Anna Petronella Williams (née Woodart)

Daughter of William Foster, a wealthy white planter, and an enslaved woman. Foster died c. 1757 (his will was made 10/04/1756 in Jamaica and proved in London 13/09/1757) and bequeathed his whole estate (inventoried at over £56,000) to Woodart, whom he manumitted in the will. Among Foster's trustees were James and Martha or Maria Spragg of Limehouse: Anna Petronella Woodart a minor married James Williams (q.v.) at St Anne's Limehouse in 1762 when the Spraggs were witnesses and by inference the guardians shown as present.

1. Baptism of Mary Dorothy Williams daughter of James and Anna Petronella St John Croydon 10/12/1770, born 10/11/1770; baptism of William Brown Williams son of James and Anna Petronella, St John Croydon 12/06/1772, born 03/04/1772.

Brooke N. Newman, ‘Contesting “Black” liberty and subjecthood in the Anglophone Caribbean, 1730s-1780s’. Slavery & Abolition 32:2, 169-183, p. 173. This gives a death-date of 1760, but the Accounts Produce show him as dead by 1757 and his will was proved that same year.

1. Ancestry.com, Surrey, England, Church of England Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1538-1812 [database online]. The latter entry is indexed as 'William Brown.'