David Charles Guthrie

London merchant, trading to central America, awarded with his partner George Clerk Cheape (q.v.) the compensation for two awards in Trinidad and Tobago as trustees and a third apparently in their own name.   

1. Son of James Guthrie, 2nd of Craigie and Emilia or Aemilia Murray. Father of James Alexander Guthrie and grandfather of David Charles Guthrie 5th of Craigie.

2. Of 30 Portland Place and Idol Lane. Born 30/06/1788, married 1820 in Edinburgh Jane Campbell (1789-1859) daughter of Sir John Hunter. Left £120,000 at death: his sons continued in the London mercantile business, James Alexander Guthrie leaving £400,000 in 1873 and Arbuthnot Charles Guthrie leaving £810,843 in 1897.

3. Guthrie was also involved with the sugar business in Mauritius as a merchant, acting in Britain on behalf of about 20 Mauritian sugar producers. He was highly critical of the effects of the Sugar Duties Act of 1846. His evidence of 1848 is very interesting on the economy of Mauritius, the importance of French owners, and the state of the sugar trade. He also observed that 'In the Mauritius there are plenty of men to do the work; the difficulty is, that they do not work.' He also thought that conditions of the enslaved in the West Indies between 1807 and 1833 were good for the slave: '. . . a slave in the West Indies was really very comfortable; he had everything found for him from the day he was born to the day he died; and there was nothing required from him but a fair and reasonable amount of work'.

Tobago no. 125 (trustees); Trinidad nos. 1657 (trustees) and 817. See also St Vincent 354, where again they acted as trustees, added after the death of Thomas Hanson.

1. http://www.clanguthriegenealogy.com/histories/Lord%20Charles [unsourced, accessed 23/01/2013].

2. William D. Rubinstein, Who were the rich? 1860- (Volumes 3 and 4, manuscripts in preparation), reference 1859/50 [omitted from the published volume covering 1859, inserted into 1860-].

3. Evidence to the Select Committee on Sugar and Coffee Planting, 2nd Report, PP1847-48 (137) XXIII Pt. I, pp. 51-69. (Quotations at p. 68)