John Nixon

Apparently resident slave-owner in Jamaica, owner of Albion in St David and Mullet Hall in St Thomas-in-the-East. Dead by 1774. Trevor Burnard shows him as leaving Total Physical Wealth of £32,218 sterling (including enslaved people; excluding realty and financial assets and liabilities) in 1774, making him the third largest Jamaican wealth-holder with an inventory taken in that year.

John Nixon was listed in the Jamaican Quit Rent books for 1754 as the owner of 354 acres of land in St Andrew.

John Nixon contributed £42 to the University of Pennsylvania following Dr John Morgan's fundraising tour of the West Indies in 1772-1773.

John Nixon of Kingston, Esquire. Estate probated in Jamaica in 1775. Slave-ownership at probate: 350 of whom 192 were listed as male and 158 as female. 81 were listed as boys, girls or children. Total value of estate at probate: £45104.85 Jamaican currency of which £24213 currency was the value of enslaved people. Estate valuation included £0 currency cash, £0 currency debts and £0 currency plate.

The will of John Nixon of St. David, Esq. was proved in Jamaica 28/07/1774: "it is my will and desire that my Executors hereinafter named do send my reputed natural son John Nixon by Elizabeth Olivia Savage a free Mulatto woman to Great Britain where he shall arrive at a proper age (6 years old) there to be genteely maintained and educated at the expence of my estate until he attains the age of Twenty one years" - at age 14 he is to be put to a trade profession (which ever one they feel that suits his genius). He gives him (when he turns 21) £5000 sterling. "And whereas I am under obligations for services received to Elizabeth Nixon a free negro woman and to the before named Elizabeth Olivia Savage a free mulato woman both of whom have lived in my employ as housekeepers I do hereby give and bequeath unto each of them the sum of Fifty Pounds currency and a weekly allowance of Twenty Shillings currency." Elizabeth Olivia Savage is to receive £50 per annum, two enslaved people, his household furniture. He has one daughter, named Elizabeth Crowder Nixon (daughter of Elizabeth Nixon listed above?). His daughter also gets furniture. It looks like there is an amendment attached to the will that says "I give and bequeath unto a mulatto female child who passes by the name of Prissey Moody and is the daughter of a free negro woman named Hannah the sum of One hundred Pounds on her attaining the age of Sixteen"; she is then to learn needlwork, reading and writing.

'A List of landholders in the Island of Jamaica together with the number of acres each person possessed taken from the quit rent books in the year 1754', TNA CO 142/31 transcribed at http://www.jamaicanfamilysearch.com/Samples2/1754lead.htm; Trevor Burnard, Planters, merchants ands slaves p. 19.

William Smith, Joseph Hopkinson, and Plunket Fleeson Glentworth, Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania Minute Books, Volume 2, 1768-1779 p. 73, entry for 13/12/1773. Note amounts are in Jamaican currency.

Trevor Burnard, Database of Jamaican inventories, 1674-1784.

LOS 41 ff. 387-388, 390.