John Adair

???? - 1839

Claimant or beneficiary

Biography

Of Port of Spain at the time of compensation, owner of two estates in Trinidad.

Identified by Raymond Blair as John Adair, sugar merchant of Dublin, who had several ships plying the sugar trade between Ireland and Trinidad - one was called "The Fortescue" and the other was called "the Dumbarton Castle". This John Adair belonged to the Adair family of Bellegrove in Queen's County and he died in 1839. Details of John Adair's sugar plantations in Trinidad can be found in the Maquay archive in the British Institute Library in Florence, Italy. There is a fair amount of correspondence there concerning them and also references in the diary of John Leland Maquay who looked after the settlement of four estates belonging to John Adair after his death in 1839: the estates reportedly passed to John Adair's brother George Adair, and in turn the wealth if not the estates themselves passed to George Adair's son, John George Adair, the landlord in the Derryveagh Co. Donegal evictions of 1861.


Sources

Email from Raymond Blair, 09/01/2015. The Maquay Collection, http://www.britishinstitute.it/en/archive/the-archive/maquay-collection" [accessed 09/11/2017]. Cf Raymond Blair, 'Culture, carnality and cash: the Florentine adventures of John George Adair', History Ireland (Nov/Dec 2014).

We are grateful to Raymond Blair for his assistance with compiling this entry.


Further Information

Absentee?
Transatlantic

Associated Claims (2)

£915 19s 3d
Awardee
£1,216 16s 2d
Awardee