Anthony William Somarsall or Somersall

A major intra-American slave-trader, with some two dozen voyages 1785-1791 in his own name originating in Dominica and St Kitts, and with his father Anthony Somarsall (or Somersall) senior a partner in other voyages until c. 1787. David Alston shows the Somersall family among the 'English planters and merchants' active in the Dutch colonies of Demerara, Essequibo and Berbice, with Anthony Somersall owning the Wismar plantation (abandoned by 1798) from at least 1759, and suspected of smuggling enslaved people from St Kitts in 1770, and Anthony William Somersall as a participant in the syndicate of land-speculators in Berbice led by Lord Seaforth in 1801, establishing his own plantation as Fellowship on the east bank of the Abary creek. The Somersall estate on St Kitts was almost certainly connected to the same family, but by 1817 was in different hands.

1. The will of James Edward Somarsall of Berbice proved 15/05/1812 was that of a son of Anthony William Somarsall, and was made in 1810 when he believed Anthony William Somarsall was still alive. James Edward Somarsall left all his unspecified property to his family, identified as father Anthony William, mother Anne, brothers Thomas Alexander and Anthony William and sisters Mary and Elizabeth. The marriage of Anthony William Somarsall bachelor and Ann Ducarpel at St Andrew Holborn in 1800 appears inconsistent with this will, unless the groom was the brother rather than the father of James Edward Somarsall.

2. An Anthony W. Somarsall was buried at Barbados 27/02/1810.

1. PROB 11/1533/270; Ancestry.com London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1932 for Anthony William Somarsall City of London St Andrew, Holborn 1790-1802 [database online].

2. Ancestry.com, Anthony W Somarsall in the Barbados, Church Records, 1637-1849 [database online].