The Beinecke Library is happy to announce the recent acquisition of the archive of Thomas Thistlewood, 18th-century British planter in Jamaica. Spanning more than thirty-five years, from before Thistlewood’s arrival in Jamaica in 1750 through his death in 1786, the archive comprises some 92 volumes of diaries and notebooks. The papers act as a crucial archival witness to the brutality of slavery and plantation culture, and to the broader political, economic, and intellectual contexts underpinning
Thistlewood’s career as a slave manager and owner in 18th-century Jamaica.
Thistlewood kept meticulous daily records of his experiences as a planter and slave owner from 1748 to 1786. The 37 volumes of his diaries leave a detailed portrait of the racial, sexual, economic, and other realities of plantation life in 18th-century Jamaica. Over 20 volumes of reading notebooks document his participation in the British literary and scientific cultures of the Enlightenment. His series of 34 weather observation notebooks offer an archive of the climate in Jamaica over three decades, and of the enactment of those philosophies of observation, categorization, and measurement which characterize Thistlewood’s notes on plantation management.
The archive has been the subject of several important recent works by scholars including Trevor Burnard, Michael Chenoweth, Douglas Hall, and James Walvin. The collection adds to the Beinecke’s already extensive manuscript and archival holdings for early modern British history and materials relating to slavery and abolition, and will prove an invaluable resource for scholarship on the Atlantic World, the Caribbean, African Diaspora Studies, cultures of empire, and British and European history.
Once catalogued and housed, the collection will be open for research in the fall. Please don’t hesitate to contact Kathryn James (kathryn.james@yale.edu), the Beinecke’s Curator for Early Modern Books and Manuscripts, with any questions.
Images: Documents form the Thistlewood Archive.