David Morrice

Resident planter in Jamaica (where he died in 1826), brother of William Morrice (q.v.). Duncan Robertson and William Ridgard, identified as trustees of David Morrice in one award but more accurately as his executors in another, counterclaimed for the compensation under two claims in western Jamaica by virtue of David Morrice's posthumous status as judgement creditor, in one case successfully, in the other apparently not.

1. David MORRICE, Esq., son of the Rev. William MORRICE of Kincardine Oneil, Aberdeenshire, d. at Elim in the Parish of St Elizabeth, 7 Sept. 1826 aged 53 years, 33 of which he resided in this parish [Black River Parish Church]. The Fastie Ecclesiae entry for Rev. William Morrice gives David's date of birth as 05/01/1776 and states he died in Jamaica in 1826. David's mother was Helen, daughter of James Paterson, minister of Coull. The entry gives two more children with Jamaican links: Robert, planter in Jamaica, born 05/10/1776) and James, "went to Jamaica", born 14/10/1769 anddied 19/01/1816. The same entry gives William junior's date of birth as 20/07/1778 but with no mention of Jamaica.

2. The children of David Morrice of Jamaica (d. 1826) included two early settlers in Australia, John Morrice (NSW Legislative Assembly member for Camden 1860-1872), who named his half of an estate at Marulan Eling after the Hampshire estate of his uncle Walter, and William Morrice, who named his half of the same estate Comfort Hill after Comfort in Jamaica.

T71/860 Manchester no. 266; T71/874 Trelawny no. 704.

1. Philip Wright, Monumental Inscriptions of Jamaica, p. 170. Hew Scott, Fasti Ecclesiae Scoticanae (Edinburgh, 1926) vol. VI pp. 101-102.

2. http://www.marulan.com/documents/24.html

We are grateful to Neil Barrow and Elizabeth Draper for their help with compiling this entry.