Samuel Martin (planter)
Samuel Martin | |
|---|---|
| Born | c. 1694 |
| Died | 1777 (aged 82–83) Ashtead, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupations |
|
| Notable work | Essay upon Plantership (1754) |
| Children | 23, including Samuel, Henry, and Josiah |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  Great Britain |
| Branch | Antigua Militia |
| Rank | Colonel |
Colonel Samuel Martin (c. 1694 – 1777) was a British West Indian planter who wrote Essay upon Plantership (1754). He is known as "Samuel Martin the Elder" to distinguish him from his son,[1] Samuel Martin, who served as a British member of parliament and the secretary to the Treasury.
Early life and career
[edit]Martin was born on the Greencastle estate in Antigua,[2] to Major Samuel Martin who, in 1701, was murdered during a slave revolt after having demanded the enslaved Africans on his estate work on Christmas Day. The seven year old Samuel escaped a similar fate, being hidden in nearby fields by his nanny. She was herself enslaved and was subsequently freed in recognition of this act.[2] The younger Samuel was sent to live with family in Ireland while his mother remarried Edward Byam.[3]
Personal life
[edit]Martin fathered 21 children, at least 16 of whom died during his lifetime.[4] The eldest son, Samuel, became a British member of parliament and the secretary to the Treasury; Henry became comptroller of the Navy, a member of parliament, and a baronet; Josiah was governor of North Carolina.[5]
Essay upon Plantership
[edit]In 1754, Martin wrote Essay upon Plantership, a treatise on managing a sugar plantation.[6][7] It appeared in at least seven editions between 1750 and 1802. In the work, he urged planters to treat their slaves with “tenderness and generosity”; the aim was to induce “love” by setting an example of “benevolence, justice, temperance, and chastity.” When Janet Schaw, a Scot, visited his Greencastle estate in Antigua in 1774, she described the eighty-year-old planter in rosy terms, as “a kind and beneficent Master,” who was “daily employed” to render the island “more improved.”[8]
References
[edit]- ^ Martin, Samuel (30 May 1777). "Will of Samuel Martin of Ashtead, [Ashstead], Surrey" (Document). Kew, England: The National Archives.
- ^ a b Jeppesen, Chris. "Atlantic and Indian Ocean Worlds: Uncovering connections between the East India Company and the British Caribbean colonies through the British Library's Collections" (PDF). Retrieved 12 September 2019.
- ^ Kalamaula Maioho, Miller. "Lydia Thomas". Geni. Geni.com. Retrieved 12 September 2019.
- ^ Sheridan, Richard B. (1994). Sugar and Slavery: An Economic History of the British West Indies, 1623-1775. Canoe Press. pp. 200–207. ISBN 978-976-8125-13-2.
- ^ Sheridan, Richard B. (1960). "Samuel Martin, Innovating Sugar Planter of Antigua 1750-1776". Agricultural History. 34 (3): 126–139. JSTOR 3740144.
- ^ "Samuel Martin the elder of Antigua". Legacies of British Slave-ownership. UCL Department of History. Retrieved 12 September 2019.
- ^ Foy, Anna M. (2016). "The Convention of Georgic Circumlocution and the Proper Use of Human Dung in Samuel Martin's Essay upon Plantership". Eighteenth-Century Studies. 49 (4): 475–506. doi:10.1353/ecs.2016.0032. S2CID 163277043.
- ^ Peterson, Derek R., ed. (2010). Abolitionism and Imperialism in Britain, Africa, and the Atlantic. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press. p. 107. ISBN 978-0-8214-1901-4. OCLC 794698907.
Further reading
[edit]- Martin, John (2004). "Martin, Samuel (1694/5–1776), plantation owner". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64973.
External links
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| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
- 1777 deaths
- 18th-century British farmers
- 18th-century British landowners
- 18th-century British male writers
- 18th-century British non-fiction writers
- 18th-century military officers
- 18th-century planters
- Antigua and Barbuda slave owners
- British agricultural writers
- British colonels
- British Militia officers
- Burials in England
- People from Ashtead
- People from Surrey (before 1889)
- Planters from the British West Indies
- Sugar plantation owners