Thomas Hibbert (1717 - 1780)

Born Jan 1717 in England

Ancestors

Descendants

Died 20 May 1780 at age 63 in Kingston, Jamaica, West Indies

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Biography

Thomas was the son of Robert Hibbert and Margaret Mills Tetlow.

Thomas Hibbert (the Eldest) was an English merchant and plantation and slave-owner who became a prominent Jamaican. Born into a family owning cotton mills which supplied barter goods to businesses in the slave-trade, Thomas was the first of the Hibbert family to settle in Jamaica, arriving in 1734 (his youngest brother, John (1732-1769), also lived in Jamaica, from 1754 until his death; his other brother, Robert, was father of Thomas, a co-founder of the family trading business Hibbert, Purrier and Horton, and of George, merchant and pro-slavery campaigner). His original remit was to redeem the bonds of slave traders at the point at which they sold their slaves in Kingston. In 1754, he started work on building Hibbert House and completed in 1755, which won a competition as the finest house in Kingston.

Rather than marrying, Thomas cohabited with Charity Harry, by whom he had three daughters. The youngest died whilst still young, but Jane and Margaret were sent to have an Anglican education in England. Margaret died while still at school.^[1]

Speaker of the house in 1756

In a vault near this place lie deposited by his own direction the remains of Thomas Hibbert Esq., late a Merchant in the Town of Kingston and proprietor of this and two adjoining Estates. He was the eldest son of Robert and Mary Hibbert, of Manchester, in the county of Lancaster, in the Kingdom of Great Britain from whence he first arrived in this Island in 1734 and after residing in it, with little interruption, almost forty-six years.

Died unmarried at this Estate, on the 20th of May 1780 in the 71st year of his age.

AGUALTA VALE, ST. MARY'S, JAMAICA.

On one face is a large shield with these arms: Ermine on a bend three crescents. Crest: A cubit arm erect holding a crescent.

On another face is:

IN MEMORY OF

THOMAS HIBBERT ESQ

LATE OF KINGSTON JAMAICA

Ob. MAY 20, 1780

AETAT. 71.

Testator in his will expressed his wish to be interred in his garden in Kingston. The inscription also appeared in "G.M." for 1864, p. 603.

WILL Thomas Hibbert the eldest of the town and parish of Kingston, Jamaica, Esq. Will dated 8 Jan. 1780, and of my age this day 70 yeare. To be buried in the deep vault I have provided in the garden belonging to my house in Kingston. I confirm unto Charity Harry my housekeeper, and to Jane Harry her dau., now in London, the provision I made for them by a deed executed in London 27 Feb. 1771, and left in the care of Nathan Sprigg, Esq., of Barnes, since deceased. To each of my brothers in G. B. and my sister-in-law, Abigail, wife of my brother Robert H. of Manchester, and my brother-in-law Nath. Phillips, husband. of my sister Eliz., mourning and a ring. My sugar works and pen lands in the parishes of St. Mary and St George which lye contiguous and all other lily real estate and slaves to the use of my 3 nephews Thomas H. the Elder and Robert H. of this Island, sons of my brother Rob. H. of Manchester, and Thomas H. the Younger son of my late brother John of this Island, deceased at 21, as tenants in common, and all residue of my personal estate, and to be Ex'ors. Witnessed by John Cosens, John Drysdale, Thomas Collison. Sworn 1 June 1780. Proved 10 June 1780. Recorded in Libro of Wills 46, fo. 119.

Sources

1. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hibbert Wikipedia Thomas Hibbert