recorded in his Log; and the great house on =Muirton= is said to be the
one to which he was taken on his arrival from Cuba with yellow fever.
=Darlingford=, an extensive coco-nut plantation belonging to the heirs
of Sir Charles Darling, a former Governor of Jamaica, stands around the
village of Manchioneal.
At =Spring Garden= is a ruined fort, said to have been erected against
the buccaneers. Sir Thomas Modyford, Governor from 1664 to 1670, is
probably commemorated in =Modyford’s Gully= at Dry River in St. George.
=Balcarres Hill= is perhaps named after Alexander, Earl of Balcarres,
Governor in 1795–1801, but Crawford Town was so called before the Earl
of Balcarres came to the Island. =Seaman’s Valley= is said to have
derived its name from the destruction of a party of seamen by the
Maroons.
In 1842 the portion of the original parish of St. George to the west of
the little Spanish River, together with part of the eastern portion of
St. Mary, was taken to constitute the separate parish of Metcalfe. On
the reduction of the number of parishes in 1867 this parish of Metcalfe
fell to St. Mary, and the parish of St. George as reduced in 1842 fell
to Portland.
VII
ST. MARY
The parish of St. Mary was probably so called from the port, Puerto
Santa Maria, thus named by the Spaniards, now known as Port Maria: but
Roby points out that Modyford’s daughter’s name was Mary, and it was
immediately next to the parish of St. George, the name of her husband
being, as we have seen, George Nedham. It includes the former parish of
Metcalfe, as well as a part of the old parish of St. George.
At =Gray’s Inn=, near Annotto Bay, are to be found remains of an old
Spanish house, one of the few left in the island. The Maroon Town of
=Scott’s Hall= is situated behind Castleton Gardens on the Junction
road, from Kingston to Annotto Bay.
The account of the defeat of Sasi by Doyley at Rio Nuevo, now on Spring
Valley, will best be told in the account of St. Ann amongst Doyley’s
other operations.
At =Decoy= on the borders of St. Catherine is the tomb of Sir Charles
Price, Bart., called the Patriot, for many years speaker of the
Assembly. The property has now been divided up. The tomb is illustrated
in Hakewill’s “Picturesque Tour of Jamaica.”
The following is a copy of the lengthy inscriptions. The Latin
inscription is on the top, the English round the sides.
HIC JACET
CAROLUS PRICE BARONETTUS
MULTIS VIR ORNATUS VIRTUTIBUS
IN OMNIBUS ENIM VITÆ OFFICIIS
ITA SE PROBAVIT
UT ET CIVIBUS ET SOCIIS
GRATISSIMA ESSET EJUS INTEGRITAS
ET FIDES.
MEMORIÆ TANTI VIRI
CAROLES PRICE
FILIUS NATU MAXIMUS
ET QUATUOR SOLUS SUPERSTES
FORTUNÆ ET HONORIS
UTINAM AC VIRTUTUM
HÆRES
HOC MONUMENTUM
POSUI.
Though thou hast past the murky road
Which Cato, Raleigh, Sidney, trod
Yet still thy name and deathless praise
By Poets sung in artless lays
Or by tradition handed down
To latest ages shall be known
With tears of unaffected joy,
Each parent teach his fav’rite boy
How you withstood your country’s foes
And o’er their spleen triumphant rose
Although ‘twill hardly be believed
That such a Patriot ever lived.
This truly great man was born on the 20th August 1708. Having finished
his Classical Education in some of the best private schools in
England, his academical at Trinity Colledge in the University of
Oxford and taken the tour of Europe he returned to this his Native
Country in the month of January 1730.
On the 13th March 1732 he was elected a Member of the Honourable House
of Assembly, of which on the 18th March 1745 he was chosen Speaker.
On the 3rd of August 1748 the House came to the following Resolution:
Resolved Nemine Contradicente: That Charles Price Esq. have the thanks
of this House for his candid and impartial behaviour in the Service of
this Country as Speaker of the Assembly, and that as a farther
acknowledgement of his said Service:
Ordered:—That the Receiver-General do purchase a peice of Plate for
the said Speaker of the value of Two hundred Pistoles to be made in
such Form and Shape as the said Speaker shall direct.
December 19th 1760 the House came to another Resolution:
Resolved Nemine Contradicente: That Charles Price, Esqr. Speaker of
the Assembly hath supported that High Office with great Dignity,
Impartiality, and Integrity, and that the thanks of the House be, and
they are hereby given to the said Charles Price, Esqr. for his
faithful discharge of the High Office of Speaker, and as a further
Testimony of the Sense this House entertains of his Conduct in that
Office that a peice of Plate of the value of Two Hundred Pounds
sterling be presented to him.
Ordered:—That Robert Graham Esq. the Receiver-General, or the
Receiver-General for the time being do pay to the order of Charles
Price Esq. the sum of two hundred pounds sterling to be laid out in
the purchase of a Peice of Plate and that this or any future Assembly
will make the same good to him.
[Illustration:
TOMB OF SIR CHARLES PRICE
]
On the 11th day of October 1763 his seat was vacated at his own
request, and the House came to the following Resolution:
Resolved Nemine Contradicente: That the Thanks of this House be given
to the Honourable Charles Price Esqr. for his steady, faithful, and
impartial Discharge of the high and important Office of Speaker of the
Assembly for a long series of years, throughout the whole course of
which he distinguished himself in the most conspicuous manner, and
approved himself a dutiful and loyal subject to His Majesty and a true
lover of this Country by supporting on every Occasion the Honour and
Dignity of the Crown and the Rights and Privileges of the People, and
as a farther testimony of the high sense and approbation this House
entertains of his conduct in that Office and Services to the Public
that he be presented with a Peice of Plate of the value of five
hundred Pounds sterling.
Ordered:—That Malcolm Lang Esqr. Receiver-General or the
Receiver-General for the time being do pay to the Order of the
Honourable Charles Price Esqr. the sum of Five Hundred Pounds sterling
to be laid out in the Purchase of a Peice of Plate, and this or any
future Assembly will make the same good to him.
Ordered:—That Mr. Speaker do transmit to the Honourable Charles Price
Esqr. a copy of the foregoing Resolution and Order, in a Letter of
thanks agreeable to the above Resolution, and expressing likewise
their Concern for the great loss the Country hath sustained by his
Resignation occasioned by his ill state of Health.
In the year 1768 as an additional Testimony of the Approbation of his
Conduct and in Reward of his great Merit, His Majesty King George the
Third in a manner, the most distinguishly honourable, it being
unsolicited, was most graciously pleased to create him a Baronet of
the Kingdom of Great Britain, an Honor, which though he did not live
many years to enjoy, he might justly be said to enjoy with honor.
In the offices also of Judge of the Supreme Court of Judicature,
Custos Rotulorum of the Parish and Precinct of St. Catherine, and
Major-General of all the Horse and Foot Militia in the Island, he
eminently distinguished himself in the service of his Country.
“His Life was gentle, and the Elements so mixed in him, that Nature
might stand up and say to all the world This was a Man.”
In the “Columbian Magazine,” Kingston, 1796, occurs a poem on “The
Decoy”:
Dedicated to Sir Charles Price, Baronet, by his Son, the Hon. Charles
Price Esq. Speaker of the Honourable House of Assembly of Jamaica.
To dust and suffocating heats,
Well pleas’d, we bade adue;
To taste your garden’s rural sweets,[9]
And pay respects to you.
Peace to this calm, sequester’d seat,
Where art and nature vie,
To decorate your lov’d retreat,
And charm the mental eye.
But who its beauty can disclose,
Who paint its gay array?
What friendly muse will interpose
And aid an artless lay?
From this sweet spot; when æther’s clear,
Rich culture breathing round,
“Cuba’s” blue distant hills appear,[10]
The prospect’s utmost bound.
Whilst you such constant care employ,
And genuine taste impart,
No wonder it should thus Decoy,
And captivate the heart.
Yet, tho’ the scene does greatly please,
You greater joy dispence,
Conversing with convivial ease,
And solid, sterling sense.
Far from the world’s alluring ills
And folly’s wide controul,
Here candid Contemplation fills
And elevates your soul.
Footnote 9:
This delightful spot, to which art and nature seemed to have
conspired, in imparting the brightest touches of beauty and sublimity
to the surrounding scenery, is situate in the higher part of the St.
Mary’s Mountains, and at present in possession of Henry Archbould,
Esq. It was denominated the “Decoy,” from the various attractions it
possessed, and the interest it maintained in the breast of its
numerous visitors. The garden is represented as the burial-place of
that respectable but unfortunate family the Prices.
Footnote 10:
From its elevated situation, the island of Cuba is said to be
distinctly seen in a clear day; a prospect, however, commanded by many
other mountainous settlements on that side of the Island.
In the same magazine appears a poem by Sir Charles Price entitled
“Resignation.” One of the twelve verses may suffice:
It was Heaven’s Almighty decree,
You will say, then, why should I repine?
Tho’ in this we perhaps may agree,
Have you ever felt anguish like mine.
Long says of St. Mary: “The weather in this parish is extremely wet
during great parts of the year, and so cold, that few if any of the
houses are unfurnished with a chimney.” In writing of the Decoy he says:
One of the greatest curiosities in this parish is the Decoy, the seat
of Sir Charles Price, Bart. It is situated on part of the range of
mountains which border on St.-Thomas-in-the-Vale. The house is of
wood, but well finished, and has in front a very fine piece of water,
which in winter is commonly stocked with wild-duck and teal. Behind it
is a very elegant garden disposed in walks, which are shaded with the
cocoanut, cabbage and sand-box trees. The flower and kitchen garden
are filled with the most beautiful and useful variety which Europe, or
this climate produce. It is decorated, besides, with some pretty
buildings; of which the principal is an octagonal saloon, richly
ornamented on the inside with lustres, and mirrors empanneled. At the
termination of another walk is a grand triumphal arch, from which the
prospect extends over the fine cultivated vale of Bagnals quite to the
North-side sea. Clumps of graceful cabbage-trees are dispersed in
different parts, to enliven the scene, and thousands of plantane and
other fruit-trees occupy a vast tract, that environs this agreeable
retreat, not many years ago a gloomy wilderness.
He further tells us that Price constantly resided on this property, and
in truly Jamaica old-time fashion kept open house: “Few gentlemen of
rank, whether of the army or navy, on service here, quitted the island
without having passed some of their time at the Decoy.”
Sir Charles Price, the first baronet, was a grandson of Francis Price, a
captain in the army of Venables at the capture of the island, who
married the widow of Lieutenant-Colonel Rose, also one of the army. His
son, Colonel Charles Price, who died in 1730 and lies buried, as we have
seen, in the church of St. John, Guanaboa Vale, was the father of the
first baronet. Sir Charles Price was a native of Jamaica, and “endued
with uncommon natural talents, which were improved by education, and
polished by travel in the early part of his life”: these abilities and
his personal wealth gained for him considerable influence in the island.
He was member of the Assembly for St. Thomas-in-the-Vale 1732, for St.
Catherine in 1752–66, and St. Mary 1756–61, and again for St. Catherine
in 1766, was speaker in 1746, and from 1756 to 1763.
He was created a baronet, of Rose Hall, Jamaica, in 1768.
His son, Sir Charles Price, the second baronet, was member of the
Assembly for St. Catherine in 1768, for St. Thomas-in-the-Vale in 1779
and 1787. He was speaker in 1763 (when he succeeded his father in that
office), 1765, and 1770. In October 1775 he was expelled the house at
his own request, and left for England, intending never to return.
In 1786 as he was in financial difficulties the House advanced £5000 on
mortgage of the Decoy, but in the following year a new Assembly voted
this transaction “unconstitutional and of dangerous example.” He died in
1788 in Spanish Town without issue, and the title became extinct.
Sir Charles Price’s name was for many years associated with a particular
species of rat—the largest in the island—known as the “cane-piece rat,”
or the “Charles Price rat” on the assumption that it was introduced into
Jamaica by him; but Richard Hill, who investigated the matter for Gosse,
and obtained the family tradition on the subject from George Price, of
Worthy Park, a great-grandson of Sir Charles Price, came to the
conclusion that the animal, which Price introduced from South America
and in the eyes of the negroes had strong rat characteristics, was no
rat. Several were set loose at the Decoy, and at Worthy Park, but they
did not survive. They may possibly have been a species of opossum, one
example of which recently came to Jamaica in a ship from Costa Rica. To
show what a curse rats were to the sugar planters, Beckford records that
39,000 were caught in five or six months on one estate.
At =Agualta Vale= is the tomb of Thomas Hibbert (d. 1780), who came to
Jamaica in 1734.
The following is the inscription:
In a vault near this place lie deposited by his own direction the
remains of—Thomas Hibbert, Esq.,—late a Merchant in the Town of
Kingston—and proprietor of this and two adjoining Estates. He was the
eldest son of Robert and Mary Hibbert, of Manchester, in the county of
Lancaster, in the Kingdom of Great Britain—from whence he first
arrived in this Island in 1734—and after residing in it, with little
interruption, almost forty-six years—Died unmarried at this Estate, on
the 20th of May, 1780—in the 71st year of his age....
As we have seen, he built Headquarters House, Kingston. He purchased
Agualta Vale, containing about 3000 acres, from the heir of one Bendish
about the year 1760. The sugar estate was settled in 1771.
=Fort George=, near Annotto Bay, is now all that remains of the lands of
the Ellis family, which once owned numerous properties in the
island—Shettlewood Montpelier in St. James, Ellis Caymanas and Crawle
Pen in St. Catherine and Nutfield, Newry, Greencastle and Fort George in
St. Mary.
The statement often made that John Ellis, the first settler, was an
officer in Venables’ army is not borne out by the list of those
officers. He is recorded as a captain in 1685. He and his descendants
sat in many Assemblies, and intermarried with the Nedhams, Beckfords,
and Longs. Charles Rose Ellis was created Baron Seaford in 1826, and his
son became Baron Howard de Walden in right of his mother.
George Ellis, the poet, and John Ellis, the naturalist and Agent in
England for Dominica, were also members of this family, who have, from
time to time, done much for cattle breeding in Jamaica, having been
pioneers in importing valuable breeds from Cuba, India, Portugal, and
Italy. To George Ellis, chief justice in 1736–39, Jamaica owes the
introduction of guinea grass—the seed having been brought from Guinea as
food for cage-birds.
At Fort George indigo was cultivated in the early days.
At =Dryland=, near Woodside, is an example of Arawâk rock-carving
(illustrated in the “Journal of the Institute of Jamaica,” vol. ii, No.
4). =Fort Haldane=, situated on a cliff above the coast on Gray’s
Charity, a mile west of Port Maria, is named after General George
Haldane, Governor in 1759. =Prospect=, near White River, is an old
loopholed house, a good example of Jamaica architecture; and =Heywood
Hall= was the scene of a fight between Koromantyn slaves and the white
inhabitants of St. Mary, who defeated them, in 1760.
As early as Slaney’s map of 1678 there was a =Christopher’s Cove= in St.
Mary in addition to Don Christopher’s Cove in St. Ann.
VIII
ST. ANN
The parish of St. Ann is rich in associations with the aboriginal
inhabitants, the Spaniards, and with the early history of the British
occupation of the colony. It was in St. Ann that Columbus discovered
Jamaica; it was in St. Ann that he spent a twelvemonth while waiting for
help from Hispaniola; it was in St. Ann, at Ocho Rios, that two
engagements of note with the Spaniards were fought; it was from St. Ann
that the last remnants of the Spaniards left the island, while the last
battle of importance was fought at Rio Nuevo in St. Mary, but a few
miles across the border.
A kitchen midden of peculiar interest was opened up in 1912, situated at
the top of the hill, some 980 feet high, on which stands the great house
of =Liberty Hall=, commanding a view from Seville, the old Spanish
settlement, on the west, to Port Maria on the east, and overlooking the
little creek to the east of St. Ann’s Bay, known as Don Christopher’s
Cove, where Columbus spent twelve weary months, from June 1503 to June
1504. The thick foliage must in those days, however, have precluded any
more than mere peeps at that sea over which the dreaded Caribs might at
any moment arrive.
It is highly probable that the Liberty Hill Arawâks supplied Columbus
and his companions with food while he lived on board ship in the creek
some three miles distant, into which the Spanish Lookout river runs,
through land which afterwards became Drax Hall property and whence
Beckford of “Vathek” fame later obtained much of the wealth he spent
lavishly at his Gothic residence in Somerset. It is possible that some
of the pottery recently dug up by the turn of the fork may have been
used to cook this food, and it is conceivable that some of the vessels
may have been handled by the great discoverer himself.
The area of the midden or shell-mound is, roughly speaking, about half
of an acre, consisting of the brow of the hill on which the great house
stands. The richest collection of remains was found just outside the
garden gate on the carriage drive, where a few days before some pieces
had been unearthed in the preliminary work of grading the drive to
facilitate the turning of motor cars—a strange link between the old
world and the new. Investigation in the banana walk at the back of the
house, and in the garden on the one side and the pastures on the other,
yielded proof that the midden extended all round the brow of the hill,
as was the usual custom.
[Illustration:
Dry Harbour
]
The remains resemble in the main the usual results of search in such
middens—as described in Dr. Duerden’s “Aboriginal Indian Remains of
Jamaica” published by the Institute of Jamaica in 1897, and in Mr. T. De
Booy’s more recent pamphlet, “Certain Kitchen-Middens in Jamaica”
(1913)—land and marine shells, some pierced for the purpose of carrying
them, fish bones, coney bones, broken pottery, broken stone implements,
flint flakes and chalcedony, from which their beads and other ornaments
were made. The Jamaica arawâk pottery, Professor Mason tells us, lies
between the Porto Rican and that of Florida to Carolina. The pieces
unearthed at Liberty Hill afford good examples of its decoration, in the
handles especially. One is distinctly fashioned like a parrot’s head.
The borders show the usual indentations made, before the pottery was
baked, by cross-hatching and otherwise. But one has a curious serrated
edge not hitherto found in Jamaica. Examples of this collection are in
the museum of the Institute of Jamaica.
Although from the nature of things only fragments of pottery were
obtained, it is not difficult, in the light of previous experience, to
reconstruct the bowls of which they formed part. Dr. Duerden mentions as
the greatest size hitherto found, a circular basin with a diameter of
about eighteen inches. That must have been approximated by one found at
Liberty Hill. The bowls vary in thickness from three-sixteenths of an
inch to half an inch, but pieces of flat cooking slabs were found as
thick as one inch. The pottery on the whole seems better baked than that
usually found.
Additional interest attaches to the Liberty Hill mound from the fact
that clay from which some of this pottery was made is to be found at
Lime Hall hard by, where there was in recent times a pottery in
operation, and also from the fact that in the St. Ann’s Great River,
which runs bordering the property to the east, are to be found stones
from which aboriginal hatchets were made, and alongside a supply of
sandstone which the Arawâks conceivably used for the shaping and
polishing of their implements. A slab of stone was found on the midden
itself, suggesting that perhaps Liberty Hill may have been the site of a
factory of both earthenware bowls and stone hatchets. But it would seem
that its greatest interest lies in its possible close association,
during a twelvemonth, with the life of the great Columbus.
Other kitchen middens have been discovered at =Moneague=, on the hotel
grounds; at =Friendship=, near by; at =Belle Vue=, on the banks of the
White River; at =Retreat=, at =Orange Valley=; and at =Cranbrook=.
Further investigations would doubtless reveal others.
There are Arawâk rock-carvings in a cave at Coventry.
On September 12, 1492, Columbus, after encountering oppositions and
difficulties which would have deterred all but very resolute men, was
the first European to set foot in the New World—landing on that day at
Guanahani (Watling Island) in the Bahamas. The important discovery of
Cuba and Hispaniola was made on his homeward voyage.
On May 4, 1494, while on his second voyage of discovery, he was the
first European to land in Jamaica, running his lateen-rigged caravel,
the _Niña_, and her two consorts into =Dry Harbour= Bay on the north
side of the island.
On April 24 he had left his new-founded city of Isabella in Hispaniola,
and started on a further voyage of discovery. He sailed westward along
the north coast of Hispaniola, and, leaving the point we now call Cape
St. Nicholas, stood across to Cuba, and anchored in a harbour
(Guantanamo), to which he gave the name of Puerto Grande. Leaving on May
1, he coasted along the southern shores, admiring the beauty of the
landscape, noting the rivers, and receiving visits from numerous Indians
in their canoes, with whom he exchanged beads and hawks’ bells for
cassava bread, fish and fresh water. But soon, on the advice of his
Guanahani guide (whom he had taken to Spain on returning from his first
voyage) he stood due south in order to visit a large island of which the
natives spoke. As he neared the island a number of carved and painted
canoes, one nearly ninety feet in length, crowded with Indians, came out
to meet him a league’s length from the shore. After giving them
presents, Columbus sailed on and dropped anchor in a place which he
named Santa Gloria, on account of its extreme beauty. Passing the night
there he sailed westward to find a closed port in which he might careen
and caulk up his vessels. About four leagues further on he found a very
singular port, to use the words of Bernaldez, or, as Fernando Colombo
describes it, resembling a horseshoe in shape, which he named Puerto
Bueno. Here two canoes full of Indians met him, but after six or seven
of the natives had been wounded by bolts from the Spaniards’ crossbows
they retreated.