James Betty

1. James Betty was executor to Mr Ratigan and trustee and guardian to the children of colour who had inherited Ratigan's estate of Amity Hall Pen. McMahon described Betty as a greedy and unprincipled planter and stated that Betty was deceiving the poor family of colour that now owned the estate. McMahon observed that these children "were kept in a state of comparative destitution, with barely sufficient clothing to cover their nakedness, or food to keep them from starving, while Mr. Betty, their father's friend, was fattening on the spoils of the property that was consigned to his charge."

2. Died at Crescent Park aged 45 and buried 07/10/1830 in St Ann, Jamaica. The Gentleman's Magazine for 1831 included a brief obituary to James Betty which noted that he had died in Jamaica 06/10/1830 following a forty-year residence on the island.

We are grateful to Steven Carter and Siddharth Singh Ahlawat for their assistance in compiling this entry.

1. Benjamin McMahon, Jamaica Plantership: Eighteen Years Employed in the Planting Line in that Island (1839) pp. 65-66.

2. Jamaica, Church of England Parish Register Transcripts, 1664-1880. FamilySearch.org. Burials 1826-1836, Registrar General's Department, Spanish Town. John Nichols, The Gentleman's Magazine, Volume 149 (London, E. Cave, 1831), p.285.