Thomas Neilson

Slave-owner in Trinidad, apparently resident, given variously in secondary material as Dr or MD. He was the son of William Neilson of Strabane Co. Tyrone, and appears to have returned to Ireland in the 1850s.

1. Neilson's or Bel Air or Stephenson's, one of the 5 Islands of Port of Spain, was granted to Thomas Neilson and used as a holding area for Indian immigrants [i.e. quarantined indentured labourers] after Emancipation.

2. Will of Thomas Neilson recorded '10/12/1866' at Tyrone, primary beneficiary Eliza Darracott [who was the daughter of Robert Neilson (q.v.)]. He had died at Mountjoy Square Dublin aged 77 10/12/1866.

3. The will was contested in a suit of Underwood v Darracott, in which the plaintiff was Thomas Neilson Underwood and the defendant Eliza Darracott or her heirs. Thomas Neilson Underwood (d. 1876) was a Presbyterian lawyer and nationalist from Strabane, co-founder of the National Brotherhood of St Patrick in 1861, and was described as the nephew of Thomas Neilson MD.

NB although Thomas Neilson appears in the database as an awardee on Hermitage, this is not supported by the Claim Notes and needs to be verified; http://cotyroneireland.com/burial/StrabaneDeaths1785-1849.html [accessed 03/11/2017] gives an announcement dated 14/06/1825 of the death at age 22 of Rosanna Neilson, sister of Dr Thomas Neilson and youngest daughter of the late William Neilson late of this town [Strabane] at Port of Spain 21/03/1825.

1. G. Carmichael, The history of the West Indian islands of Trinidad and Tobago p. 438.

2. Ancestry,com, Thomas Neilson in the Web: Ireland, Calendar of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1920 [database online]; Ancestry.com, Thomas Neilson Esq in the Belfast, Northern Ireland, The Belfast Newsletter (Birth, Marriage and Death Notices), 1738-1925 [database online].

3. Thomas Neilson Underwood is given as the plaintiff and as the nephew at http://www.connectedhistories.org/Search_results.aspx?pc=Darracott&sr=bu [accessed 03/11/2017], in which Neilson was reported to have returned to Ireland c. 1855 and lived with Eliza Darracott, presumably in Dublin; Edinburgh Evening News 17 December 1873 gave details of an 'Irish will case' over a deed claimed to have been executed by Dr Thomas Neilson in Trinidad in 1854 and again by Neilson and his wife at Londonderry in 1857 which purported to sign 'a large property' to the plaintiff.' This appears to have been the case given as Darracott v Underwood, in which a minor action for costs was reported by the Irish Times 16/03/1871 p. 5 'in a suit instituted to establish the will of the late Dr Thomas Neilson, of Mountjoy square, Dublin.'