THE MOUNTRAVERS PLANTATION COMMUNITY - INTRODUCTION P a g e | 164 PART 2 The enslaved people Chapter 3 An interregnum: the William Coker years (1761-1764) ‘… for most assuredly Negroes are the sinews of an estate ...’ William Coker, October 1762 1 With William Coker’s arrival in Nevis a period began when close attention was, once again, paid to the running of Mountravers. For its inhabitants this brought many changes. In addition to those who had survived since 1734, in 1761 another 89 new people are known to have lived on the estate. Their stories are told, as well as those of seven children born on Mountravers during Coker’s managership and of ten new Africans whom he purchased in 1762. Of these 106 individuals, only one lived long enough to see slavery being abolished. ◄► ▼◄► By the 1760s as many a third of all sugar plantations in the British West Indies belonged to absentee owners. 2 Some were managed by able men with energy and drive, but Mountravers had gone stale after almost thirty years of absentee ownership. The land had become neglected and the people who worked it were in poor shape. Those who had survived since 1734 had buried many of their friends and relatives, but children had also been born on the plantation and although fewer slaving ships called at Nevis, there were still new arrivals. A great number had been imported in the year 1755.3 However, the last people bought for Mountravers probably were those purchased in the late 1740s during John Frederick Pinney’s second visit to Nevis. Year in, year out, the workers had harvested the cane and made sugar and rum. Several hurricanes had struck Nevis, and more than once they had to rebuild their houses and restore their gardens. They had worked under a succession of overseers and undoubtedly greeted the arrival of William Coker and Thomas Arthurton with mixed emotions. While Thomas Arthurton took on the job of overseer at Mountravers, Coker’s first task was to inspect Pinney’s and Edward Jesup’s properties. He had powers of attorney from both men (much to his dissatisfaction, Coker shared Pinney’s with old Mr Browne),4 and he set out to assess the state of the plantations. The ‘blast’ had attacked the canes in both estates but luckily not as badly as elsewhere in the island. Some planters lost their whole crop.5 Coker saw that Pinney’s properties had ‘suffered neglect and 1 PP, WI Box D: Wm Coker to JF Pinney, 21 October 1762 2 Ward, JR British West Indian Slavery p13 3 Lambert, S (ed) House of Commons Sessional Papers Vol 70 pp275-77 4 PP, WI Cat 3 Index III.ii Domestic: Wm Coker to JF Pinney, 12 March 1761 5 PP, WI Cat 3 Index III.ii Domestic: Edward Jesup, Writtle Park, to JF Pinney, 29 July 1761 THE MOUNTRAVERS PLANTATION COMMUNITY - INTRODUCTION P a g e | 165 mismanagement’ and realised that the Brownes had left Mountravers in a worse state than anticipated.6 To set everything right would require much energy on Coker’s part, substantial financial investment on Pinney’s and a lot of hard graft by the plantation workers. Pinney was still undecided what to do with Choppin’s, his estate in the parish of St George Gingerland. Should he sell it, or rent it out? For the time being it was left unworked. Pinney’s other property, the small, 40-acre Mountain plantation in the parish of St John Figtree, Coker rented out to James Brodbelt7 and concentrated his activities on Mountravers. He set about to revitalise the run-down enterprise. He proposed to start a flock of sheep and put forward a revised plan of planting. But his priority was to acquire fresh workers. The plantation lacked skilled tradesmen - coopers, masons and carpenters - and many people were in a poor state of health. To the sick, he allotted extra food and fed them rice and honey 8 and administered the all-purpose cure, castor oil,9 but held back on ordering plantation supplies until Pinney had endorsed the expenditure.10 He realised that he could not initiate any substantial changes until he had complete control. This happened in due course when Pinney gave instructions to sack both Brownes: the father, the attorney, and the son, the manager. Coker set about ordering a multitude of ‘sundries wanted on the estate’ – everything from ‘a strong dung cart’ to sugar bags, chains for mules, tallow, thread, tools, and three pairs of cart wheels strong enough to withstand the rocky roads.11 When Coker arrived in mid-May 1761, 136 people lived on Mountravers. They represented about 1.6 percent of the total enslaved population in Nevis.12 Of those registered by James Browne in 1734, just under a third survived; others had either been bought or born in the intervening years.13 A relatively large number from two particular groups had made it to 1761: three of those four children who had been born on the plantation in 1734 and nine of the twenty individuals who had previously belonged to Mrs Broom. Among the Broom people, a high proportion of women had survived, seven out of nine.14 This supports other historians’ research; Michael Craton, for instance, found that enslaved women lived at least five percent longer than men.15 Of those who disappeared from the plantation, a few may have managed to escape but it is highly unlikely that any were sold - unless they were sold into exile abroad because Browne found managing them too difficult. The overwhelming majority had died, and John Frederick Pinney was shocked to find that, despite the purchases and the births, since the 1730s the overall number had declined. He blamed the Brownes. According to him, the losses ‘happened within these few years’;16 presumably basing his knowledge on inventories which the Brownes would have sent him occasionally but which no longer exist. Certainly between 1755 and 1761 the number had decreased by eight. 6 PP, WI Cat 3 Index III.ii Domestic: Edward Jesup, London, to JF Pinney, 1 August 1761 7 PP, AB 15 William Coker’s a/c 8 PP, WI Box D: Accounts referring to the Estate of JF Pinney 9 PP, AB 15 William Coker’s a/c 10 PP, WI Cat 3 Index III.ii Domestic: William Withers, London, to JF Pinney, 13 September 1761 11 PP, WI Box D: Wm Coker to JF Pinney, 23 July 1761, and LB 3: An Invoice of Goods order’d by Mr Coker 1763 12 In 1756, 1,058 whites lived in Nevis and 8,380 enslaved people (Lambert, S (ed) House of Commons Sessional Papers Vol 70 pp275-77). 13 22 men and 24 women had survived since 1734 and were alive in 1761 and beyond. They represented 31.7 percent of the 146 people registered. 14 The Broom slaves probably consisted of 11 males and 9 females. Orange may have been male or female; Cancoo probably was male. 15 Craton, Michael Empire Enslavement and Freedom p207 16 PP, LB 3: JF Pinney, Bettiscombe, to Wm Coker, 19 November 1761 THE MOUNTRAVERS PLANTATION COMMUNITY - INTRODUCTION P a g e | 166 Under the Brownes’ management the estate had also lost animals. In 1761, for instance, a steer and two new mules perished.17 14 cattle and 29 mules remained on the plantation18 but some of the mules were ‘very old & low’ and, although Coker believed that they would not give ‘much more service’, he was determined ‘to get them into as good state as to make them hold out as long as possible.’19 As it turned out, the mules had to last for another three years. Carefully husbanding his employer’s money, in his first year Coker did not call in any doctors but in the following year the system of medical care changed. Instead of paying a doctor for each visit, John Frederick Pinney wanted to employ a doctor on an annual sum. This scheme was more expensive but the new arrangement guaranteed that there was medical care when needed; managers would not be tempted to save money by delaying requests for doctor’s assistance. Pinney had taken the decision reluctantly but ‘the fatal reduction’ of his people had driven him to it.20 The timing was propitious; in the following year, when Coker engaged Dr Smith, 21 several people on Mountravers suffered from the smallpox. Once again, the outbreak was island-wide and in April 1762 the Nevis Council gave one man, John Brodbelt, the authority ‘to remove all negroes and other slaves infected with the smallpox to a pest house provided for the purpose.’ This quarantine was mandatory; non-compliant owners could expect fines of N£20 for every person they sought to conceal. Several planters refused or neglected to hand over their people - among them Coker. 22 He did not remove anyone from Mountravers and at the beginning of June there were ‘five negroes in the smallpox’. Africans knew about inoculations against smallpox23 and on some estates they may have carried them out, but it appears that on Mountravers this was not the case because during the outbreak Coker considered inoculating people and asked Pinney for guidance;24 he would not have done so had the plantation people already undertaken the procedure themselves. While Coker was awaiting his employer’s orders, a further seven caught the smallpox ‘in the natural way’. One young woman, Ducks Jenny, died.25 Others were left disfigured, their faces forever bearing the scars. 17 PP, WI Box 3: Wm Coker to JF Pinney, 28 July 1761 18 PP, Cat 3 Domestic Box 1756-1762: ‘Copy of Note sent to Mr Daniel at Beaminster to pay Mr Russell for Mr Browne of Frampton, 21 July 1762’ 19 PP, WI Box 3: Wm Coker to JF Pinney, 28 July 1761, including a list of ‘Negroes, Mules & Cattle’.