Day 8. An interlude

High Street, Barbados late 19th century.

In a family history of the Winslow family written by Margaret Winslow I read: “Mr Barrell was well connected and had at one time been wealthy, but was at this time living in the village of Saugerties about 90  miles up the Hudson river, on a reduced income, with his wife and three daughters, the eldest having married an Italian gentleman, Mr Massa, by whom she had two children, all making a part of Mr Barrell’s household. Mrs Barrell was from Barbados…” In a footnote she recalls  “that we have been told of Isaac’s visit in July of 1828 to the Barrells in Saugerties and that he “was quite smitten with some of the young ladies there””

______

Theodore Barrell returned to America. His daughter Abigail Elizabeth was getting married [November 1832]. As far as we know he never left the shores of the continent of his birth again. He died in Saugerties, New York in 1846. This gave him plenty of time to give Henry further trouble.

As for Henry I have found very little evidence of his activities as a merchant. He described himself sometimes as a merchant and at other time a planter in the baptismal records of his children and, so far, I have found only one advertisement for his merchant business in the Barbadian papers. This gives his business address as the High Street in Bridgetown. But, this lack of information does not worry me too much as I know what happens as Henry seeks to improve his position in Barbadian society. His plan was to acquire capital and a good marriage. Let me tell you about my great great grandmother.

I would like to be able to tell you that she was the most beautiful woman Henry had ever set his eyes on, but I just don’t know. If she was anything like her sister (at left) then my description would not be flatering. A solidly built woman (just as well as she gave birth to 12 children) with a scowl which I have inherited. She had been born in Sint Martin on the Dutch side of the island to a family of high status in Europe, the von Hitzlers. She would have been brought up in a small Dutch élite of ambassadors and plantation owners whose power was on the wane. She may have met Henry when they were both young and living in Demerara which had only recently been handed over to the English after being passed between the two nations from 1796 until 1803 finally being ceded in 1814. 

Demeraran habits were very different to the English. Merchants in Georgetown would think nothing of providing hospitality to visiting plantation owners who had come down the vast Demerarary river. And likewise, the plantation owners were renown for their hospitality to visiters travelling upstream.

The marriage was probably arranged by their parents; Henry’s mother was still living in Demerara so in a good position to arrange the match. There is no record of where the marriage took place but the date is recorded as 2^nd March 1827 when Sarah Halman Margaret Hitzler was just 20. They had their first child on 11^th December in Barbados, a daughter. It was about this time that the couple moved into Dalkeith Cottage in Christchurch a little bit out of the hustle and bustle of Bridgetown and a very pleasant place to bring up the children. This was the location of many family events; most of the children were born there; Henry’s mother died there and was buried in St.John’s on 21^st December 1833. 

Whether Sarah settled into English ways is not known. I doubt her links to Dutch high society counted for anything in Barbados. Dalkeith must have been full of children and so perhaps Henry was a family man. He certainly trusted his wife, for in his will he left all his property to her “knowing that she will perform a mother’s part by my children…”  

   

So I have digressed from the story. I will tell you next how Barrell’s  antics drove my search to the National Archives in Kew and the slave compensation records that are kept there. 

Day 9. Aftermath and a trip to Kew.