William Whitehorne Lawrence senior

Slave-owner in Jamaica, owner of a share of Lawrence Park in St Ann, and 'Late a trustee' for the children of Oswald Brodie on Lawrence Park. Deceased by 1823.

1. William Whitehorne Lawrence, son of William Lawrence and his wife Frances, born 17/01/1777 and baptised in St Ann, 30/07/1778.

2. William Whitehorne Lawrence married Mary R. Brodie, spinster, in St Ann 06/09/1806. Their daughter Frances Gordon Lawrence was baptised at Lawrence Hall, 17/07/1810, aged 9 months (sponsors: William James Hall, Colin McKenzie, William Ward, Robert Gordon, Mrs F. Hall, Mrs Muller, Mrs Brodie). They had five further children baptised in Jamaica: William Whitehorne (1812), Elizabeth Ann (1812), Oswald Brodie (1814). Mary Brodie (1815), Ann Newby (1817), Florence Hall (1819). Their two youngest children John James William and Charles Hilton were baptised in Llanblethian, Glamorgan, Wales in 1822 and 1823 respectively.

3. His wife Marie D. Raymond Brodie, daughter of Richard and Elizabeth Brodie, had been born 13/06/1786 and baptised in Trelawny 07/06/1787. As Marie de Raymond Lawrence she intended to leave Jamaica, 19/04/1827, and as Mary de Raymond Lawrence, variously described as of Bernard Street, Brunswick Square, and of York Street, Portman Square, London, “widow, in no business”, she was insolvent in 1843. She was living with her daughters Elizabeth and Frances in the household of her sister, Eliza Brodie (aged 65, born Jamaica) in Seymour Place, Kensington, in 1861, and was buried in Kensal Green All Souls, London in 1871, aged 84.

1. Familysearch.org, Jamaica Church of England Parish Register Transcripts, 1664-1880 [database online].

2. Familysearch.org, Jamaica Church of England Parish Register Transcripts, 1664-1880 [database online]; Ancestry.com, Wales, Select Births and Baptisms, 1541-1907 [database online].

3. Familysearch.org, Jamaican Parish Registers, Trelawny, Births, Marriages and Deaths, 1771-1839, p. 17; Royal Gazette of Jamaica 21/04/1827; Evening Standard 26/08/1843; Perry’s Bankrupt Gazette 26/08/1843; 1861 census online; Ancestry.com, London, England, Church of England Deaths and Burials, 1813-2003 [database online].

We are grateful to Jim Brennan and Paul Hitchings for their assistance with compiling this entry.