Richard Kinkead

Owner of Stirling Castle estate in Portland, Jamaica. Member of Assembly in Jamaica in 1813. Alive in 1834 but deceased by 1839.

Mr. Kinkead, owner of Stirling Castle, “who some years previously had left [Jamaica] with a fortune”, returned to run the estate in the 1820s and employed Benjamin McMahon as an overseer. McMahon states that Kinkead had little awareness of the workings of the plantations and was “blinded” to the falling production and diminishing number of slaves. He is described as being “no lover of the whip”. According to McMahon, "his people were in a wretchedly poor condition owing to the extreme poverty of their master", but still "they cheerfully submitted to their privations" and "were much attached to the old gentleman."

The Ninth Report of the British and Foreign Bible Society (London, 1813) Appndix [unpaginated].

Benjamin McMahon, A Description of Jamaica Planters, viz Attorneys, Overseers and Book-keepers, With Several Interesting Anecdotes (London, 1839) pp. 80-81.

We are grateful to Robert Keirle, Siddharth Singh Ahlawat and Hannah Dubad for their assistance with compiling this entry.