Keep Your Personal Copy
Keep Your Personal Copy
1784 – 1787 Horatio Nelson was stationed in the Caribbean and became hated by WI planters because, unlike other naval officers, he enforced the trade blockade with the newly independent USA.
After this commission, he was out of work on half pay for five years, he thought that this was punishment for his carrying out the letter of the law
In writing, he endorsed an idea to have immigrant Asians replace enslaved persons in Trinidad
In June 1805 he wrote a letter to leading Jamaican planter Simon Taylor asking him to look out for a good position for a clerical friend who had lost his job; the letter was critical of Wilberforce’s character, Nelson dies in October of that year. Nelson, as was his custom, kept a pressed copy (which is like a carbon copy) of this letter in his personal files.
He had no use for WWilberforce as he knew about his hedonistic youth
Jamaica
After Nelson’s death, Taylor (who was the archetype of a decadent WI planter and also a mastermind) sent a copy of the letter to anti-abolitionists as evidence that their national hero was critical of Wilberforce.
Barbados
1815 Statue of Nelson erected in Bridgetown Barbados for Nelson’s protection of the British WI from other colonial powers.
Public awareness of systemic racism arising from the 2020 killing of George Floyd in the USA has caused the Barbados government to unearth a 1998 constitutional review commission and act on the recommendation to relocate Nelson’s statue to a less prominent position as he was a leading agent of colonialism.
On November 17, 2020, that statue will relocated.
Historians have unearthed Nelson’s pressed copy and revealed the forgery.
My view
Tell the entire story. Jamaica, as far as I know, has no statues of Nelson but at least two chunks of real estate in the capital are named in recognition of his professional exploits. One area is Trafalgar Park and its main road is Lord Nelson way that joins Trafalgar Rd (Nelson died at the Battle of Trafalgar off the coast of Spain); Waterloo Road (named for the Battle of Waterloo in Belgium where Napoleon Buonaparte was defeated by joint European forces under the command of a British officer whose famous name is not necessary for this note). Trafalgar Park of course has Hamilton Drive named in recognition of his long term mistress. Chancery Hall has Lord Nelson Drive, Horatio Drive and of course Hamilton Drive. There is no road named in honour of Nelson’s long suffering wife, Caribbean born Frances Woolward.
Jamaican culture has a liking for a power culture. A lot of our settlements and urban quarters are named in recognition of military leaders or places that have become synonymous with human bloodshed or civil strife.
The point of this is, keep a copy of important correspondence, you never know when it can come to your defence.
EpitathA fictional account of a real love story that I did about the period when Nelson was stationed in the Caribbeanhttps://biteable.com/watch/now-that-we-found-love-what-are-we-gpoing-to-do-wi-2726331
