Bartholomew Owen Williams

1. Resident in Jamaica, holding a number of official positions, for example, he was one of the commissioners of the Supreme Court in Jamaica in 1824 and Clerk to the Common Council in the late 1820s. Apparently formerly a schoolmaster. Founder of the Sussex Lodge of Freemasons in Jamaica. Ensign in the militia First Battalion 2nd Company ("Jews"), became 2nd Lieut. 24/05/1796; 1st Lieut. in the Kingston Regiment of Foot 2nd Battalion Grenadiers from at least 1805 and Lieut. Col. 26/02/1813; Colonel in the Kingston Regiment of Foot from 23/09/1820 and still serving in 1824. It's not clear why he initially joined a Jewish regiment; previous and subsequent references are for Anglican baptisms and burials.

2. Bartholomew Owen Williams, son of Bartholomew and Hannah Williams, born 22/05/1764 and baptised 26/05/1765 in Kingston.

3. Bartholomew Owen Williams and his wife Alice Pierce nee Ibbott had ten children baptised in Kingston: Bartholomew Ibbott (1789), Thomas Pierce (1789), John Sutton (1791), William Owen (1793), Joseph Taylor (1794), Hannah (1796), Alice Pierce (1799), Isabella Sophia (1801), Eliza (1803) and Edward Barnes (1804).

4. Memorial inscription in Kingston Cathedral Church to Bartholomew Owen Williams who died 10/04/1830 aged 66 and his wife Alice Pierce Williams who died 20/10/1805.

1. Jamaica Almanac (1824); Frank Cundell, Historic Jamaica: With Fifty-Two Illustrations (1915) p. 170; A Letter to the Right Honorable Sir George Murray Relative to the Deportation of Lecesne and Escoffery from Jamaica (1829) p. 312; military lists from the Jamaican Almanacs at http://www.jamaicanfamilysearch.com/Samples/Almanacs.htm.

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

3. Ibid.

4. James Henry Lawrence-Archer, Memorial Inscriptions of the British West Indies (1875) p. 115.

We are grateful to Mary Hewitt for her assistance with compiling this entry.