Rev. Walter Stevenson Halliday

Awarded the compensation for Castle Wemyss estate in St James Jamaica, son of Simon Halliday. Halliday appears to have settled with the counterclaimant, Catherine Mathison nee Farquhar (q.v.), an annuitant of the estate and widow of the previous owner Gilbert Mathison.

1. Walter Stevenson Halliday, son of Simon of Bombay India matriculated Exeter Oxford 29/11/1809 aged 16, BA 1813 MA 1816; of Whinnyriggs [sic] Co. Dumfries and of  Linton [=Lynton] Devon. 'See Eton School lists'. Married Katharine, youngest daughter of late John Gardiner Esq., and niece of the late Sir David Dundas of Richmond bart., 1830. Death of Walter Stevenson Halliday aged 79 registered Q1 1872 Barnstaple Devon. Will of Rev. Walter Stevenson Halliday late of Glenthorne in the parish of Countisbury Devon, who died 16/01/1872 proved by Katharine Halliday widow 15/04/1872, effects under £25,000.

2. The Castle Wemyss estate has been the subject of study of in the period of 'amelioration' post-1807 based on the papers at the Institute of Commonwealth Study.

3. The Charity of Walter Stevenson Halliday was registered with the Charity Commissioners 20/01/1965, removed 20/05/1997. Its objects had been: 'Warm clothing, bread, coals or otherwise to be distributed at Christmas among deserving and necessitous sick poor inhabitants of Oare.' This must be Oare in Somerset, close to Countisbury and Lynton.

4. The manuscript Grand Tour Diary of Walter Stevenson Halliday 'friend and confident [sic] of the poet Shelley' appears on a site of Mullock's Auctions [n.d.].

T71/873 St James claim no. 394.

1. Ancestry.com, Oxford University Alumni, 1500-1886 [database online]; The Lady's Magazine 1830 p. 291; FreeUKGen, England and Wales Free BMD Database, Deaths, 1837-1983 [database online]; National Probate Calendar 1872.

2. See Ursula Halliday, 'The slave owner as reformer: theory and practise at Castle Wemyss estate Jamaica 1808-1823', Journal of Caribbean History, 30 (1-2) (1996), pp. 65-82.

3. Charity Commission Registered Charity 238507.

4. http://www.mullocksauctions.co.uk/auction-19-historical_documents_&_ephemera.html [accessed 08/03/2012].