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Land Policy in the Eighteenth-Century British Empire: the Sale of Crown Lands in the Ceded Islands, 1763–1783*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

D. H. Murdoch
D. H. Murdoch
Affiliation:
University of Leeds
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Extract

Amid the continuing re-evaluations of how the eighteenth-century British empire functioned, the role of land policy remains neglected. Yet it would not be disputed that land was the primary colonial resource. For colonists, its acquisition and exploitation was the most obvious route to wealth, privilege and political power, while in Britain, for those with access to government favour, colonial land was an investment opportunity for making monetary profit from political influence. By the mid eighteenth century, however, opportunities deriving from possession of colonial land varied a good deal. Proprietorial rights in Maryland and Pennsylvania, largely worthless up to the 1730s, rapidly became highly lucrative. In New England, mounting pressure on the supply of land had sharply forced up land values but diminished the average size of landholdings. For both colonists and British investors seeking new opportunities the highest returns on investment in land were likely to be made in the royal colonies of America and the West Indies, where title to land lay in the crown and its acquisition and tenure were subject to regulations which collectively amounted to crown policy. As it had developed over one hundred and fifty years, crown land policy offered terms which were relatively generous and restrictions which were easy to evade. Its study therefore, and particularly examination of attempts by the crown to change the traditional pattern, contribute to a clearer understanding of the imperial nexus in the period before the American Revolution.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 27 , Issue 3 , September 1984 , pp. 549 - 574
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

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17 Propositions for settling the New Sugar Islands Roughly thrown together, undated, Shelburne papers, XLVIII, 71–3; Hints relative to the settling of our New acquisitions in America, undated, ibid. 407–10.

18 Considerations on settling the Grenadoes and the other Islands Ceded to the Crown of Great Britain by the Definitive Treaty, undated, Henry E. Huntington Library, Stowe Collection, Grenville papers [hereafter cited as STG] Box 12/27; A sketch of a plan for the disposal of lands in the newly acquired islands, undated, Shelburne papers, LXXIV, 95–109.

19 Abstract of Several Informations and Plans relative to the Settling of Grenada, Tobago, St Vincent & Dominica, April 1763, STG Box 12/12.

20 Some Hints about settling the lands in the New Sugar Islands, undated, STG Box 12/19. In addition to the views expressed here, Martin was almost certainly the author of at least two other papers on the subject: Some Hints for the better Settlement of the Ceded Islands, undated, Shelburne papers, XLVIII, 567–73, and Supplementary Hints for the more speedy and effectual settlement of the ceded Islands, ibid. 574–6 (copies of both in STG 12/12).

21 Some Hints Concerning the new Islands humbly offered to the Right Honble. George Grenville Esq., by Hugh Graeme, undated, STG Box 12/16.

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24 Board of Trade Journal, 1759–1763, 380, 396–7, 401–3; Henry E. Huntington Library, Stowe Collection, Grenville diplomatic correspondence, Box 103 (c); Plan of 1726, ibid., Grenville miscellaneous papers; T 29/35, 260–9; T 54/39, 240–50.

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27 Ibid. pp. 592–5, 601, 604–5; C.O. 101/9, 113–14.

28 Acts of the privy council, col. ser. IV, 583, 589–92, 596, 605–7; C.O. 101/9, 114.

29 Acts of the privy council, col. ser. pp. 599–603; C.O. 101/9, 111. The length of time during which grants could be revoked by the Treasury was left blank in the latter's report.

30 Acts of the privy council, col. ser., IV, 580, 608—9; C.O. 101/1, 109–10, 120–7. At some point in February, the Board of Trade appears also to have asked the Admiralty for its comments on the draft plan: Draft of a minute concerning the settlement of the Leeward Islands [sic] and Dominica, White to the Board of Trade, undated, STG Box 17/27.

31 Nardin, , La mise en valeur de Tabago, p. 109n.Google Scholar; Clark, , Rise of the Treasury, p. 141 nGoogle Scholar.

32 The commissions of the land commissioners, dated 25 or 26 Mar. 1764, are to be found in C.O. 324/52.

33 Instructions to the land commissioners under the royal sign manual, 24 March 1764, T 1 /436.

34 Copy of a letter and enclosure to the land commissioners, 6 Dec. 1764, T 1/436.

35 Several proposals for remitting the money arising by the sale of lands, undated, T 1/436.

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37 Young's commission as receiver is to be found in C.O. 324/52, his instructions, 26 March 1764, in T 1/436.

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39 Acts of the privy council, col. ser. IV, 609; Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, XII (1897), 218–24; Annual Register, 1764, p. 57.

40 Nardin, , La mise en valeur de Tobago, p. 97 n., notes that ‘Des brochures officieuses de caractère publicitaires furent mise en circulation’Google Scholar; Campbell, John, Candid and impartial considerations on the nature of the sugar trade, the comparative importance of the British and French islands in the West Indies, with the value and consequences of St. Lucia truly stated (London, 1763)Google Scholar.

41 Considerations which may tend to promote the settlement of our new West India colonies by encouraging individuals to embark in the undertaking (London, 1764)Google Scholar, copy in Shelburne papers, LXXIV. Similarities between this and Campbell's pamphlet, particularly in the sections describing the islands, suggest that both authors were working from a common brief.

42 One review of Young's pamphlet remarked of those ‘willing to risk their private fortunes’ in the Ceded Isles that ‘we fear nothwithstanding all this writer advances, that very few of them will live to reap the fruits of their labour’; The Monthly Review, or Literary Journal, XXXII (1764), 319Google Scholar. At least one counter-pamphlet was published: Some observations on the nature, importance and settlement of our new West India colonies (London, 1764)Google Scholar.

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45 On 5 Dec. 1766 commissioner John Stewart forwarded to the earl of Shelburne, then secretary of state for the southern department, five letters jointly addressed to himself and Sir George Colebrooke ‘as the most considerable proprietors in Dominica’, complaining of the situation in that island; the quotation here is from the first of these letters, dated 8 Apr. 1766; C.O. 101/11, 144–5. This copy has no signature, but the author was probably Frank Moore (of the Barbados planter family). Cf. a similar letter in William L. Clements Library, Townshend papers, GD 224, Box 296/5/2.

46 Land commissioners to the Board of Trade, 15 Apr. 1769, C.O. 106/11. A successful lobby of Dominica interests had secured the separation of the island from Grenada's jurisdiction in 1768, when it was subordinated to the Leeward Islands, with Young as its lieutenant-governor. In 1770 the island was made independent of any other West Indies government and Young was promoted governor; Shelburne papers, LII, 467–8.

47 Calculated from the land sales registers for 1765, 1767, 1768 in C.O. 106/9, 1770 in C.O. 76/9, and land commission minutes, 22 Apr. 1771, C.O. 106/12, 1–4; final figures are from Edwards, , History of the British colonies in the West Indies, 1, 432Google Scholar.

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59 Land commission minutes, 10 Aug. 1765, and 15 Aug. 1768, C.O. 106/9.

60 Land commission accounts, 1765–1768, C.O. 106/9; 1769 C.O. 106/11, 64.

61 Ibid.

62 Ibid. and land commission report, 2 Apr. 1765, C.O. 106/9.

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66 Townshend papers, GD 224 8/7/1. This paper appears to be one of the many prepared for Charles Townshend, as chancellor of the exchequer in the Chatham ministry, to facilitate his search for a revenue from the colonies, in the winter of 1766–7; see Thomas, P. G. D., British politics and the Stamp Act crisis, pp. 337ffGoogle Scholar.

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69 Journal ofthe House of Commons, XXXI, 583, 591; XXXII, 374; XXXIN, 726; H.C. accounts and papers, XXXV, part 1, 162, 164, 166; T 29/42, 75.

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84 Address, Memorial and Petition of the Assembly of Dominica to the Crown, undated, C.O. 71/6; Shirley to the Treasury, 13 Oct. 1776, T 1/521, 295–8.

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89 Hewitt to the Treasury, 12 June, 25 July, 26 July and 8 Aug. 1777, Hewitt papers, 522/326a.

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91 Report by Hewitt on the Tobago memorial of 24 July 1776, and Hewitt to the Treasury, 8 Aug. 1777, Hewitt papers, 522/323, 60 and 522/3268.

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94 Hewitt to the Treasury, 8 Aug. 1777, Hewitt papers, 522/3263.

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102 Cf. Thomas, P. G. D., British politics and the Stamp Act crisis, pp. 295ffGoogle Scholar. For an analysis of the origins and intention of the 1774 regulations, see my forthcoming article ‘An “American revenue” from land: the 1774 regulations and the royal colonies in America’.