Volume Thirteen - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - even more aspects - Slavery - echoes of the past . . . .

A further search of the database of the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery [1356] revealed even earlier entries :

John Ashley was listed in the Jamaican Quit Rent books for 1754 as the owner of 666 acres of land in Clarendon and 130 acres of land in Vere, total 816 [sic] acres.

William Turner and John Ashley were listed in the Jamaican Quit Rent books for 1754 as the owner of 146 acres of land in Vere.

John Ashley of Vere, Esquire. Estate probated in Jamaica in 1769. Slave-ownership at probate: 73 of whom 41 were listed as male and 32 as female. 8 were listed as boys and 1 girl. Total value of estate at probate: £6,329.13 Jamaican currency of which £4,451.25 currency was the value of enslaved people.

Absentee Ownership : Maybe a reason for my perceived lack of continuity in the records of the Ashley family and estate(s) on Jamaica was the common practice amongst British enslavers who entrusted the day-to-day management of their estates to third-party or employed attorneys, overseers and/or managers. This system was open to extensive corruption and mismanagement!

The absentee system on Jamaica was generally noted to be an oppressive system of management built often upon brutal enforcement and exploitation. The reliance upon local managers often resulted in a lack of direct oversight. This abdication of responsibility on the part of the estate owners, I feel sure, exacerbated the harsh conditions and violence handed out to the enslaved.

Benjamin McMahon was employed on Exeter Estate during the mid-1820s. He noted that "Mr. Ashley was a noble minded gentleman, who abhorred the villanous proceedings of those around him. He was well aware of the infamous conduct of planting attorneys in general; for he had been made to suffer during his own absence from the country — he was nearly ruined by them" McMahon also observed that no-one in Ashley's employ would have dared mistreat enslaved people.