Observatory

Estate Details


Associated People (2)

The dates listed below have different categories as denoted by the letters in the brackets following each date. Here is a key to explain those letter codes:

  • SD - Association Start Date
  • SY - Association Start Year
  • EA - Earliest Known Association
  • ED - Association End Date
  • EY - Association End Year
  • LA - Latest Known Association
- 1827 [EY] → Owner
1773 [EA] - 1773 [LA] → Joint owner

Associated Claims (1)

£1,706 10S 0D

Notes

The original grantees of Observatory were Will. Young and Rob. Irving & J. Phipps, under St John nos. 33 and 34 respectively: 'Present Possessor' Houston Stewart for St John no. 33, Unknown for St John no. 34. The estate does not appear on the list in 1832 appended to Byres' map, although it does appear in the slave compensation records. In 1773, 'Cheap, Callow [sic] and Paul' were show as the Present Proprietors of Northeast division (St John parish) Lot no. 33 (200 acres) originally purchased by William Young 05/06/1770 and which became [part of] Observatory. This probably referred to William Collow, known to have been a partner with Thomas Cheap in 1782.

John Fowler, A summary account of the present flourishing state of the respectable colony of Tobago in the British West Indies illustrated with a map of the island and a plan of its settlement, agreeably to the sales by his Majesty’s Commissioners (London: A Grant, 1774) pp. 48-49; Woodcock's transcription shows St John Lot No. 33 as a precursor to Observatory, 'Tables showing the Lots in each Parish, numbered as originally granted - the original Grantee - the name of the Lot, or lots, if one has been acquired, and the present Possessor where there is one' and 'A Table, showing the Estates in cultivation in 1832, and their Owners, in 1832, copied from the list appended to Byres' map of that date, with those in cultivation in 1862', Henry Iles Woodcock, A History of Tobago (Ayr: Smith and Grant, 1867; new impression London: Frank Cass and Company Limited, 1971).


Sources

'Tables showing the Lots in each Parish, numbered as originally granted - the original Grantee - the name of the Lot, or lots, if one has been acquired, and the present Possessor where there is one' and 'A Table, showing the Estates in cultivation in 1832, and their Owners, in 1832, copied from the list appended to Byres' map of that date, with those in cultivation in 1862', Henry Iles Woodcock, A History of Tobago (Ayr: Smith and Grant, 1867; new impression London: Frank Cass and Company Limited, 1971).


Estate Information (3)

What is this?

1819
[Number of enslaved people] 106(Tot) 53(F) 53(M)  
[Name] Observatory  
 

1819 registration 'Charles Gray by his Attorney Alexander Warrack' 26/01/1819.

 
T71/462 527-531
1825
[Number of enslaved people] 106(Tot) 54(F) 52(M)  
[Name] Observatory  
 

Charles Gray [no capacity given]

 
T71/474 65
1829
[Number of enslaved people] 84(Tot) 44(F) 40(M)  
[Name] Observatory  
 

Ja Aitchison attorney

 
T71/481 64