WEBVTT - Frances Duff's Jamaican Inheritance 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:04.560 Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm 0:00:04.600 --> 0:00:11.160 and Mild from Aaron Manky listener discretion advised. In July 0:00:11.560 --> 0:00:16.520 seventeen thirty eight, Jamaica's House of Assembly convened in Saint 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:19.680 Diego de la Vega for what seemed to be an 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:24.040 ordinary day of legislative business. In that room were some 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:29.880 of the richest men in Britain's richest Caribbean colony, likely 0:00:30.000 --> 0:00:34.360 dressed in light linen shirts to weather the heat. While 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:39.640 these men were elected officials, they were hardly representative of 0:00:39.680 --> 0:00:44.760 the population. At this time, around one hundred thousand enslaved 0:00:44.800 --> 0:00:49.879 Africans lived in Jamaica, outnumbering the white population of the 0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:55.400 island ten to one. But these white propertied elite who 0:00:55.440 --> 0:01:00.520 built their fortunes on sugar plantations and the enslaved people 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:04.679 who worked on them, wrote the laws that governed the colony. 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:10.400 One topic of discussion was a private petition from a 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:16.440 woman named Susannah Augiir. Susanna was mixed race. Her father 0:01:16.720 --> 0:01:20.600 was a white planter and her mother was enslaved on 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:25.920 his plantation. Her mother's name did not survive the historical record. 0:01:26.520 --> 0:01:31.000 Susanna was born into slavery, but had been freed some 0:01:31.200 --> 0:01:35.319 time before her father died in seventeen twenty two. We 0:01:35.520 --> 0:01:39.760 don't know exactly how Susannah was freed, but she went 0:01:39.840 --> 0:01:43.800 on to have a number of relationships with white plantation 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:49.520 owners and bore six children. Free people of color like 0:01:49.600 --> 0:01:55.680 Susannah and her children occupied an uneasy middle position in 0:01:55.760 --> 0:02:01.760 Jamaican society. They could own property and businesses, and in 0:02:01.800 --> 0:02:06.160 some cases a mass a significant amount of wealth, but 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:11.639 they couldn't vote inherit large amounts of property, or testify 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:16.720 in court, and they were saddled with additional fees and taxes. 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:22.400 Their position was only made more uneasy in seventeen twenty 0:02:22.480 --> 0:02:27.119 eight when the Assembly ruled that anyone with more than 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:33.200 one black great grandparent could not legally be white, out 0:02:33.200 --> 0:02:37.279 of a fear that the colonies growing mixed race population 0:02:38.040 --> 0:02:42.800 might side with the enslaved in a rebellion. In the 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:47.800 summer of seventeen thirty eight, Susannah had brought a petition 0:02:48.040 --> 0:02:52.320 before the Assembly to grant herself and two of her 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:58.359 daughters quote the same rights and privileges with English subjects 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:04.440 born of white parents end quote. Susanna was the second 0:03:04.639 --> 0:03:10.160 recorded individual and the first woman to submit a private 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:14.840 bill like this to the Jamaican Assembly. Although Susannah was 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:19.320 born into slavery with an African parent, she was asking 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:23.519 the House of Assembly to grant herself and her daughter's 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:28.960 whiteness under the eyes of the law. On July nineteenth, 0:03:29.120 --> 0:03:34.960 seventeen thirty eight, the Jamaican Assembly approved Susanna's petition. She 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:38.760 had taken great pains to show the Assembly that she 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:43.280 was no threat to the white propertied Jamaican elite. In 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:46.720 spite of her origins. Susanna had come to own a 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:51.080 share of a sugar plantation which included both land and 0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:56.480 enslaved human beings. Her daughters had a Church of England education, 0:03:57.200 --> 0:04:01.040 and their father had a number of plumb posts in 0:04:01.120 --> 0:04:05.920 the legal elite, as the Provost, Marshal and Sergeant at 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:10.360 Mace of the Jamaican High Court of Admiralty. It was 0:04:10.400 --> 0:04:14.200 not cheap to lodge a petition with the Assembly. It 0:04:14.320 --> 0:04:19.480 cost ninety pounds, roughly the price of according to historian 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:26.000 Miranda Kaufman, three enslaved people. Susanna's petition would set her 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:30.400 two daughters up for riches and status far beyond even 0:04:30.560 --> 0:04:34.360 the considerable wealth she had managed to earn in her 0:04:34.360 --> 0:04:38.880 own life. One of these daughters, Francis, who was just 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:42.920 nine in seventeen thirty eight, would go on to marry 0:04:42.960 --> 0:04:47.400 a Scottish aristocrat, the youngest son of the first Earl 0:04:47.520 --> 0:04:52.080 of Fife. In doing so, she became the first heiress 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:56.359 of African ancestry as far as we know, to join 0:04:56.600 --> 0:05:04.880 the British aristocracy. I'm Dana Schwartz and this is noble blood. 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:10.040 By the time Francis Dalzell was born in Kingston, Jamaica 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:14.080 in seventeen twenty nine, her mother, Susanna, had already had 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:18.400 four other children. Three of these were with Peter Kayard, 0:05:18.760 --> 0:05:23.159 a prosperous merchant in Kingston. Peter was a friend and 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:27.880 business partner of Susanna's father, and he eventually entered into 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:33.000 a sexual relationship with Susannah when she was around thirteen 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:38.159 and Peter was in his fifties. These types of arrangements 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:42.920 between white enslavers and black or mixed heritage women were 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:47.320 commonplace in the Caribbean. As Miranda Kaufman put it, these 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:52.880 relationships quote existed on a spectrum from brutal rape to 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:58.240 long term cohabitation, but always involved a coercive element, or 0:05:58.320 --> 0:06:04.040 at best an dream imbalance of power. In seventeen twenty five, 0:06:04.160 --> 0:06:08.599 when Peter was sixty and Susannah was seventeen, she had 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:11.479 her first daughter by Peter, and would go on to 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:15.599 have two more children in seventeen twenty six and seventeen 0:06:15.680 --> 0:06:20.000 twenty eight. Peter died the same month that their youngest 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:24.359 child was born, leaving Susannah with a massive fortune, which 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:28.320 included several properties in Kingston and Saint Diego de la Vega, 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.719 a plantation in Saint Andrew, and two cattle pen and 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:35.960 two plots of land in Saint Catharine, all of which 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:39.600 was worth an estimated twenty six thousand, one hundred and 0:06:39.600 --> 0:06:45.760 fifty pounds. Kaufman speculates that Peter even bought Susanna's freedom 0:06:46.160 --> 0:06:49.960 a few years earlier, sometime before her father died in 0:06:50.080 --> 0:06:56.120 seventeen twenty two. Although no surviving evidence confirms that, it 0:06:56.200 --> 0:07:01.760 does explain a curious detail in Susanna's fire will. After 0:07:01.800 --> 0:07:05.960 his death, his will ensured the manumission of many of 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:10.200 his enslaved children and left them part of his inheritance, 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:14.200 which was extremely rare for the time, but he did 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:18.120 not free Susanna, nor did he leave anything for her 0:07:18.160 --> 0:07:22.200 in his will. Kaufman infers that her father had left 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:26.440 Susanna out because he knew that his friend and colleague Peter, 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:31.080 had already freed her and offered her tremendous financial support. 0:07:32.120 --> 0:07:37.000 After Peter's death, Susanna began a relationship with another wealthy merchant, 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:41.679 Gibson Dalzell, who had left Scotland as a young man 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:47.280 and built a fortune in Jamaica's booming sugar economy. Gibson 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:50.760 was far closer to Susanna's age at this point than 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:54.600 Peter had been, and appeared to show her and her 0:07:54.680 --> 0:07:59.760 children affection throughout their relationship, but there is no evidence 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:01.880 of her feelings for him. 0:08:02.240 --> 0:08:06.000 In any case, their relationship was unequal at its core. 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:11.160 As a free woman of color, Susannah's legal rights still 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:17.240 depended on his goodwill. Gibson and Susannah conceived Francis the 0:08:17.360 --> 0:08:22.080 year they met. Susannah raised Francis in a townhouse that 0:08:22.200 --> 0:08:26.000 had once belonged to Peter in Water Lane in Kingston. 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:33.520 After Susannah's petition successfully guaranteed her and her children's legal whiteness, 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:37.480 Francis left for boarding school in Britain in the fall 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.640 of seventeen thirty eight. Francis was lucky to go to 0:08:41.760 --> 0:08:45.000 boarding school at the time she did. At the end 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:49.040 of the eighteenth century, elite schools would crack down on 0:08:49.200 --> 0:08:53.760 admissions to people of mixed heritage, but in the seventeen thirties, 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:57.440 thousands of young people of color left the Caribbean to 0:08:57.520 --> 0:09:03.520 attend British schools. The Jamaican enslaver and historian Edward Long 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:08.680 explained that mixed race children quote are often sent to 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:12.480 the most expensive public schools, where the history of their 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:17.280 parentage is entirely unknown. They pass under the general name 0:09:17.400 --> 0:09:21.640 of West Indians, and the bronze of their complexion is 0:09:21.760 --> 0:09:25.200 ignorantly ascribed to the fervor of the sun in the 0:09:25.240 --> 0:09:30.560 torrid zone end quote. In Francis's case, this may have 0:09:30.600 --> 0:09:36.240 only been partially true. Francis's grandfather, Robert Dalzel, was her 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:40.120 closest relative in London, but it seems that he may 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:45.120 have received her coolly in spite of his wealth. His 0:09:45.400 --> 0:09:50.719 sister in law paid Francis's tuition instead. Perhaps her grandfather 0:09:50.960 --> 0:09:56.840 treated Francis with such distance because she represented Gibson's life 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:02.559 in Jamaica. Which to Robert see like an undignified dalliance 0:10:02.600 --> 0:10:06.920 from a real career in London. In seventeen forty three, 0:10:07.360 --> 0:10:11.960 a few years after Francis left Jamaica for school, Robert 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:15.720 ordered Gibson to return to England. He promised that he 0:10:15.720 --> 0:10:18.600 would set his son up with a job, a townhouse, 0:10:18.640 --> 0:10:23.280 a coach, quote, everything he likes. Robert may have even 0:10:23.400 --> 0:10:27.160 used his granddaughter as a bargaining chip. Although she was 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:31.239 too young to marry. Robert said that if Gibson returned 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:34.280 to England and picked out a good match for her, 0:10:34.760 --> 0:10:39.200 he Robert would quote give her a fortune. According to 0:10:39.280 --> 0:10:43.880 a letter from Gibson's aunt, much to his father's delight, 0:10:44.080 --> 0:10:48.920 Gibson arrived in London in seventeen forty six, reuniting with 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:53.280 fifteen year old Francis for the first time in six years. 0:10:54.000 --> 0:10:58.120 Robert had secured his son Gibson a prestigious directorship and 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:01.839 a lucrative public office in London that would allow him 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:06.200 to make a fortune while running his plantations remotely. But 0:11:06.480 --> 0:11:11.120 Gibson was in London reluctantly, still longing for his life 0:11:11.240 --> 0:11:15.959 back in Jamaica. Even though Susannah and Gibson were not married, 0:11:16.360 --> 0:11:20.960 their lives were deeply intertwined. They lived together in Kingston 0:11:21.120 --> 0:11:25.199 with Francis's younger brother, Bob, who had been born while 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:29.960 Francis was away. In seventeen thirty nine, Susannah had bought 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:33.640 three hundred acres of land that she had transferred to 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:39.559 Gibson for a token payment of five shillings. Gibson expanded 0:11:39.559 --> 0:11:43.720 it by one thousand acres, transforming it into a sugar 0:11:43.800 --> 0:11:49.480 plantation called Lucky Hill. In spite of Gibson's protestations, his 0:11:49.640 --> 0:11:54.359 father convinced him to remain in London. In late seventeen 0:11:54.559 --> 0:11:58.440 forty six, Gibson's son Bob joined him at the Dulzell 0:11:58.520 --> 0:12:02.400 House in Mayfair to go to a posh elementary school, 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:08.800 just like his sister had. Meanwhile, Susanna remained in Jamaica alone. 0:12:08.840 --> 0:12:12.520 Francis often wore a gold chain that her mother had sent, 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.440 perhaps as a tribute to her. It was unclear if 0:12:16.480 --> 0:12:24.760 Francis would ever see her mother again. Throughout Francis's young adulthood, 0:12:24.920 --> 0:12:28.320 she and her father tried to stay in touch with Susannah. 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:34.000 Both wrote Susannah long letters. Gibson even included affectionate messages 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:38.400 for her in his business correspondence. In one he wrote, quote, 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:42.680 tell her I sincerely wish her health and happiness, which 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:47.679 I suppose does qualify as affectionate. But replies were few 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:52.640 and far between. In July seventeen fifty one, Francis was 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:55.480 still waiting for her mother to reply to a letter 0:12:55.800 --> 0:13:01.000 she had sent last November. Susannah had problems of her 0:13:01.040 --> 0:13:04.920 own to deal with back in Jamaica. In seventeen forty eight, 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.880 when one of Susanna's debts led her to transfer a 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:13.560 valuable bond Gibson had given her, creditors came after him 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:18.520 for more than two thousand pounds. The crisis forced the 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:24.320 family to reorganize Susanna's affairs. Gibson's attorney persuaded her to 0:13:24.440 --> 0:13:28.200 write a will leaving her estate to their two children. 0:13:28.960 --> 0:13:33.280 With his old, imperious father skeptical of his financial dealings 0:13:33.320 --> 0:13:36.680 in the Caribbean and his son too young to understand, 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:41.240 Gibson turned to his daughter Francis to discuss his business 0:13:41.679 --> 0:13:45.439 as if she were his apprentice. He even entrusted her 0:13:45.480 --> 0:13:50.880 with a copy of his will when she was just seventeen. Francis, too, 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:55.640 was preparing for her future in March seventeen fifty six, 0:13:56.080 --> 0:13:59.960 Francis introduced her father to the man that she hoped 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:05.199 to Mary George Duff, a twenty year old cornette in 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:09.720 the tenth Regiment of Dragoons. He seemed to be besotted 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:13.960 with Francis from the jump. After they met at the 0:14:14.160 --> 0:14:18.440 marriage mart In Bath, he plied her with flowery letters, 0:14:18.760 --> 0:14:22.000 writing quote the power you have over me, you can 0:14:22.120 --> 0:14:26.000 use me ill or well as you please, and that 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.360 when they weren't together, quote I could not be said 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:34.680 to live. Frances affectionately called him my dear Duff, but 0:14:34.800 --> 0:14:38.280 she was a little more reserved than George was, at 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:42.400 least from his perspective. In one letter, he complained she 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:46.560 wasn't expressing as much devotion to him as she was 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:50.680 to her, but it was hard to compete with George's devotion. 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:54.520 He wrote that quote, I could work for your smile 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:58.640 at poverty and say it was happiness above expression, while 0:14:58.720 --> 0:15:03.680 I had my fanny. While perhaps a sweet sentiment, it 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:07.120 seemed clear that neither of them would have a life 0:15:07.120 --> 0:15:11.680 of poverty. As the youngest son of William Duff, Lord 0:15:11.800 --> 0:15:17.440 Bracco of Kilbride, George was rich and titled. Educated at 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:22.480 Edinburgh and Saint Andrew's and about to inherit estates in 0:15:22.680 --> 0:15:27.120 Banffshire and Moray, yielding over one thousand pounds a year. 0:15:29.200 --> 0:15:33.920 George approached Francis's father, Gibson with a similar poetic flare. 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:38.080 The day after they met, George wrote to him quote, 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:40.760 I have loved your daughter ever since I had the 0:15:40.800 --> 0:15:43.920 happiness to know her, and it is in your power 0:15:44.000 --> 0:15:47.600 and hers to make me happy or miserable forever. I 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:50.880 never can be happy without her. But rather than you 0:15:50.960 --> 0:15:54.720 should be displeased with her, I'll suffer all the torments 0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:59.680 the world affords. But before George could formally get Francis's 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:04.200 father's permission for her hand in marriage, Gibson died in 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:08.000 May seventeen fifty six, at the age of fifty eight. 0:16:08.640 --> 0:16:11.960 Francis had to break the news to her mother. She 0:16:12.080 --> 0:16:16.200 wrote to Susannah, it will always give me great pleasure 0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:19.240 to hear of your happiness and to serve you in 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:23.840 everything in my power whichever you want, Please to command me. 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:29.520 Gibson's will placed his assets in trust, the income to 0:16:29.600 --> 0:16:33.840 be shared equally between his two children. His total personal 0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:37.880 property in Jamaica was worth five thousand seven hundred and 0:16:38.000 --> 0:16:42.560 ninety eight pounds, including both land and one hundred and 0:16:42.680 --> 0:16:47.480 thirty three enslaved people across his plantations. The people he 0:16:47.720 --> 0:16:53.240 enslaved represented almost seventy five percent of his wealth. Additionally, 0:16:53.560 --> 0:16:57.920 Gibson left Francis the income from several shares of his 0:16:58.080 --> 0:17:03.800 businesses in London. Unusually, her younger brother Bob would benefit 0:17:03.840 --> 0:17:07.240 from these assets only in the event of Francis's death 0:17:07.359 --> 0:17:12.680 without children, suggesting just how much Gibson trusted his daughter. 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:17.439 But Gibson had not named a formal executor for his 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:22.040 estates in his will, leaving it open to interference from 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:26.919 his various trustees. Francis feared that they would use the 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:30.720 interests of her fourteen year old younger brother, still too 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:35.119 young to advocate for himself, as an excuse to rest 0:17:35.280 --> 0:17:39.240 control of the estate. As she put it, she would 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:43.040 not quote permit any of the trustees in England to 0:17:43.119 --> 0:17:46.920 interfere because, in her words, they had treated her quote 0:17:47.359 --> 0:17:52.800 very ill since her father's death. Francis challenged the arrangement 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:57.080 in court. In English law of the time, a beneficiary 0:17:57.160 --> 0:18:01.320 of a will could apply for probate in situations where 0:18:01.400 --> 0:18:06.520 no executor was named. In July seventeen fifty six, Francis 0:18:06.680 --> 0:18:11.480 won letters of administration, giving her legal control over her 0:18:11.520 --> 0:18:15.760 father's estate, but she had not managed to inherit the 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:19.199 land in Jamaica. To do that, she would need a 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:23.120 grant from the governor. She sent copies of the letters 0:18:23.160 --> 0:18:28.600 of administration and Gibson's will across the Atlantic, and appointed 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:32.880 two of her father's friends with power of attorney, allowing 0:18:32.920 --> 0:18:36.240 them to act as her agents on the island. Later 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:40.480 that year, the governor granted her responsibility for running her 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:45.600 late father's Lucky Hill estate, an extraordinary victory for an 0:18:45.680 --> 0:18:50.200 unmarried twenty six year old woman. But even though Francis 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:55.080 was able to secure her inheritance, her engagement to George 0:18:55.480 --> 0:18:59.640 was on less solid ground. In her way was another 0:18:59.720 --> 0:19:07.080 set of gatekeepers George's parents. After George told his parents 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:11.000 he was engaged in late seventeen fifty six, his parents 0:19:11.119 --> 0:19:14.960 were furious. He received an angry letter from his mother, 0:19:15.320 --> 0:19:18.879 and his father threatened to disown him. There is no 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:23.840 solid evidence as to what exactly about Francis the family disliked, 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:27.960 but they had plenty of ammo in spite of her wealth. 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:31.600 Francis was twenty six years old, considered old for the 0:19:31.680 --> 0:19:38.040 time from Jamaica, had unmarried parents, and had mixed heritage. 0:19:38.160 --> 0:19:43.680 George's sentimental promises of eternal love wouldn't work on the ambitious, 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:49.480 pragmatic DUFs. Kaufmann speculates that the Duffs were quote self 0:19:49.520 --> 0:19:53.880 conscious about their social position. George's brother and sister had 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:59.480 already married unimpressive prospects in their parents' eyes. His brother 0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:03.639 had induced his mother's maid, while his sister eloped with 0:20:03.760 --> 0:20:08.720 a Jacobite. George's father had only held his title since 0:20:08.800 --> 0:20:13.240 seventeen thirty five and feared that his social scene saw 0:20:13.280 --> 0:20:18.920 them as impostors. But in February seventeen fifty seven, George's 0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:23.000 parents seemed open to changing their minds. They were impressed 0:20:23.119 --> 0:20:28.600 by Francis's connection to her grandfather, Robert Dalzell, who was 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:32.520 by that point a well known general and the oldest 0:20:32.680 --> 0:20:37.800 serving officer in Britain. One of George's uncles described Francis 0:20:37.960 --> 0:20:43.120 as quote a grandchild of General Dalzell's by whom George 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:47.840 got a good fortune. George's father sent two of his 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:51.760 relatives to visit the general quote to know his mind 0:20:51.840 --> 0:20:55.359 with regard to the intended marriage and whether he would 0:20:55.359 --> 0:20:59.400 agree to leave Francis any money. According to a letter 0:20:59.440 --> 0:21:02.399 he sent to o son. While we don't know what 0:21:02.440 --> 0:21:05.919 they discussed, it must have pleased the Duffs well enough 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:12.640 to consent to Francis's marriage to George. Francis married George 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:17.560 Duff on April seventh, seventeen fifty seven, at Saint Martin 0:21:17.680 --> 0:21:21.920 in the Fields, But even at that moment she entered 0:21:22.000 --> 0:21:26.760 married life, Francis was watchful of ways things could go wrong. 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:31.600 She kept her marriage a secret for several months, refusing 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:35.679 to change her maiden name. She was still nervous about 0:21:35.680 --> 0:21:40.800 her father's trustees going after her estate because the power 0:21:40.880 --> 0:21:45.040 of attorney she had sent to Jamaica had been executed 0:21:45.119 --> 0:21:49.400 under her maiden name. Changing her name might give them 0:21:49.600 --> 0:21:53.840 leeway to question its validity. It wasn't until the end 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:57.040 of the year she began to sign her name Francis 0:21:57.200 --> 0:22:02.320 Duff instead of Francis Dull's. For all of the excitement 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:06.120 of her new marriage, Francis was still thinking of Jamaica. 0:22:06.720 --> 0:22:10.320 Francis had been contemplating a trip home to take charge 0:22:10.359 --> 0:22:13.600 of her inheritance in person, and perhaps even to see 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:17.600 her mother again. After decades of separation. She wrote to 0:22:17.640 --> 0:22:20.960 one of her business partners, quote, if my courage was 0:22:21.040 --> 0:22:24.840 equal to my inclination of seeing you, I certainly should 0:22:24.840 --> 0:22:28.800 be at Jamaica in three months time. But the ongoing 0:22:28.960 --> 0:22:33.359 Seven Years War made Atlantic crossings slower and more dangerous, 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:38.840 so Francis delayed her trip, and by April seventeen fifty seven, 0:22:39.280 --> 0:22:44.399 Susanna was dead. She had passed suddenly in February, but 0:22:44.560 --> 0:22:48.560 Francis hadn't found out until May, a month after her wedding. 0:22:50.080 --> 0:22:53.639 Susanna may have taken pride in seeing how far her 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:57.680 daughter had risen made possible in part by her own 0:22:57.960 --> 0:23:02.720 determined advocacy, but in a few years the German Assembly 0:23:03.040 --> 0:23:08.399 would make that trajectory nearly impossible for anyone else. In 0:23:08.480 --> 0:23:12.600 seventeen sixty one, the Jamaica Assembly passed a law limiting 0:23:12.720 --> 0:23:17.159 inheritances for mixed heritage people to two thousand pounds in 0:23:17.240 --> 0:23:21.639 Jamaica currency, which would have prevented Francis from amassing the 0:23:21.720 --> 0:23:25.760 fortune she had fought so hard for. Although Susannah might 0:23:25.800 --> 0:23:29.840 have hoped that her seventeen thirty eight Private Act would 0:23:29.880 --> 0:23:34.360 have exempted her daughter from these restrictions, by seventeen sixty one, 0:23:34.800 --> 0:23:38.439 that was no longer a guarantee. In a motion to 0:23:38.520 --> 0:23:44.080 the British government, the Jamaican Assembly even cited Francis's inheritance 0:23:44.280 --> 0:23:48.560 explicitly as an example of what they were trying to prevent. 0:23:49.200 --> 0:23:53.000 The legislators wrote about these kinds of inheritance and as 0:23:53.040 --> 0:23:56.639 a brief aside, because they use antiquated terms for race, 0:23:56.960 --> 0:24:00.159 I'll be replacing them in my reading. They wrote that 0:24:00.280 --> 0:24:06.240 these inheritances quote tend to greatly destroy the distinction requisite 0:24:06.520 --> 0:24:10.560 and absolutely necessary to be kept up in this island 0:24:10.800 --> 0:24:15.320 between white persons and people of color their issue and offspring, 0:24:15.600 --> 0:24:18.879 and may, in progress of time, be the means of 0:24:19.000 --> 0:24:24.479 decreasing the number of white inhabitants. The state viewed mixed 0:24:24.520 --> 0:24:29.920 heritage women like Francis as particular threats to the status quo. 0:24:30.760 --> 0:24:34.239 The British agent to Jamaica wrote that they needed to 0:24:34.280 --> 0:24:38.760 be quote restrained or else quote A great part of 0:24:38.800 --> 0:24:41.720 the property of the island will be in the hands 0:24:41.760 --> 0:24:46.680 of mixed race people and quote as power ever follows property, 0:24:47.119 --> 0:24:52.000 the power will then be in their hands. These fears 0:24:52.080 --> 0:24:57.440 were unfounded, at least in Francis's case. After years apprenticing 0:24:57.480 --> 0:25:00.920 her father. As a teenager, she was prepared to take 0:25:01.040 --> 0:25:05.440 over the work of operating her father's plantations as they were. 0:25:06.040 --> 0:25:10.520 She proved herself to be an attentive businesswoman, ordering inventories 0:25:10.520 --> 0:25:16.119 of every asset and demanding meticulous accounts. She purchased twenty 0:25:16.200 --> 0:25:20.919 enslaved people for Lucky Hill in seventeen fifty seven and 0:25:21.160 --> 0:25:26.119 instructed her lawyer to brand them with quote our mark, 0:25:26.640 --> 0:25:30.800 a common practice at the time. We're not sure exactly 0:25:31.000 --> 0:25:34.639 what this brand might have looked like. Often it was 0:25:34.720 --> 0:25:38.919 the owner's initials. Perhaps it was once her father's initials, 0:25:38.960 --> 0:25:41.600 and then after he died, it might have been hers. 0:25:42.359 --> 0:25:47.080 As historian Miranda Kaufman puts it, quote the stain of 0:25:47.280 --> 0:25:53.960 human exploitation permeated Francis's quote success as deeply as her 0:25:54.000 --> 0:25:58.200 initials were branded on the people who toiled on her plantation. 0:25:59.200 --> 0:26:03.439 It is a co implicated, fascinating story, a moment in 0:26:03.520 --> 0:26:07.199 time when a woman of mixed heritage could rise, but 0:26:07.359 --> 0:26:13.760 only on the terms of a deeply exploitative system. That's 0:26:13.800 --> 0:26:16.800 the story of Francis Duff. But stick around to hear 0:26:17.000 --> 0:26:20.439 about how her story may have influenced a work of 0:26:20.520 --> 0:26:32.720 classic English literature. In William Thackeray's Vanity Fair, in eighteen 0:26:32.960 --> 0:26:37.119 forty eight satirical novel about upper crust British life, a 0:26:37.200 --> 0:26:42.320 minor character named Miss Swartz bears a notable resemblance to 0:26:42.480 --> 0:26:47.760 Francis Duff. Swartz is, of course, reminiscent of the German 0:26:47.840 --> 0:26:52.480 word for black, and like Francis, Miss Swartz is a 0:26:52.720 --> 0:26:56.560 mixed heritage heiress from the Caribbean who goes to London 0:26:56.640 --> 0:27:00.520 as a child to attend a fancy boarding school. Because 0:27:00.520 --> 0:27:04.719 of Miss Schwartz's wealth, she is proposed as a potential 0:27:04.760 --> 0:27:10.399 spouse for self obsessed banker's son George Osborne, but he 0:27:10.600 --> 0:27:15.080 refuses rejecting her because of her race. Miss Swartz and 0:27:15.280 --> 0:27:19.760 Francis both end up marrying members of the Scottish nobility. 0:27:20.440 --> 0:27:25.480 It's unclear whether Francis Duff inspired the character. Miranda Kaufman wrote, 0:27:25.640 --> 0:27:29.080 quote Francis Dalzel may have been long forgotten by the 0:27:29.119 --> 0:27:33.520 novel reading public by eighteen forty eight, but the resemblance 0:27:33.640 --> 0:27:38.960 reveals that the racial anxieties Francis encountered lingered in the 0:27:39.040 --> 0:27:50.520 Victorian imagination almost a century later. Noble Blood is a 0:27:50.560 --> 0:27:54.800 production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey. 0:27:55.400 --> 0:27:59.159 Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz. Writers for 0:27:59.240 --> 0:28:04.240 Noble Blood are Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Paul Jaffey, Natasha Laski, 0:28:04.400 --> 0:28:08.360 and me Danish Swartz. The show is edited and produced 0:28:08.400 --> 0:28:13.240 by Jesse Funk and Nomes Griffin, with supervising producer rima 0:28:13.440 --> 0:28:17.760 il Kaali and executive producers Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and 0:28:17.880 --> 0:28:23.399 Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 0:28:23.640 --> 0:28:27.120 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.