The History, Civil And Commercial, Of The British Colonies In The West Indies.Fourth Edition, With Considerable Additions

London: Printed For John Stockdale, 1807., 1807. 3 Volumes. 8vo. pp. xlviii, 576; viii, 616; 1 p.l., xxx, 477. engraved frontis. portrait, 11 folding engraved maps, & 10 folding engraved plates by F. Bartolozzi, T.Milton, Scott, Storer, Grignion, W.Grainger, & Audinet after B.West, Hayes, Thomas Stothard, &c. contemporary sprinkled calf (little worn & rubbed, margins of a few plates browned, few short tears in several plates repaired - no loss). ownership entry & armorial bookplate of the Hon. Archibald Cochrane, R.N. Fourth Edition of a classic in British Caribbean literature. Edwards lived in Jamaica with his uncle for a number of years and inherited the latter's estate. He is also said to have been left heir in 1773 to the substantial property of a Mr. Hume of Jamaica. Returning permanently to England in 1792 he became a highly successful West Indian merchant, founder of a bank, and a member of Parliament. In his account of the British West Indies Edwards argued for unrestricted trade with America and the freeing of West Indian produce from hampering British import duties, and for the continuance of the slave trade with certain restrictions. The present edition also incorporates Edwards' An Historical Survey of the French Colony in the Island of St. Domingo, together with an Account of the Maroon Negroes in Jamaica, and a History of the War in the West Indies, an autobiographical sketch, and Sir William Young's Tour Through Barbadoes, St. Vincent, Antigua, Tobago, and Grenada, in the Years 1791 and 1792. These were first added to the edition of 1801. Edwards' condemnation of the treatment of the negroes by the French inhabitants in St. Domingo, as well as his stance in favour of restricted continuance of the slave trade aroused some adverse criticism, but on the whole his work was deservedly popular and highly praised. While Ratgatz notes that some of Edwards' statistics are now known to be inaccurate, he also deems his discussion of the slave trade to be "of immeasurable value for contemporary conditions, showing the state of affairs after the American war and before the abolition of the traffic in blacks". Cundall, West Indies, 2095. Howgego E15. Sabin 21901. cfCox II 228. cfBell E55. cfCundall, Bib. Jamaicensis, 928. cfRagatz 165..