Drax Hall Estate is a

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fib ...

plantation Plantations are farms specializing in cash crops, usually mainly planting a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. Plantations, centered on a plantation house, grow crops including cotton, cannabis, tob ...

situated in

Saint George Saint George (;Geʽez: ጊዮርጊስ, , ka, გიორგი, , , died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was an early Christian martyr who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to holy tradition, he was a soldier in the ...

Barbados Barbados, officially the Republic of Barbados, is an island country in the Atlantic Ocean. It is part of the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies and the easternmost island of the Caribbean region. It lies on the boundary of the South American ...

, in the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

. Drax Hall still stands on the site where sugarcane was first cultivated on Barbados and is one of the

island An island or isle is a piece of land, distinct from a continent, completely surrounded by water. There are continental islands, which were formed by being split from a continent by plate tectonics, and oceanic islands, which have never been ...

's two remaining Jacobean

house A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air c ...

History

The estate has belonged to the

Drax family Drax may refer to: Places * Drax, North Yorkshire, a village and civil parish in the United Kingdom ** Drax Priory, a former Augustinian priory ** Drax Power Station, the largest power station in Britain People * Drax (surname), people with the s ...

since the early 1650s when it was built by

James Drax Colonel Sir James Drax ( – ) was an English planter and military officer. Born in Stoneleigh, Warwickshire, Drax migrated to the English colony of Barbados and acquired ownership of several sugar plantations and slaves. Drax was expelled from Ba ...

and his brother, William Drax, early settlers in

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

. The Drax's Caribbean slave plantations and estates then descended with that of

Charborough House Charborough House, also known as Charborough Park, is a Listed building (United Kingdom), Grade I listed building, the manor house of the ancient Manorialism, manor of Charborough. The house is between the villages of Sturminster Marshall and Be ...

Dorset Dorset ( ; Archaism, archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, t ...

. By 1680, Henry Drax was the owner of the largest plantations on Barbados, then in the parish of St. John. A planter-merchant, Drax had a hired "proper persons' to act in, and do all business in Bridgetown".

Legacy

Historian

Hilary Beckles Sir Hilary McDonald Beckles KA (born 11 August 1955) is a Barbadian historian. He is the current vice-chancellor of the University of the West Indies (UWI) and chairman of the CARICOM Reparations Commission. Educated at the University of Hul ...

estimated that close to 30,000 enslaved African men, women and children died on the Drax Caribbean plantations over 200 years. By 1832, there were 275 people enslaved on the

, producing 300 tons of

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose Glucose is a sugar with the Chemical formula#Molecular formula, molecul ...

and 140 puncheons of

rum Rum is a liquor made by fermenting and then distilling sugarcane molasses or sugarcane juice. The distillate, a clear liquid, is often aged in barrels of oak. Rum originated in the Caribbean in the 17th century, but today it is produced i ...

Ownership

The estate continues as a sugar plantation but Drax Hall is closed to the public, although its grounds spanning much of the eastern landscape of the parish of Saint George are open to visitors. The current owner is Richard Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax, a British former member of parliament, who inherited the

property Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, re ...

after the death of his father, Henry Walter Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax (1928–2017), a former

High Sheriff of Dorset The High Sheriff of Dorset is an ancient high sheriff title which has been in existence for over one thousand years. Until 1567 the Sheriff of Somerset was also the Sheriff of Dorset. On 1 April 1974, under the provisions of the Local Governmen ...

. The Drax family also owned slave plantations in Jamaica, which they sold in the mid-1700s. In April 2024, the Barbadian government planned to buy the estate for £3 million for housing; however, this plan was later cancelled.

History

Legacy

Ownership

See also

References

Further reading