Edited by Azizi Powell
This post is part of a continuing pancocojams series on names and naming practices in the Caribbean.
This post presents an excerpt from an online article about Jamaican last names that are Scottish in origin.
The content of this post is presented for folkloric and cultural purposes.
I'm quoting these article to help preserve and disseminate this information.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to all those who are quoted in this post.
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Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2016/07/list-of-most-common-black-jamaican-last.htmlfor a 2016 pancocojams post entitled "List Of Most Common Black Jamaican Last Names".
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EXCERPT FROM ARTICLE ABOUT THE SCOTTISH ORIGIN OF SOME JAMAICAN LAST NAMES
From https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/13839601.jamaica-the-country-with-more-campbells-per-head-of-population-than-scotland/ By David Leask, 10th October 2015
"In which Commonwealth country outside Scotland will you find the highest percentage of people with Scottish surnames?
You might expect the answer to that question to be Canada or New Zealand, but the surprising answer is Jamaica.
The frequency of Scottish surnames is such that 60% of names in the Jamaican telephone directory are Scottish in origin. The reasons for this surprising fact are not very well known in either Scotland or Jamaica, but perhaps that is because it is not entirely a comfortable story...
[A] group of Scottish prisoners of war disembarked from a ship called The Two Sisters and began a new life as indentured servants on sugar plantations in Jamaica.
It was only a year before that Jamaica had been captured from the Spanish and Oliver Cromwell saw the new colony as a useful opportunity to be rid of these Scottish prisoners who had been languishing in jails since the battles at Dunbar in 1650 and Worcester in 1651.
Later in the seventeenth century these first Scots were followed by other exiles including petty criminals and Covenanters. We know some of the names of those Covenanters including Marshall and Martin which are common surnames in Jamaica today and the first of millions of Jamaicans of mixed African and Scottish descent date from this period.
Some Jacobite rebels were also exiled to Jamaica, but the number of involuntary Scottish exiles was soon to be exceeded by Scots who chose to come to Jamaica. The first of these may have been Colonel John Campbell from Inveraray in Argyllshire.
At the end of the seventeenth century, Campbell had participated in the disastrous Darien experiment in the Panama. Rather than returning to Scotland, he decided to stop off in Jamaica in 1701 where he settled at Black River in the south west of the island. He had a large family which initiated the spread of the Campbell name all over the island. It is the commonest surname in Jamaica and there are said to be more Campbells per square acre in Jamaica than in Scotland!
His descendants include the fashion model Naomi Campbell and the sprinter Veronica Campbell-Brown.
As the slave economy expanded in the eighteenth century a disproportionate number of Scots, especially from the Lowlands, came to seek their fortune in Jamaica.
A large number of plantation owners and overseers in Jamaica were from Scotland as well as being involved in a variety of other occupations. During her visit to Jamaica in 1801, Lady Nugent observed that,“Almost all the agents, attornies [sic], merchants and shopkeepers, are of that country [Scotland] and really do deserve to thrive in this, they are so industrious.”
The Scottish slave owners whose surnames live on in Jamaica today include James Wedderburn, David Lyon, Rev Alexander Whyte and John Newland. The last named owned plantations in St Andrew in what is now the western part of Kingston.
[...]
The leaders of the Morant Bay Rebellion in 1865, Paul Bogle and George William Gordon, both had Scottish surnames. Other Jamaicans who had Scottish fathers included the radicals Robert Wedderburn and William Davidson and also Mary Seacole who was born Mary Grant. She was a famous nurse during the Crimean War. Olympic gold medalist Shelly."
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Selected comments from this article, with numbers added for referencing purposes only:
1. Vince Lue11th, October 2015 1:09 pm
"This article proves what I know by experience, There are communities that were almost totally Scottish in Westmoreland and just three generations ago. One of these is called Dumbslane. Drove through Scotland and saw Dumblane (or Dumblaine) and realise this could be the origin of Dumbslane. Dumbslane is part of Strawberry with Stewarts, McIntosh, Campbell, Ruddock, Johnson, Petgrave, etc."
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2. Chic Harden11th October 2015 3:48 pm
"I read this article with interest. Back in the early 1990s my mate and I holidayed in Turkey and met a second generation Jamiacan, Pete McKenzie, whose parents emigrated to London from Jamaica before he was born.
I marvelled at the surname and he told me his ancestors were descended from scots prisoners, though Pete himself looked pure Afro-Carib. He also mentioned that his two best mates in London, also of Jamiacan extract, were a Campbell and a Davidson. I'd forgotten about this until tonight.
As an aside, I holidayed in Jamaica 15 years ago and was slightly depressed to discover that indigenous Jamiacans, lighter skinned and noticeably different in appearance, habitually were employed in lower ranking jobs and were, it's fair to say, discriminated against openly. Human beings, eh."
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Reply
3. Ann Marie Canavan 11th October 2015 4:29 pm
"Hi there, Chic,
Your comment reminds me of a holiday in Barbados 2003, when I put my back out and consulted a local doctor, Malcolm Grant, an eminent Afro Caribbean gent. Soon after that I attended a book signing for Professor Tom Devine's new book, the title eludes me at the moment, which detailed the practice of sending Scots prisoners, indentured labourers, to work in the plantations in the Caribbean, where they burned easily, henceforth gaining the nickname of "redlegs".
This is a period of Scottish history which requires more exposure and reflection."
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