SCOTTISH JAMAICA TESTAMENTS

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The Scottish connection with Jamaica dates from 1656 when Oliver
Cromwell banished 1200 Scots prisoners-of-war to the recently acquired
English colony there. Subsequently the island attracted a growing
number of Scottish immigrants who generally arrived as indentured
servants. At the same time the government in Scotland was exiling
criminals and Covenanters to Jamaica. The last group of Scots to
arrive in Jamaica during the seventeenth century, comprised a number
of refugees from the failed colony at Darien. Jamaica seems to have
had a special attraction for Scots, as an observer in 1763 reckoned
that one-third of the white population there were Scots or of Scottish
origin.

Little evidence survives to identify the majority of these Scottish
emigrants – however, amongst the documents in the Island Record Office
in Kingston, are a number of testaments which seem to be those of
early Scottish settlers. Regrettably, in the majority of cases the
documents contain little or no reference to Scotland, and only refer
to friends and relatives in Jamaica.

An exception is the testament of John Macfarline, which identifies him
as the son of John Macfarline at the Water of Leven, Lennox, Scotland.
It also contains reference to his wife, Alice, and their son, John;
his sister Eleanor, the wife of Thomas Anderson, carpenter near the
Water of Leven; John Cross, a planter in St.Ann’s parish, Jamaica;
James Gray; and his executors, William Watson from Aberdeen, a
merchant in Port Royal, Jamaica, and Joseph Norris, also there;
subscribed on 13th September 1689 and witnessed by John Birch, John
Chalkhill and Edward Dendy. Probate given 13th January 1690, Jamaica.

The undernoted list of testaments probated in seventeenth century
Jamaica is believed to be those of early Scottish immigrants to the
colony:

This article first appeared in The Scottish Genealogist, March 1988,
vol.XXXV No.1, ISSN 0300-337X.