James Beckford Wildman (19 October 1789 – 25 May 1867) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

landowner and

Tory A Tory () is an individual who supports a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalist conservatism which upholds the established social order as it has evolved through the history of Great Britain. The To ...

politician who served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for

Colchester Colchester ( ) is a city in northeastern Essex, England. It is the second-largest settlement in the county, with a population of 130,245 at the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 Census. The demonym is ''Colcestrian''. Colchester occupies the ...

from 1818 to 1826. His properties included

plantations 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, tobacco ...

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 ...

and

Chilham Castle Chilham Castle is a Jacobean manor house and keep in the village of Chilham, between Ashford and Canterbury in the county of Kent, England. The keep is of Norman origin and dates to 1174, although it may have been built on an older Anglo-Sax ...

Burke, John (1832)
"A General and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire"page 111
H. Colburn and R. Bentley. in

Kent, England Kent is a ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Greater London to the north-west. ...

, which he sold in 1861. The Jamaican plantation, Quebec Estate, was obtained by the Wildman family from William Beckford. Beckford claimed to have been swindled by the Wildmans, who pressured him to sign over the property under threat of calling in outstanding mortgages. Quebec Estate was one of the largest sugar plantations in Jamaica with well over 800 slaves (the average at that time was 200). The profits from this plantation allowed Thomas Wildman to purchase (and renovate)

Newstead Abbey Newstead Abbey, in Nottinghamshire, England, was formerly an Augustinian priory. Converted to a domestic home following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, it is now best known as the ancestral home of Lord Byron. The Abbey is on the national ...

from

Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824) was an English poet. He is one of the major figures of the Romantic movement, and is regarded as being among the greatest poets of the United Kingdom. Among his best-kno ...

. In 1830, Wildman complained to Viscount Goderich about the treatment of one of his slaves, Eleanor James, by the proprietor of an estate called North Hall. (James was flogged for requesting payment for a hog.) In 1840,

Joseph John Gurney Joseph John Gurney (2 August 1788 – 4 January 1847) was a banker in Norwich, England, and a member of the Gurney family of that city. He became an evangelical minister of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), whose views and actions le ...

visited the estate and described the trial of a Myalist that took place there.

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wildman, James Beckford English businesspeople History of the Colony of Jamaica Merchants from the British West Indies 1789 births 1867 deaths Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies UK MPs 1818–1820 UK MPs 1820–1826 Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford Tory MPs (pre-1834) English landowners

James James may refer to: People * James (given name) * James (surname) * James (musician), aka Faruq Mahfuz Anam James, (born 1964), Bollywood musician * James, brother of Jesus * King James (disambiguation), various kings named James * Prince Ja ...

19th-century Jamaican people 19th-century English businesspeople English slave owners Jamaican landowners