Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky listener discretion advised. In July
Speaker 1: seventeen thirty eight, Jamaica's House of Assembly convened in Saint
Speaker 1: Diego de la Vega for what seemed to be an
Speaker 1: ordinary day of legislative business. In that room were some
Speaker 1: of the richest men in Britain's richest Caribbean colony, likely
Speaker 1: dressed in light linen shirts to weather the heat. While
Speaker 1: these men were elected officials, they were hardly representative of
Speaker 1: the population. At this time, around one hundred thousand enslaved
Speaker 1: Africans lived in Jamaica, outnumbering the white population of the
Speaker 1: island ten to one. But these white propertied elite who
Speaker 1: built their fortunes on sugar plantations and the enslaved people
Speaker 1: who worked on them, wrote the laws that governed the colony.
Speaker 1: One topic of discussion was a private petition from a
Speaker 1: woman named Susannah Augiir. Susanna was mixed race. Her father
Speaker 1: was a white planter and her mother was enslaved on
Speaker 1: his plantation. Her mother's name did not survive the historical record.
Speaker 1: Susanna was born into slavery, but had been freed some
Speaker 1: time before her father died in seventeen twenty two. We
Speaker 1: don't know exactly how Susannah was freed, but she went
Speaker 1: on to have a number of relationships with white plantation
Speaker 1: owners and bore six children. Free people of color like
Speaker 1: Susannah and her children occupied an uneasy middle position in
Speaker 1: Jamaican society. They could own property and businesses, and in
Speaker 1: some cases a mass a significant amount of wealth, but
Speaker 1: they couldn't vote inherit large amounts of property, or testify
Speaker 1: in court, and they were saddled with additional fees and taxes.
Speaker 1: Their position was only made more uneasy in seventeen twenty
Speaker 1: eight when the Assembly ruled that anyone with more than
Speaker 1: one black great grandparent could not legally be white, out
Speaker 1: of a fear that the colonies growing mixed race population
Speaker 1: might side with the enslaved in a rebellion. In the
Speaker 1: summer of seventeen thirty eight, Susannah had brought a petition
Speaker 1: before the Assembly to grant herself and two of her
Speaker 1: daughters quote the same rights and privileges with English subjects
Speaker 1: born of white parents end quote. Susanna was the second
Speaker 1: recorded individual and the first woman to submit a private
Speaker 1: bill like this to the Jamaican Assembly. Although Susannah was
Speaker 1: born into slavery with an African parent, she was asking
Speaker 1: the House of Assembly to grant herself and her daughter's
Speaker 1: whiteness under the eyes of the law. On July nineteenth,
Speaker 1: seventeen thirty eight, the Jamaican Assembly approved Susanna's petition. She
Speaker 1: had taken great pains to show the Assembly that she
Speaker 1: was no threat to the white propertied Jamaican elite. In
Speaker 1: spite of her origins. Susanna had come to own a
Speaker 1: share of a sugar plantation which included both land and
Speaker 1: enslaved human beings. Her daughters had a Church of England education,
Speaker 1: and their father had a number of plumb posts in
Speaker 1: the legal elite, as the Provost, Marshal and Sergeant at
Speaker 1: Mace of the Jamaican High Court of Admiralty. It was
Speaker 1: not cheap to lodge a petition with the Assembly. It
Speaker 1: cost ninety pounds, roughly the price of according to historian
Speaker 1: Miranda Kaufman, three enslaved people. Susanna's petition would set her
Speaker 1: two daughters up for riches and status far beyond even
Speaker 1: the considerable wealth she had managed to earn in her
Speaker 1: own life. One of these daughters, Francis, who was just
Speaker 1: nine in seventeen thirty eight, would go on to marry
Speaker 1: a Scottish aristocrat, the youngest son of the first Earl
Speaker 1: of Fife. In doing so, she became the first heiress
Speaker 1: of African ancestry as far as we know, to join
Speaker 1: the British aristocracy. I'm Dana Schwartz and this is noble blood.
Speaker 1: By the time Francis Dalzell was born in Kingston, Jamaica
Speaker 1: in seventeen twenty nine, her mother, Susanna, had already had
Speaker 1: four other children. Three of these were with Peter Kayard,
Speaker 1: a prosperous merchant in Kingston. Peter was a friend and
Speaker 1: business partner of Susanna's father, and he eventually entered into
Speaker 1: a sexual relationship with Susannah when she was around thirteen
Speaker 1: and Peter was in his fifties. These types of arrangements
Speaker 1: between white enslavers and black or mixed heritage women were
Speaker 1: commonplace in the Caribbean. As Miranda Kaufman put it, these
Speaker 1: relationships quote existed on a spectrum from brutal rape to
Speaker 1: long term cohabitation, but always involved a coercive element, or
Speaker 1: at best an dream imbalance of power. In seventeen twenty five,
Speaker 1: when Peter was sixty and Susannah was seventeen, she had
Speaker 1: her first daughter by Peter, and would go on to
Speaker 1: have two more children in seventeen twenty six and seventeen
Speaker 1: twenty eight. Peter died the same month that their youngest
Speaker 1: child was born, leaving Susannah with a massive fortune, which
Speaker 1: included several properties in Kingston and Saint Diego de la Vega,
Speaker 1: a plantation in Saint Andrew, and two cattle pen and
Speaker 1: two plots of land in Saint Catharine, all of which
Speaker 1: was worth an estimated twenty six thousand, one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty pounds. Kaufman speculates that Peter even bought Susanna's freedom
Speaker 1: a few years earlier, sometime before her father died in
Speaker 1: seventeen twenty two. Although no surviving evidence confirms that, it
Speaker 1: does explain a curious detail in Susanna's fire will. After
Speaker 1: his death, his will ensured the manumission of many of
Speaker 1: his enslaved children and left them part of his inheritance,
Speaker 1: which was extremely rare for the time, but he did
Speaker 1: not free Susanna, nor did he leave anything for her
Speaker 1: in his will. Kaufman infers that her father had left
Speaker 1: Susanna out because he knew that his friend and colleague Peter,
Speaker 1: had already freed her and offered her tremendous financial support.
Speaker 1: After Peter's death, Susanna began a relationship with another wealthy merchant,
Speaker 1: Gibson Dalzell, who had left Scotland as a young man
Speaker 1: and built a fortune in Jamaica's booming sugar economy. Gibson
Speaker 1: was far closer to Susanna's age at this point than
Speaker 1: Peter had been, and appeared to show her and her
Speaker 1: children affection throughout their relationship, but there is no evidence
Speaker 1: of her feelings for him.
Speaker 2: In any case, their relationship was unequal at its core.
Speaker 2: As a free woman of color, Susannah's legal rights still
Speaker 2: depended on his goodwill. Gibson and Susannah conceived Francis the
Speaker 2: year they met. Susannah raised Francis in a townhouse that
Speaker 2: had once belonged to Peter in Water Lane in Kingston.
Speaker 2: After Susannah's petition successfully guaranteed her and her children's legal whiteness,
Speaker 2: Francis left for boarding school in Britain in the fall
Speaker 2: of seventeen thirty eight. Francis was lucky to go to
Speaker 2: boarding school at the time she did. At the end
Speaker 2: of the eighteenth century, elite schools would crack down on
Speaker 2: admissions to people of mixed heritage, but in the seventeen thirties,
Speaker 2: thousands of young people of color left the Caribbean to
Speaker 2: attend British schools. The Jamaican enslaver and historian Edward Long
Speaker 2: explained that mixed race children quote are often sent to
Speaker 2: the most expensive public schools, where the history of their
Speaker 2: parentage is entirely unknown. They pass under the general name
Speaker 2: of West Indians, and the bronze of their complexion is
Speaker 2: ignorantly ascribed to the fervor of the sun in the
Speaker 2: torrid zone end quote. In Francis's case, this may have
Speaker 2: only been partially true. Francis's grandfather, Robert Dalzel, was her
Speaker 2: closest relative in London, but it seems that he may
Speaker 2: have received her coolly in spite of his wealth. His
Speaker 2: sister in law paid Francis's tuition instead. Perhaps her grandfather
Speaker 2: treated Francis with such distance because she represented Gibson's life
Speaker 2: in Jamaica. Which to Robert see like an undignified dalliance
Speaker 2: from a real career in London. In seventeen forty three,
Speaker 2: a few years after Francis left Jamaica for school, Robert
Speaker 2: ordered Gibson to return to England. He promised that he
Speaker 2: would set his son up with a job, a townhouse,
Speaker 2: a coach, quote, everything he likes. Robert may have even
Speaker 2: used his granddaughter as a bargaining chip. Although she was
Speaker 2: too young to marry. Robert said that if Gibson returned
Speaker 2: to England and picked out a good match for her,
Speaker 2: he Robert would quote give her a fortune. According to
Speaker 2: a letter from Gibson's aunt, much to his father's delight,
Speaker 2: Gibson arrived in London in seventeen forty six, reuniting with
Speaker 2: fifteen year old Francis for the first time in six years.
Speaker 2: Robert had secured his son Gibson a prestigious directorship and
Speaker 2: a lucrative public office in London that would allow him
Speaker 2: to make a fortune while running his plantations remotely. But
Speaker 2: Gibson was in London reluctantly, still longing for his life
Speaker 2: back in Jamaica. Even though Susannah and Gibson were not married,
Speaker 2: their lives were deeply intertwined. They lived together in Kingston
Speaker 2: with Francis's younger brother, Bob, who had been born while
Speaker 2: Francis was away. In seventeen thirty nine, Susannah had bought
Speaker 2: three hundred acres of land that she had transferred to
Speaker 2: Gibson for a token payment of five shillings. Gibson expanded
Speaker 2: it by one thousand acres, transforming it into a sugar
Speaker 2: plantation called Lucky Hill. In spite of Gibson's protestations, his
Speaker 2: father convinced him to remain in London. In late seventeen
Speaker 2: forty six, Gibson's son Bob joined him at the Dulzell
Speaker 2: House in Mayfair to go to a posh elementary school,
Speaker 2: just like his sister had. Meanwhile, Susanna remained in Jamaica alone.
Speaker 2: Francis often wore a gold chain that her mother had sent,
Speaker 2: perhaps as a tribute to her. It was unclear if
Speaker 2: Francis would ever see her mother again. Throughout Francis's young adulthood,
Speaker 2: she and her father tried to stay in touch with Susannah.
Speaker 2: Both wrote Susannah long letters. Gibson even included affectionate messages
Speaker 2: for her in his business correspondence. In one he wrote, quote,
Speaker 2: tell her I sincerely wish her health and happiness, which
Speaker 2: I suppose does qualify as affectionate. But replies were few
Speaker 2: and far between. In July seventeen fifty one, Francis was
Speaker 2: still waiting for her mother to reply to a letter
Speaker 2: she had sent last November. Susannah had problems of her
Speaker 2: own to deal with back in Jamaica. In seventeen forty eight,
Speaker 2: when one of Susanna's debts led her to transfer a
Speaker 2: valuable bond Gibson had given her, creditors came after him
Speaker 2: for more than two thousand pounds. The crisis forced the
Speaker 2: family to reorganize Susanna's affairs. Gibson's attorney persuaded her to
Speaker 2: write a will leaving her estate to their two children.
Speaker 2: With his old, imperious father skeptical of his financial dealings
Speaker 2: in the Caribbean and his son too young to understand,
Speaker 2: Gibson turned to his daughter Francis to discuss his business
Speaker 2: as if she were his apprentice. He even entrusted her
Speaker 2: with a copy of his will when she was just seventeen. Francis, too,
Speaker 2: was preparing for her future in March seventeen fifty six,
Speaker 2: Francis introduced her father to the man that she hoped
Speaker 2: to Mary George Duff, a twenty year old cornette in
Speaker 2: the tenth Regiment of Dragoons. He seemed to be besotted
Speaker 2: with Francis from the jump. After they met at the
Speaker 2: marriage mart In Bath, he plied her with flowery letters,
Speaker 2: writing quote the power you have over me, you can
Speaker 2: use me ill or well as you please, and that
Speaker 2: when they weren't together, quote I could not be said
Speaker 2: to live. Frances affectionately called him my dear Duff, but
Speaker 2: she was a little more reserved than George was, at
Speaker 2: least from his perspective. In one letter, he complained she
Speaker 2: wasn't expressing as much devotion to him as she was
Speaker 2: to her, but it was hard to compete with George's devotion.
Speaker 2: He wrote that quote, I could work for your smile
Speaker 2: at poverty and say it was happiness above expression, while
Speaker 2: I had my fanny. While perhaps a sweet sentiment, it
Speaker 2: seemed clear that neither of them would have a life
Speaker 2: of poverty. As the youngest son of William Duff, Lord
Speaker 2: Bracco of Kilbride, George was rich and titled. Educated at
Speaker 2: Edinburgh and Saint Andrew's and about to inherit estates in
Speaker 2: Banffshire and Moray, yielding over one thousand pounds a year.
Speaker 2: George approached Francis's father, Gibson with a similar poetic flare.
Speaker 2: The day after they met, George wrote to him quote,
Speaker 2: I have loved your daughter ever since I had the
Speaker 2: happiness to know her, and it is in your power
Speaker 2: and hers to make me happy or miserable forever. I
Speaker 2: never can be happy without her. But rather than you
Speaker 2: should be displeased with her, I'll suffer all the torments
Speaker 2: the world affords. But before George could formally get Francis's
Speaker 2: father's permission for her hand in marriage, Gibson died in
Speaker 2: May seventeen fifty six, at the age of fifty eight.
Speaker 2: Francis had to break the news to her mother. She
Speaker 2: wrote to Susannah, it will always give me great pleasure
Speaker 2: to hear of your happiness and to serve you in
Speaker 2: everything in my power whichever you want, Please to command me.
Speaker 2: Gibson's will placed his assets in trust, the income to
Speaker 2: be shared equally between his two children. His total personal
Speaker 2: property in Jamaica was worth five thousand seven hundred and
Speaker 2: ninety eight pounds, including both land and one hundred and
Speaker 2: thirty three enslaved people across his plantations. The people he
Speaker 2: enslaved represented almost seventy five percent of his wealth. Additionally,
Speaker 2: Gibson left Francis the income from several shares of his
Speaker 2: businesses in London. Unusually, her younger brother Bob would benefit
Speaker 2: from these assets only in the event of Francis's death
Speaker 2: without children, suggesting just how much Gibson trusted his daughter.
Speaker 2: But Gibson had not named a formal executor for his
Speaker 2: estates in his will, leaving it open to interference from
Speaker 2: his various trustees. Francis feared that they would use the
Speaker 2: interests of her fourteen year old younger brother, still too
Speaker 2: young to advocate for himself, as an excuse to rest
Speaker 2: control of the estate. As she put it, she would
Speaker 2: not quote permit any of the trustees in England to
Speaker 2: interfere because, in her words, they had treated her quote
Speaker 2: very ill since her father's death. Francis challenged the arrangement
Speaker 2: in court. In English law of the time, a beneficiary
Speaker 2: of a will could apply for probate in situations where
Speaker 2: no executor was named. In July seventeen fifty six, Francis
Speaker 2: won letters of administration, giving her legal control over her
Speaker 2: father's estate, but she had not managed to inherit the
Speaker 2: land in Jamaica. To do that, she would need a
Speaker 2: grant from the governor. She sent copies of the letters
Speaker 2: of administration and Gibson's will across the Atlantic, and appointed
Speaker 2: two of her father's friends with power of attorney, allowing
Speaker 2: them to act as her agents on the island. Later
Speaker 2: that year, the governor granted her responsibility for running her
Speaker 2: late father's Lucky Hill estate, an extraordinary victory for an
Speaker 2: unmarried twenty six year old woman. But even though Francis
Speaker 2: was able to secure her inheritance, her engagement to George
Speaker 2: was on less solid ground. In her way was another
Speaker 2: set of gatekeepers George's parents. After George told his parents
Speaker 2: he was engaged in late seventeen fifty six, his parents
Speaker 2: were furious. He received an angry letter from his mother,
Speaker 2: and his father threatened to disown him. There is no
Speaker 2: solid evidence as to what exactly about Francis the family disliked,
Speaker 2: but they had plenty of ammo in spite of her wealth.
Speaker 2: Francis was twenty six years old, considered old for the
Speaker 2: time from Jamaica, had unmarried parents, and had mixed heritage.
Speaker 2: George's sentimental promises of eternal love wouldn't work on the ambitious,
Speaker 2: pragmatic DUFs. Kaufmann speculates that the Duffs were quote self
Speaker 2: conscious about their social position. George's brother and sister had
Speaker 2: already married unimpressive prospects in their parents' eyes. His brother
Speaker 2: had induced his mother's maid, while his sister eloped with
Speaker 2: a Jacobite. George's father had only held his title since
Speaker 2: seventeen thirty five and feared that his social scene saw
Speaker 2: them as impostors. But in February seventeen fifty seven, George's
Speaker 2: parents seemed open to changing their minds. They were impressed
Speaker 2: by Francis's connection to her grandfather, Robert Dalzell, who was
Speaker 2: by that point a well known general and the oldest
Speaker 2: serving officer in Britain. One of George's uncles described Francis
Speaker 2: as quote a grandchild of General Dalzell's by whom George
Speaker 2: got a good fortune. George's father sent two of his
Speaker 2: relatives to visit the general quote to know his mind
Speaker 2: with regard to the intended marriage and whether he would
Speaker 2: agree to leave Francis any money. According to a letter
Speaker 2: he sent to o son. While we don't know what
Speaker 2: they discussed, it must have pleased the Duffs well enough
Speaker 2: to consent to Francis's marriage to George. Francis married George
Speaker 2: Duff on April seventh, seventeen fifty seven, at Saint Martin
Speaker 2: in the Fields, But even at that moment she entered
Speaker 2: married life, Francis was watchful of ways things could go wrong.
Speaker 2: She kept her marriage a secret for several months, refusing
Speaker 2: to change her maiden name. She was still nervous about
Speaker 2: her father's trustees going after her estate because the power
Speaker 2: of attorney she had sent to Jamaica had been executed
Speaker 2: under her maiden name. Changing her name might give them
Speaker 2: leeway to question its validity. It wasn't until the end
Speaker 2: of the year she began to sign her name Francis
Speaker 2: Duff instead of Francis Dull's. For all of the excitement
Speaker 2: of her new marriage, Francis was still thinking of Jamaica.
Speaker 2: Francis had been contemplating a trip home to take charge
Speaker 2: of her inheritance in person, and perhaps even to see
Speaker 2: her mother again. After decades of separation. She wrote to
Speaker 2: one of her business partners, quote, if my courage was
Speaker 2: equal to my inclination of seeing you, I certainly should
Speaker 2: be at Jamaica in three months time. But the ongoing
Speaker 2: Seven Years War made Atlantic crossings slower and more dangerous,
Speaker 2: so Francis delayed her trip, and by April seventeen fifty seven,
Speaker 2: Susanna was dead. She had passed suddenly in February, but
Speaker 2: Francis hadn't found out until May, a month after her wedding.
Speaker 2: Susanna may have taken pride in seeing how far her
Speaker 2: daughter had risen made possible in part by her own
Speaker 2: determined advocacy, but in a few years the German Assembly
Speaker 2: would make that trajectory nearly impossible for anyone else. In
Speaker 2: seventeen sixty one, the Jamaica Assembly passed a law limiting
Speaker 2: inheritances for mixed heritage people to two thousand pounds in
Speaker 2: Jamaica currency, which would have prevented Francis from amassing the
Speaker 2: fortune she had fought so hard for. Although Susannah might
Speaker 2: have hoped that her seventeen thirty eight Private Act would
Speaker 2: have exempted her daughter from these restrictions, by seventeen sixty one,
Speaker 2: that was no longer a guarantee. In a motion to
Speaker 2: the British government, the Jamaican Assembly even cited Francis's inheritance
Speaker 2: explicitly as an example of what they were trying to prevent.
Speaker 2: The legislators wrote about these kinds of inheritance and as
Speaker 2: a brief aside, because they use antiquated terms for race,
Speaker 2: I'll be replacing them in my reading. They wrote that
Speaker 2: these inheritances quote tend to greatly destroy the distinction requisite
Speaker 2: and absolutely necessary to be kept up in this island
Speaker 2: between white persons and people of color their issue and offspring,
Speaker 2: and may, in progress of time, be the means of
Speaker 2: decreasing the number of white inhabitants. The state viewed mixed
Speaker 2: heritage women like Francis as particular threats to the status quo.
Speaker 2: The British agent to Jamaica wrote that they needed to
Speaker 2: be quote restrained or else quote A great part of
Speaker 2: the property of the island will be in the hands
Speaker 2: of mixed race people and quote as power ever follows property,
Speaker 2: the power will then be in their hands. These fears
Speaker 2: were unfounded, at least in Francis's case. After years apprenticing
Speaker 2: her father. As a teenager, she was prepared to take
Speaker 2: over the work of operating her father's plantations as they were.
Speaker 2: She proved herself to be an attentive businesswoman, ordering inventories
Speaker 2: of every asset and demanding meticulous accounts. She purchased twenty
Speaker 2: enslaved people for Lucky Hill in seventeen fifty seven and
Speaker 2: instructed her lawyer to brand them with quote our mark,
Speaker 2: a common practice at the time. We're not sure exactly
Speaker 2: what this brand might have looked like. Often it was
Speaker 2: the owner's initials. Perhaps it was once her father's initials,
Speaker 2: and then after he died, it might have been hers.
Speaker 2: As historian Miranda Kaufman puts it, quote the stain of
Speaker 2: human exploitation permeated Francis's quote success as deeply as her
Speaker 2: initials were branded on the people who toiled on her plantation.
Speaker 2: It is a co implicated, fascinating story, a moment in
Speaker 2: time when a woman of mixed heritage could rise, but
Speaker 2: only on the terms of a deeply exploitative system. That's
Speaker 2: the story of Francis Duff. But stick around to hear
Speaker 2: about how her story may have influenced a work of
Speaker 2: classic English literature. In William Thackeray's Vanity Fair, in eighteen
Speaker 2: forty eight satirical novel about upper crust British life, a
Speaker 2: minor character named Miss Swartz bears a notable resemblance to
Speaker 2: Francis Duff. Swartz is, of course, reminiscent of the German
Speaker 2: word for black, and like Francis, Miss Swartz is a
Speaker 2: mixed heritage heiress from the Caribbean who goes to London
Speaker 2: as a child to attend a fancy boarding school. Because
Speaker 2: of Miss Schwartz's wealth, she is proposed as a potential
Speaker 2: spouse for self obsessed banker's son George Osborne, but he
Speaker 2: refuses rejecting her because of her race. Miss Swartz and
Speaker 2: Francis both end up marrying members of the Scottish nobility.
Speaker 2: It's unclear whether Francis Duff inspired the character. Miranda Kaufman wrote,
Speaker 2: quote Francis Dalzel may have been long forgotten by the
Speaker 2: novel reading public by eighteen forty eight, but the resemblance
Speaker 2: reveals that the racial anxieties Francis encountered lingered in the
Speaker 2: Victorian imagination almost a century later. Noble Blood is a
Speaker 2: production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey.
Speaker 2: Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz. Writers for
Speaker 2: Noble Blood are Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Paul Jaffey, Natasha Laski,
Speaker 2: and me Danish Swartz. The show is edited and produced
Speaker 2: by Jesse Funk and Nomes Griffin, with supervising producer rima
Speaker 2: il Kaali and executive producers Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and
Speaker 2: Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.