William McKenzie of St Vincent

Shown as owner of Tourama on St Vincent in the 1817 Slave Register. Brother of Lt Gen Sir Alexander Mackenzie (q.v.) and father of a natural son, Alexander Mackenzie (whom also q.v.).

1. Second son of Roderick Mackenzie, 9th of Fairburn, and his wife Catherine nee Baillie. Born 08/12/1773 and baptised 10/12/1773 in Urray, Ross-shire, Scotland.

2. Will of William McKenzie of St Vincent but currently residing at Bath (made in 1816) proved 12/06/1820. Under the will, he gave Margaret Lincoln of St Vincent £2000; his reputed son Alexander McKenzie at present at 71 Cornhill £5000 at 21; £2000 to each of his nephews Roderick Murchison and Kenneth Murchison; £500 each to his aunts Mary Walcott and Mary McKenzie; £2000 in trust to Malthus William Massie and Robert Sutherland to pay the interest to his sister Barbara Murray wife of Colonel Robert Murray 'for her own separate and independent use'. his residuary heir was his brother Lieutenant General Alexander McKenzie. If the latter died before William McKenzie, the legacies to the reputed son Alexander and his nieces were to be double and the residue go to his Murchison nephews. Further, if Lt General Alexander McKenzie predeceased him, then any landed or family property to which William McKenzie became entitled was to go to Roderick Murchsion, proved Murchison took the McKenzie surname. In a codicil dated 23/10/1819, when he was 'at present of the city of Florence', he left a different set of monetary legacies: £1000 each to his sister Mary Massy, and his half-brother Hugh Scott and half-sister Georgiana Scott; £2000 each to his nephews Roderick and Kenneth Murchison and nieces Jennetta and Barbara Murray; £3000 each to his sister Barbara Murray and his brother-in-law Col. Robert Murray. He revoked the legacies to his aunts and replaced them with annuities of £150 p.a. each. He left his reputed son Alexander McKenzie by Margaret Lincoln £5000 at 24, and confirmed an annuity of £200 p.a. to Margaret Lincoln previously granted to her, and £1000, expressly additive to his original legacy to her.

3. "Willm Mackenzie Esqr (younger) of Fairburn, County of Ross, North Britain, and of the Island of St Vincent, died at Florence on the 30th of October 1819 aged 43 years, and on the 3rd of Novr following was interred in the English burial ground at Leghorn, by me - Thomas Hall."

4. The relationship between the legacies under codicil and those under the will were the subject of a Chancery suit, Mackenzie v Mackenzie, which in 1826 determined that the legacies in the codicil were additive. The account of the case shows Sir Alexander Mackenzie as the man identified as Lt General Alexander Mackenzie in the will.

1. GROS OPR Births 085/10 68. Alexander Mackenzie, History of the Mackenzies with genealogies of the principal families of the same name (Inverness, 1894) p. 516.

2. PROB 11/1631/132.

3. Ancestry.com, UK, Foreign and Overseas Registers of British Subjects, 1628-1969 [database online].

4. James Russell, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the High Court of Chancery during the time of Lord Chancellor Eldon, Vol.2 1826, 1827 - 7 &8 Geo.IV (1829), pp. 262-274.

We are grateful to Paul Kay Foster Mackenzie and David Alston for their assistance with compiling this entry.