Zachary Bayly (1721-1769) was an English-born Jamaican planter and politician.

Early life

In the 1730s, Zachary Bayly was a young boy when his family relocated with him to the

Colony of Jamaica The Crown Colony of Jamaica and Dependencies was a British colony from 1655, when it was Invasion of Jamaica (1655), captured by the The Protectorate, English Protectorate from the Spanish Empire. Jamaica became a British Empire, British colon ...

. In 1759, his brother

Nathaniel Bayly Nathaniel Bayly (c. 1726 – 1798) was an English planter and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1770 to 1779. Early life In 1726, Nathaniel Bayly was born in Westbury, Wiltshire.''Nathaniel Bayly'', Legacies of British Slave-Owner ...

moved to England, and the two brothers conducted a trans-Atlantic family business, using their slaves on their Jamaican estates to create large profits, and using their political contacts to protect their investments.

Slave owner

Bayly was the owner of Bayly's Vale,

Brimmer Hall Brimmer Hall is a Jamaican Great House and plantation located near Port Maria, in Saint Mary Parish, Jamaica. In the eighteenth century Brimmer Hall was owned by Zachary Bayly as part of a series of contiguous sugar plantations. These consisted ...

, Nonsuch,

Trinity The Trinity (, from 'threefold') is the Christian doctrine concerning the nature of God, which defines one God existing in three, , consubstantial divine persons: God the Father, God the Son (Jesus Christ) and God the Holy Spirit, thr ...

Tryall ''Tryall'' (or ''Trial'') was a British East India Company-owned East Indiaman launched in 1621. She was under the command of John Brooke when she was wrecked on the Tryal Rocks off the north-west coast of Western Australia in 1622. Her crew w ...

and

Unity Unity is the state of being as one (either literally or figuratively). It may also refer to: Buildings * Unity Building, Oregon, Illinois, US; a historic building * Unity Building (Chicago), Illinois, US; a skyscraper * Unity Buildings, Liverpoo ...

plantations as well 3,000 acres in cattle pens."The Letters of Simon Taylor of Jamaica to Chaloner Arcedekne, 1765-1775"
edited by

Betty Wood Betty C. Wood (23 February 1945 – 3 September 2021) was a British historian and academic, who specialised in early American history, Atlantic history, social history, and slavery in eighteenth and early nineteenth century. She was a Fellow of ...

''et al'' in In addition to being a sugar planter, Bayly was also a successful sugar merchant. He also served as a planting attorney for several absentee owners, managing several thousand more slaves for other estates. He was one of the 10 wealthiest Jamaicans in the eighteenth century.

Tacky's Revolt

In 1760, when

Tacky's War Tacky's Revolt (also known as Tacky's Rebellion and Tacky's War) was a slave rebellion in the British colony of Jamaica which lasted from 7 April 1760 to 1761. Spearheaded by self-emancipated Coromantee people, the rebels were led by a Fante ro ...

broke out, slaves rose up in revolt on Bayly's estates at Trinity.

Death and estate

Bayly owned over 2,000 slaves at the time of his death in 1769. His estate was valued at over £114,000 when he died.Vincent Brown, ''Tacky's Revolt: The Story of an Atlantic Slave War''(Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2020), p. 53.

Family

He was the brother of

, both being uncles of the politician Bryan Edwards.

References

1721 births 1769 deaths English slave owners Jamaican planters 18th-century Jamaican politicians {{Jamaica-bio-stub