Eleanor Baldwin Parke

Probably Eleanor, daughter of Samuel Baldwin Crosse of Jamaica who married William Parke of the Thickets, Jamaica. They had, among others, two sons, William, of Jamaica, and Charles, of Henbury House, Dorset. "William Parke, a younger son, born 5 Nov. 1752, settled in Jamaica about 1760-70, where he owned an estate called The Thickets in St Ann's Parish. He was a Lieut.Gen of Militia, and died 27 April 1813. By his wife Eleanor, dau. of Samuel Baldwin Crosse of Jamaica whom he mar. before 1786, he had: (1) William, who inherited his plantations, (2) Charles, who purchased Lower Henbury in Dorsetshire; and several daus."

William Parke senior died in 1813 in Gower Street, London. His memorial inscription at St James, Hampstead Road, London, reads: SACRED To the Memory of WILLIAM PARKE late of the Hermitage St. Ann's in the Island of JAMAICA ESQre. born the 5th. of November 1752 died the 27th. of April 1813 in the 61st. Year of his Age". After his death, a legal dispute occurred as to whether documents found in his possession in Gower Street constituted formal amendments to the will he had written in Jamaica at an earlier date.

One of the daughters of William Parke and Eleanor Crosse was Eleanor/Ellen Parke who married John Frederick Nembhard at the Hermitage in 1821. She claimed compensation for Pedro River estate in St Ann's as tenant for life under will of John Frederick Nembhard and as annuitant, the compensation for which was awarded to her brother William Parke and John Anderson as executors of the will of John Frederick Nembhard. As Eleanor Nembhard Widow she went on to marry William Bromley Rose in 1836, who may be the William B. Rose who was awarded compensation for ownership of enslaved people in St George, Jamaica.

Burke's Landed Gentry, Vol. 2 (1894) p. 1559 available at http://www.ebooksread.com/authors-eng/bernard-burke/a-genealogical-and-heraldic-history-of-the-landed-gentry-of-great-britain--irel-kru/page-139-a-genealogical-and-heraldic-history-of-the-landed-gentry-of-great-britain--irel-kru.shtml [accessed 22/03/2013]. Quote from Vere Langord Oliver, Caribbeana being miscellaneous papers relating to the history, genealogy, topography, and antiquities of the British West Indies (6 vols., London, Mitchell Hughes and Clarke, 1914) Vol. 4 p. 181. Eleanor Baldwin Parke claimed compensation as tenant-for-life, suggesting she was a widow of the previous owner, and a William Parke (presumably the son) claimed compensation as remainderman under the will of William Parke. The son William Parke also claimed for Hermitage estate in St Ann as owner-in-fee.

Memorial inscription from Survey of London Volume 21 available at http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=65195. Legal case in Edmund Burke, Dodsley's Annual Register, Vol. 57, pp. 262-263 available at http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=h3tIAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA262&lpg=PA262&dq=parke+hermitage+jamaica&source=bl&ots=wctaFsj4M5&sig=JjBf1EJn1d-gQYOEXzuUTqAXMiA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=vyVMUczlKYaV0QXuyYG4Bw&ved=0CCgQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=parke%20hermitage%20jamaica&f=false [accessed 22/03/2013].

See Mabel Nembhard, Nembhard of Jamaica (privately printed) p. 2, available at http://archive.org/stream/nembhardofjamaic00nemb#page/n3/mode/2up [accessed 22/03/2013] for a family tree of the Nembhards including Eleanor Parke.