Georgiana Arthurton

Georgiana Arthurton, free person of colour, was the daughter of Elizabeth Ottley of St Kitts and the free mustee Charles Arthurton Snr of Nevis. Her paternal grandmother was a mulatto woman from Nevis, Charlotte and her paternal grandfather,John Arthurton senior, a white man from Norfolk in England (the brother of Thomas Arthurton senior who purchased Richmond Lodge in Nevis). Her brothers were Charles and George Arthurton (both q.v.).

1. In 1817 Georgiana Arthurton’s father, Charles Snr, registered nine enslaved people in Nevis, of whom he subsequently sold four to Grace Osborn of St Kitts: the 15-year-old Matilda and three boys. John was six, Stedman four and Jackey three years old. Some time before 1822 Charles Snr acquired a plantation named Johnson’s in the parish of Capisterre, St Kitts. He died sometime between 1822 and 1825.

2. After Charles Snr's death Grace Osborn ‘transferred or sold’ to Georgiana Arthurton the four enslaved people Charles had sold to her, and by 1828 Georgiana recorded two additions: Harriot, a two-year-old sambo girl who had been born, and Lawrence, a 4 ½ year old boy, who been omitted in her previous register and who was admitted by order of the Commander-in-Chief. In 1828 Georgiana's mother registered her slaves on her behalf but three years later Georgiana’s brother Charles was old enough to submit registers for himself and his siblings. In the 1834 he recorded for Georgiana the sale of Stedman, a house servant, to Jos. K Barnes of St Kitts, leaving Georgiana Arthurton’s mother to complete a compensation claim for five people.

UK National Archives (UKNA), T 71/258 Slave Register St Christopher 1827-8 f.158.

1. UKNA, T 71/255 Slave Register St Christopher 1822 f.2; UKNA, T 71/256 Slave Register St Christopher 1825 f.15.

2. UKNA, T 71/255, T 71/256, T 71/258, T 71/259, T 71/260 Slave Registers St Christopher 1822 f.217; 1825 f.269 and f.270; 1827-8 f.158 and f.159; 1831 f.162 and 1834 f.187.

We are extremely grateful to Christine Eickelmann for sharing with us her detailed archival research and on which this entry is based.