
Rigol,
Dr. Isobel, 2.2 Watler Cemetery
Senior,
Olive, A-Z of Jamaican Heritage http://books.google.com/books?id=n5FqAAAAMAAJ&q=Stokes+Hall+#search_anchor
Sykes,
Nicholas J.G., The Dependency Question
1996
Waddell, Hope Masterton, Twenty-Nine
Years in the West Indies and Central Africa: A Review of Missionary Work
& Adventure 1829-1858 publ. 1863 http://books.google.com/books?id=bt71nHmVezMC&pg=PA206&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=4#v=onepage&q&f=false
Chapter
X pages 212-217
Watler Cemetery, National Trust for the Cayman
Islands
Williams, Christopher A. Caymanianness, History, Culture, Tradition,
and Globalisation: Assessing the Dynamic Interplay Between Modern and
Traditional(ist) Thought in the Cayman Islands
Williams, Neville, A History of the Cayman
Islands 1970
1837
Racer's Storm,
the 10th known Tropical Storm of the 1837 Atlantic Hurricane season, was one of
the most powerful and destructive hurricanes in the 19th century, causing heavy
damage to many cities on its 2,000+ mile path. It was named after the British sloop-of-war
HMS Racer, and was
first observed in the Western Caribbean near Jamaica on September 28.
1837 Queen Victoria June 20 Coronation
June 28, 1838)
On
20 June 1837, King William IV died and his niece, Princess Victoria, became
Queen at the age of 18. Her coronation was held at Westminster Abbey a year
later on 28 June 1838. The coronation was a huge occasion and four hundred
thousand visitors went to London
to see the new Queen being crowned.
Governors of Jamaica
English
Commanders of Jamaica
(1655-1661)
In
1655, an English force led by Admiral Sir William Penn, and General Robert
Venables seized the island, and successfully held it against Spanish
attempts to retake it over the next few years.
Admiral
Sir William Penn 11 May 1655 – 1655
General
Robert
Venables, 1655
Edward D'Oyley, 1655–1656,
first time
William Brayne, 1656–1657
Edward D'Oyley, 1657–1661,
second time
English
Governors of Jamaica
(1661-1662)
In
1661, England
began colonisation of the island.
Edward D'Oyley, 1661–August
1662, continued
Thomas, Lord Windsor,
August 1662–November 1662
Deputy
Governors of Jamaica
(1662-1671)
Charles Lyttleton, 1662–1663,
acting
Thomas Lynch, 1663–1664, acting, first time
Edward Morgan, 1664
Sir
Thomas
Modyford, 1664–August 1671 Muddy Foots, Little Cayman
is named after him. www.itsyourstoexplore.com/tl_files/documents/LittleCaymanNTBrochure.pdf
Jamaican
Consulate www.jaconsulatecayman.org/m8c.html
The
first recorded settlements were located on Little Cayman and Cayman Brac, during the 1661-71 tenure
of Sir Thomas Modyford as Governor of Jamaica. Because of the depredations of
Spanish privateers, Modyford's successor called the settlers back to Jamaica, though by this time Spain had recognised British possession of the Islands in the 1670 Treaty of Madrid. Often in breach of
the treaty, British privateers roamed the area taking their prizes, probably
using the Cayman Islands for replenishing
stocks of food and water and careening their vessels. During the 18th century,
the Islands were certainly well known to such pirates as Edward Teach
(Blackbeard), Neal Walker, George Lowther and Thomas Antis, even after the
Treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, was supposed to have ended privateering.
Lieutenant Governors of Jamaica (1671-1690) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Governors_of_Jamaica
In
1670, the Treaty of Madrid legitimised English claim
to the island. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Madrid_%281670%29
Sir
Thomas Lynch, August 1671–November 1674,
second time
Sir
Henry
Morgan, 1674–1675, acting, first time
John Vaughan, 1675–1678
Sir
Henry
Morgan, 1678, acting, second time
The Earl of Carlisle,
1678–1680
Sir
Henry
Morgan, 1680–1682, acting, third time
Sir
Thomas Lynch, 1682–1684, third time
Hender Molesworth, 1684–December
1687, acting
Christopher
Monck The Duke of Albermarle, 1687–1688
(2nd and last Duke of Albemarle). He died in Jamaica in
1688. Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753)
accompanied him as physician. During his 15 months in Jamaica, he
compiled a list of animal and plant specimens required by friends and assembled
for himself a fine collection of plants, insects, shells, fish and other
specimens. It was to be the founding
core of the British Museum, and later the Natural
History Museum,
in London.
Sir Hans Sloane's Voyage to Jamaica, 1687-1689 www.nhm.ac.uk/resources-rx/files/45sloane_voyage_jamaica-3129.pdf
The Sloane connection www.nhm.ac.uk/nature-online/life/plants-fungi/roots-herbs/introduction.jsp
Sloane Herbarium
www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/collections/our-collections/botanical-collections/historical-collections/sloane-herbarium/index.html
Hender Molesworth, 1688–1689,
acting
Francis
Watson, 1689–1690, acting
Governors
of Jamaica
(1691-1856)
The Earl of Inchiquin,
1690–1691
John White, 1691–1692,
acting
John Burden,
1692–1693, acting
Sir
William Beeston, March 1693–January
1702, acting to 1699
William Selwyn, 1702
Peter
Beckford, 1702, acting
Thomas Handasyde, 1702–1711,
acting to 1704
Lord Archibald Hamilton, 1711–1716
Peter Heywood,
1716–1718
Sir
Nicholas
Lawes, 1718–1722
The Duke of Portland, 1722–4
July 1726 after whom the parish of Portland was named). Henry Bentinck died in office in 1726
at Spanish
Town and his body was returned to
England for burial.
John Ayscough, 1726–1728,
acting, first time
Robert Hunter, 1728–March 1734
John Ayscough, 1734–1735,
acting, second time
The
first royal grant of land in Grand Cayman was made by the Governor of Jamaica in 1734. It covered 3,000 acres in the
area between Prospect and North Sound. Others followed, up to 1742, developing
an existing settlement, which included the use of slaves. Cayman Travel Guide www.thecaymanislands.ky/about-cayman/history
John Gregory, 1735,
acting, first time
Henry Cunningham, 1735–1736
John Gregory,
1736–1738, acting, second time
Edward Trelawny, 1738–1752
Charles Knowles, 1752–January 1756 Knowles Family in the Caribbean
www.knowlesclan.org/carrib.htm
Sir
Henry Moore, February 1756–April 1756,
acting, first time
George
Haldane, April 1756–November 1759
Sir
Henry Moore, November 1759 – 1762, acting,
second time
Sir
William Lyttleton,
1762–1766
Roger Hope Elletson,
1766–1767
Sir
William Trelawny, 1767–December
1772
John
Dalling, December 1772 – 1774, acting, first time
Sir
Basil Keith, 1774–1777
John
Dalling, 1777–1781, second time
Archibald Campbell,
1781–1784, acting to 1783
Alured
Clarke, 1784–1790
The Earl of Effingham, 1790–19
November 1791
Sir
Adam Williamson,
1791–1795, acting
The Earl of Balcarres,
1795–1801
Sir
George Nugent, 1801–1805
Sir
Eyre Coote, 1806–1808
The Duke of Manchester,
1808–1821
Sir
John Keane, 1827–1829, acting
The Earl Belmore, 1829–1832
George Cuthbert, 1832, acting,
first time
The Earl of Mulgrave,
1832–1834
Sir
Amos
Norcott, 1834, acting
George Cuthbert, 1834, acting,
second time
The Marquess of Sligo,
1834–1836
Sir
Lionel Smith, 1836–1839
Sir
Charles Theophilus Metcalfe, 1839–1842
The Earl of Elgin, 1842–1846
George Henry Frederick Berkeley,
1846–1847, acting
Sir
Charles Edward Grey, 1847–1853
Sir
Henry
Barkly, 1853–1856
In
1962, Jamaica gained
independence from the United Kingdom. Since independence, the viceroy in Jamaica has
been the Governor-General of Jamaica.
Hirst’s “history” is incorrect. The name was never “Walter.” Watlers were craftsmen who constructed wattles. Google it:
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wattle_(construction)
Furthermore, the tale of Stephen Watler or one of his ancestors being a Cromwell deserter is hogwash. Look it up; run your DNA (as I did). You’ll then discover the unequivocal truth of who we Watlers truly are. I respectfully request The Trust & others correct their signs, comments and blogs that perpetuate these myths of my family, our graveyard, and any military histories referencing desertion, which never happened. Thanks. -Elaine (Watler) Levine
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOkay. I finally found the correct link.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wattle_(construction)
Thank you again for your patience and consideration.
E.
Apparently, you must type (or block, copy & paste) the link in manually. I will also publish this on my Facebook, just in case. Thank you.
Delete