Dr James Clark

Slave-owner on Dominica, pioneering examiner of Yellow Fever and Fellow of the Royal Society (1799).

1. Will of James Clark physician and Fellow of the Royal Society of London proved 17/08/1819. In the will he said that he was seeking to dispose of the 'wreck' of his fortune, 'occasioned by repeated hurricanes in this...island, by bankruptcies and by other misfortunes.' He left £5000 in consols in trust for his youngest daughter Sarah now residing with Mrs Matchison [sp?] at Clapham. He left his ten shares in the British Life Office that bring £30 pa. to his eldest daughter Ann Eliza now Mrs Sim. He left his half-share in Clark Hall - described as a sugar and coffee estate - and in the enslaved people thereto attached to his brother George Clark, merchant of Rotterdam, and if he were dead to his [George's] children. James Clark instructed that his share in Clark Hall not be sold for at least three years after his death or three crops, the income from which was to go to his nieces and nephews. He left land on Dominica to his sons George and Edward Clark, one a millwright in Jamaica and the other a clerk to Thos. Laing in Roseau; their mother Mary was to have a house for life.

2. He has an entry in the ODNB as 'physician'.

1. PROB 11/1619/221.

2. Goodwin, Gordon, and Jeffrey S. Reznick. 2004 "Clark, James (c. 1737–1819), physician." Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 2 Jul. 2019. https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-5462.