Nathaniel Wells
| Nathaniel Wells | |
|---|---|
Wells' seal
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|
| Born |
10 September 1779 St Kitts, British West Indies |
| Died | 13 May 1852 (aged 72) Bath, Somerset, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | Slave owner, landowner, magistrate, High Sheriff |
Nathaniel Wells (10 September 1779 – 13 May 1852), was the son of a Welsh merchant and a black slave. After inheriting his father's plantations, Wells became a wealthy land owner, magistrate, the second black person to hold a commission in the Armed Forces of the Crown (after Captain John Perkins). He was also Britain's first black High Sheriff.
Wells was the son of William Wells, who emigrated from a rich Cardiff family to St Kitts, where he was a successful slave trader and latterly became a wealthy plantation owner. After his British wife died, William began fathering children by his slave women – at least six, all by different women. Although rape was a well known practice, Wells looked after both the children and their mothers, giving them their freedom and sums of money to live on—including Nathaniel's mother, Juggy, and leaving the bulk of his estate to Nathaniel.
Wells' father sent him to London to be educated. On completing his education he stayed in Britain and seems to have been accepted despite his colour and illegitimacy by other members of high society, becoming a respected land owner in Monmouthshire. Wells also became a magistrate, sitting in judgement over white people at a time when most black people in Britain's colonies – including on Wells' own estates – would have had no rights to such a court hearing.
Wells managed his inherited sugar plantation estates like any other absentee white owner. Wells would have had little control over the way the slaves he owned were treated, as the estates were leased out to local managers. The punishment of slaves by one of these managers was singled out for criticism by abolitionists and became the subject of an abolitionist tract, although it would appear that this was with the tacit consent of Wells, who refrained from suppressing its publication in the Courts. There were only supposed to be 39 lashes administered in a certain period of time, while it was alleged that this manager gave 39 lashes plus a "brining" – putting pepper water onto those lashes to make the slaves scream.
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Wikipedia