Beckford family

Notes:

Traced origins as sugar plantation owners to Peter Beckford, c1643-1710, who arrived at Jamaica in the 1660s to work as a merchant. His accumulation of wealth enabled him to be a pioneer in establishing sugar plantations and he emerged both as a leading plantation owner using enslaved labour, and as a powerful official. Succeeded by his son, also Peter, c1672-1735, who was reckoned to be the largest plantation owner in Jamaica and also a financier of other plantation owners. On his death his estate passed to his sons, much of it to William, c1709-70, who managed his plantations in Jamaica before returning to England in the 1740s to make a career in politics. The family followed the general pattern of becoming absentee owners and accumulated considerable assets and influence in England; the assets included of a large landed estate in Wiltshire and a great house at Fonthill [2023]