Site specific project developed for Curiouser and Curiouser at Bouton House, Gloucestershire, 2004

Home from Home – A History

• 1509 Jamaica, then called Santiago, settled by Spanish adventurer Juan de Esquivel.
• 1655 Jamaica is seized by the English from Spanish.
• 1661 Proclamation from Charles II gives Jamaica’s non slave populace the rights of English citizens. Jamaican House of Assembly introduced.
• 1663 Captain John East receives Jamaican estates form Charles II for services in the Royal army.
• 1738 Maroons (escaped slaves living in the interior) sign peace agreement with British troops
• 1761 Edward EAST & Amy HALL married in St. Andrews parish, Jamaica
• 1764 Edward Hyde East born St. Andrews, Jamaica Son of Edward East
• 1778 Ackee plants brought to Jamaica from West Africa aboard slave ships and introduced to the eastern parishes by Dr. Thomas Clarke.
• 1793 Capt. William Bligh delivers Bread fruit plants to Jamaica from South Sea Islands and returns samples of the Ackee tree to Kew Gardens in England, where it is given the name Blighia Sapida
• 1808 British Slave trade abolished.
• 1818 Capt. William Bligh names John Bligh 4th Earl of Darnley as executor in his will.
• 1830 Robert Lynch, “a negro slave died at St. Andrews, Jamaica, the property of Sir Edward Hyde East” reputedly at the age of approximately one hundred and sixty years.
• 1834 Slavery abolished throughout the British Colonies.
• 1851 Bourton House purchased by Sir James Buller East son of Sir Edward Hyde East.
• 1861 Henry English, born “Africa I think” is footman at Bourton House
• 1865 Morant Bay Rebellion prompts Jamaican assembly to vote to abolish itself and asked for the establishment of direct British rule.
• 1871 John Lumley,18, agricultural labourer (born Greenwich, Jamaica) and Frederick Lutes, 14, ploughboy (born Jamaica) living in Morton on the Marsh
• Sir James Buller East resident in Bourton House
• 1876 Bourton House Bequeathed to Emily Matilder East cousin of Sir James Buller East
• 1877 John Lumley marries Emma ? , 23 born Hanover, Jamaica, at Morton on Marsh
• 1880* Emily Matilder East marries Frederick Cherburgh Bligh cousin of John Bligh 4th Earl of Darnley
• 1929 Marcus Mosiah Garvey founds black nationalist movement in Jamaica.
• 1935 Ras Taffari brotherhood (the Rastafarians) hail Ethiopia’s emperor Haile Selassie as its god (Jah)
• 1940’s Ada Theodosia Bligh, daughter of F.C. Bligh and E.M. East owner occupier of Bourton House
• 1962 Jamaica receives its independence, William Alexander Bustamante, at age seventy-eight, becomes the new nation’s first prime minister. Ackee declared the countries national fruit.