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James Townson Letters
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Jamaica Kingston 1 January 1833
Thomas Mayhew esq
Dear Sir, Your favour with respect to the purchase of Chiswick Land is with Mr. Forsyth who undertook to reply to it and furnish the articles you wish to be sent. My commercial connexion with that Gentleman terminated on the 31 ultimo but we continue colleagues in various concerns which we thought most for the interest of our friends to arrange insuch away that each of our services may be turned to best account.
In this way the management of Chiswick will continue in me while Mr. Forsyth will ship the Produce, supply the Property and keep the accounts. This arrangement we hope to prove to be advantageous and we trust will be satisfactory.
The estate I think will produce 150 hhds this year which is [a return] fully equal to the labor the people are able to accomplish. The Holidays have passed with the greatest mirth and good humour among our people I Remain
Dear Sir Your obedt Servant J Townson
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Jam:a Kingston
Dear Sir I feel great pleasure in saying that our Seasons are promising and the prospect of the Sugar Crop such as to give every reasonable hope for a fair return - provisions are plentifull and our people enjoying the blessings of abundance.
The advance in Sugar will be felt this year by the proprieters of Chiswick in the quantity of Produce that will be at Market - The West Indian [?with?] the 43 [??] the remainder of last years Crop and the seasons are so favorable for the manufacture of Sugar that the [] will take [] by the first of March - The Estate is doing very well but the supplies have been rather beyond what they were the year before - this may not happen again for some time but there will occasionally be a call for some extras which cannot be dispensed with in the same way as in English Farming
I remain Dear Sir Your faithful & obt Sevt
J. Townson
Thomas Mayhew Esq
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Jam Kingston Jany 1. 1835
Dear Sir
In answer to your esteemed favour of the 14th of October concerning the interest of the Chiswick Estate I have to acquaint you that the Machinery required is to enable the property to make more Sugar within a given time - thereby facilitating the manufactory of the crop in the short space allowed for Labor by the Abolition Act - At present the canes are expressed by the Laborious operation at a Cattle Mill which with difficulty is brought to produce liquer to boil five Hhds of Sugar per week -- a quantity quite inadequate to the purpose - formerly we made an average of eight Hhds per week with a continuous exertion from Monday morning to Saturday night and now we are limited in our right from the Laborer to 45 Hours for a week accompanied with so many interruptions that it becomes a matter of interest to consider how the work can be better accomplished - Should things remain quiet and orderly the remedy for getting over our difficulty about the Crop appears to furnish a Horizontal Sugar Mill and Steam Engine to make better weeks work to finish the Crop early and turn the Labour of the people to the cultivation of the
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properly - for at present not a single hand can be spared for that purpose for while we find it difficult to find enough of people to attend the manufactory to make the crop the Estate is runing into a wilderness and canes which ought to be growing for the succeeding year with be choaked in weeds and fail - each succeeding years growth of canes must feel the effects of this want of cultivation very severely - On Monday I visit this week when I will consult with a mechanic about the machinery and the Island expense of erecting it after arrival from England and the form best adapted for our purpose.
Our Holidays have passed in peace and good order and our people have gone to their work - the emancipation is working into operation by degrees the records of the magistrates shew that all classes of managers both in speech and in practice have been most anxious to fullfill the Law - but the apprentices have been disappointed - with them freedom and idlesness and synonymous terms - in fact the abolition act as a labour system is a failure It requires the master to supply the wants of the Laborer upon his giving 40 1/2 hours work per week - these supplies he takes as a right that belonged to him
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in former times - he does not think he has gained enough - he has no direct impulse to work now that the master is without controul and his feelings does not stimulate him to give his 40 1/2 hours with the good will of a free laborer - the climate is also fine and the wants of the people easily satisfied so that they spinned at taking wages for extra time for many weeks but a better feeling in generating they are taking wages - high rates certainly but it is the beginning of a principal which will work its own cure - the Law I trust will be altered and wages be substituted for allowances and thereby a direct stimulant be given to promote industry - At present we are acting and dealing with the Law as it stands and I should only practice a delusion if I said I expected to get off the Crop - at present my hopes are not sanguine although I am not in absolute despair but what we shall improve now that the people are [[??]] money for time - the proprieters must now console themselves that although there will be great additional expences their property will not be entirely swamp'd under the new system although it will be unproductive for a time - my colleague Mr Forsyth will write you fully about the Shipments and with best wishes
I remain Dear Sir yours J Townson
Thomas Mayhew Esq
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Jama: Kingston June 24. 1836
Dear Sir
When I wrote you in January our prospects for the Chiswick Crop promised a hundred and twenty Hogsheads of Sugar but I regret to say our canes have not yielded in the way I looked for - the juice was abundant but so poor as to require two thousand six hundred Gallons to make a Hhd inplace of seventeen or eighteen hundred - the consequence is that the Shipment for this year will not be over 105 Hhds - It is however very satisfactory to say that [our flock] is in better order - our prospects good and the people behaving in a very creditable way - so much so that there is but little occasion to call upon the magistrate - It is true I never ask them to labour in their own time without paying them for it as I consider it desirable to instruct them in the value of money as an exchange for Labor as early as possible and I hope something will be done to compel the idle and the lazy to accept of a standard rate of wages if they will not work without it - I really do think that the Island Crop this year will be some thousand Hogsheads short of the last and that sugars kept until the fall will bring good price[s??]
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I regret to mention that my old friend Mr Forsyth who was suffering from an affection of the heart for a long time past went off very suddenly on the morning of the 14th before I could obey the summons of his wife although not more than 150 yds off - He had expected to be snatched away at a moments notice and prepared himself accordingly - He was under great apprehension for fear he should die away from his home and in consequence he seldom went out - I think he was only once at Chiswick since the year 1832 and then for not more than half an Hour - You may therefore confidently rely upon the Estate having my service devoted to it as it has hereunto been and it is some satisfaction to me to say that although I have been rather short in the crop I expected the neighbours are still shorter by a very large proportion I therefore can only hope with our Governor in his speech to the House of Assembly when he persuaded them that although the crop was short the prices were excellent - With best wishes
I remain DearSir respectfully yours J Townson
Thomas Mayhew Esq Saxmunden
