George Henry Burt (1787 - 1851)

Born 17 May 1787 in St Kitts, West Indies.

Descendants

Died 10 Oct 1851 at age 64 in St Kitts, West Indies.

Biography

Sugar planter & merchant; Road Surveyor of St Kitts; Speaker of the House of Assembly of Saint Christopher. His family had been resident in the West Indies since 1635, primarily involved in administration of the Leeward Islands and in sugar plantations.

His relation William Mathew Burt, was Governor-General (1776–1781) of the Leeward Islands during the American War of Independence.

Slave owner

Received compensation for enslaved people as an individual, and jointly with his son Archibald Paull Burt Q.C. (1810-1879)

After two weeks of revolt in St. Kitts in 1834, Speaker of the assembly GH Burt, a proprietor of an estate in St. Ann parish, burned the housing of the absent 'former slaves, now apprentices' who were hiding in the mountains. This was to 'encourage' them to return to unpaid work.^[1]

He made his will on 29 July 1847, leaving "all my real and personal estate of all and any nature soever unto my Son Archibald Paull Burt Q.C. (1810-1879) and my Son in Law Francis Spencer Wigley I (1805-1872) to have and to hold the same to them their heirs executors administrators and assigns respectively as Tenants in Common for ever and I hereby appoint the said Archibald Paull Burt and Francis Spencer Wigley Executors of this my will ...". ^[2]

Sources

1. ↑ Frucht, Richard. “Emancipation and Revolt in the West Indies: St. Kitts, 1834.” Science & Society 39, no. 2 (1975): 199–214. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40401879.
2. ↑ registered in the St Christopher Registry of Deeds Calendar of Entries commencing no 10509 March 19 1841, no 20701.

See also

• http://homepages.nildram.co.uk/~cbirch/burt_2008/FH01/FH01_011.HTM#P145F108
• Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septimus_Burt