Bridges tells us that “in the year 1695 Sir Nicolas Lawes bequeathed his
estate, in default of heirs, to found a free school for the benefit of
the parishes of Kingston and St. Andrew. A school was consequently
incorporated, with a seal, bearing the founder’s arms, but it failed for
want of sufficient means, and the land was attached to the rectory.
Twelve years afterwards Zacariah Gaulton left £80 per annum to pay a
master and £500 to build a schoolhouse, and in 1721 Benjamin Cotman
bequeathed his estate for the same purpose.” As a matter of fact Sir
Nicholas Lawes’s will is dated August 21, 1730, and the bequest was not
to _establish_ a school, but “unto the Governors of the Free School of
St. Andrews in the Island of Jamaica for the time being, and in case
there be no Governors at that time as the Law directs then to such
Governors as the Chancellor or Commander-in-Chief of the said Island
shall direct and appoint Governors of the said Free School then I say I
give to such Governors of the said Free School and their successors for
ever the estate and premisses aforesaid for and towards the maintenance
of the Masters Teachers and other Officers of the said Free School the
repairing and making new Buildings more fitt and comodious large house
or houses on the land at Halfway Tree which I formerly gave for that use
finishing and furnishing the same and for and towards the maintenance
support education and learning of so many Scholars (native youths of
Jamaica) as the said Governors of the said School or the major part of
them shall from time to time think fitt to admit to that benefit and the
said bequest can support and maintain.”
But this bequest never took effect, for all his children who were living
when he made his will—his sons James and Temple and his daughter Judith
Maria—survived him.
Roger Elletson, Speaker of the House of Assembly, and Chief Justice, in
the year 1690 gave £20 towards the foundation of a school in St. Andrew.
Edward Harrison, in 1695, and Charles Delacree, in the succeeding year,
each bequeathed £10 per annum for the same purpose. The bequests,
however, were allowed to lie dormant until the year 1789, when the
principal and interest were estimated at £14,710, no part of which was,
however, recovered.
John Mills, in 1711, after several entails, left money to establish a
free school in St. Elizabeth, but no such institution ever existed.
In the year 1736, Edward Pennant left £200 for a school and books, in
Clarendon; and a school was founded in Old Woman’s Savannah, aided by
subscriptions to the amount of £2000. It flourished about the year 1758,
when, by some ill-management, it failed; the premises were vested in
trustees for sale, and the institution vanished.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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