Slavery.- Jamaica

Letter from Malcolm Laing, a slave-owner of Kingston, to the London sugar merchant Serocold & Jackson, marked as 'duplicate', regarding the affairs in Jamaica of Sir Charles Price and saying "Sir Charles has now put all his Estates, Possessions and Property under the direction of an experienced good Planter...by which means I am persuaded in the course of two or three years, it will make an addition to his Crops of at least 2 or 300 hogsheads of sugar a year; for many years past, they have been most shamefully neglected... He was thoroughly sensible of it himself, which has made him take the prudent steps, knowing that from his easing of temper and goodness of heart , he was very unfit for the task of obliging them to do their duty...", two pages, address leaf, broken seal, folding marks, minor browning to ink, 4to, Jamaica, 7 October 1774.

The Price Baronetcy, of Jamaica in the West Indies, was created in the baronetage of Great Britain for Charles Price (1708–1772), Speaker of the House of Assembly of Jamaica. The second baronet, also named Sir Charles Price (c. 1733–1788), also served as Speaker of the House of Assembly of Jamaica. The first Baronet was listed in the Jamaican Quit Rent books for 1754 as the owner of 1534 acres of land in St Catherine, 950 acres in St Mary, 1700 acres in St Ann, 700 acres in St Dorothy, 2869 acres in St John and 5898 acres in St Thomas-in-the-Vale. Upon his death, his son Charles inherited all the heavily indebted estates.