Note (return) — Chapter VII

In November 1688 a petition was presented to the king by the planters and merchants trading to Jamaica protesting against the new régime introduced by Lord Albemarle:—"The once flourishing island of Jamaica is likely to be utterly undone by the irregularities of some needy persons lately set in power. Many of the most considerable inhabitants are deserting it, others are under severe fines and imprisonments from little or no cause.... The provost-marshal has been dismissed and an indebted person put in his place; and all the most substantial officers, civil and military, have been turned out and necessitous persons set up in their room. The like has been done in the judicial offices, whereby the benefit of appeals and prohibitions is rendered useless. Councillors are suspended without royal order and without a hearing. Several persons have been forced to give security not to leave the island lest they should seek redress; others have been brought before the council for trifling offences and innumerable fees taken from them; money has been raised twenty per cent. over its value to defend creditors. Lastly, the elections have been tampered with by the indebted provost-marshal, and since the Duke of Albemarle's death are continued without your royal authority."494 The death of Albemarle, indeed, at this opportune time was the greatest service he rendered to the colony. Molesworth was immediately commanded to return to Jamaica and resume authority. The duke's system was entirely reversed, and the government restored as it had been under the administration of Sir Thomas Lynch. Elletson was removed from the council and from his position as chief justice, and Bernard returned in his former place. All of the rest of Albemarle's creatures were dismissed from their posts, and the supporters of Lynch's régime again put in control of a majority in the council.495 This measure of plain justice was one of the last acts of James II. as King of England. On 5th November 1688 William of Orange landed in England at Torbay, and on 22nd December James escaped to France to live as a pensioner of Louis XIV. The new king almost immediately wrote to Jamaica confirming the reappointment of Molesworth, and a commission to the latter was issued on 25th July 1689.496 Molesworth, unfortunately for the colony, died within a few days,497 and the Earl of Inchiquin was appointed on 19th September to succeed him.498 Sir Francis Watson, President of the Council in Jamaica, obeyed the instructions of William III., although he was a partizan of Albemarle; yet so high was the feeling between the two factions that the greatest confusion reigned in the government of the island until the arrival of Inchiquin in May 1690.499