Drewry Ottley of St Vincent

Son of Richard Ottley (q.v.) and half-brother of Warner Ottley (also q.v.).

1. Will of Drewry Ottley of St Vincent West Indies proved 27/08/1807. In the will he said that he was about to depart for Tobago: he left his estate in trust (to Edward Sharpe, Josias Jackson and Warner Ottley), with instructions to realise his property to pay an annuity of £300 p.a. to his wife Eliza in accordance with their marriage settlement. He identified his house and premises in the neighbourhood of Kingstown as The Retreat and provided that if his wife should choose to reside there she should have use of 'negroes' who were Drewry Ottley's separate property and not connected with any partnership concern, 'that is to say Jean Louis a carpenter purchased by me of the sale of the estate effects of Messieurs Sharpe and Clapham, Martye, Anne, Margaret, Harry, Billy, Maria , Sally and Gray [?]', but that if his wife took this option then a bond for £1000 he had left for her would not be payable until five years after his death. He directed that an enslaved man named Jack be moved to the The Retreat 'for the use of my wife', and he left to his son Richard two enslaved women, Katy and Sally, who had been received from Dr Gardener in exchange for 'a mulatto woman' Harriet and her daughter Fanny, who had been left to Richard Ottley by the will of his grandmother Mrs Jackson. He left a further three enslaved people - Nicholas, Madelaine and Myrtilla - to Anne Rose Questel and immediately after her death to his natural daughter with her, also named Anne.

2. A genealogical website posting by Nevilla E. Ottley, which gives details of the children of Ottley males with enslaved women and free women of colour, shows Drewry Ottley (1754-1805) President of the Council and Chief Justice of St Vincent as the son of Richard Ottley (q.v.). If the life-dates are correct, then this Drewry Ottley (1754-1805) could not be the same man as the purchaser of land in Tobago in 1766, despite the connection of the 1807 testator to Tobago.

3. There was a second Drewry Ottley of St Marylebone (q.v.) whose will was proved 13/04/1822 who was possibly the Tobago purchaser. This second man was Drewry Ottley Esq. of St Marylebone, who was buried aged 82 at St Martin-in-the-fields 10/04/1822. A third Drewry Ottley of Bedford Row whose daughter Grace married Sir William Burnaby was the Drewry Ottley of Saint Andrew Holborn whose will was proved 25/11/1760 and the same man also as Drewry Ottley, 'of St Kitts', the grand-father of Martha Fleming Ottley (q.v.) and great-grandfather of Charles Wollaston (also q.v.). A fourth Drewry Ottley who was buried at St Mary Teddington 24/09/1794 aged 58 was the grandson of Drewry Ottley of St Kitts and might also have been the Tobago land-purchaser.

1. PROB 11/1466/249.

2. http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/CARIBBEAN/2007-01/1169424004 accessed 18/11/2013.

3. PROB 11/1656/90; Ancestry.com, London, England, Deaths and Burials 1813-1980 [database online]; PROB 11/860/471 (this last, of Drewry Ottley of St Andrew Holborn presumably Drewry Ottley of Bedford Row); Ancestry.com, London, England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials 1538-1812 [database online].