Cornelius Burroughs
Ephistus[?] Crofte
Capt William Beeston
John Pinhorn
Hawes Alley
Samuel Barry
Henry Sweeting
Humphrey Freeman
The Smiths
John Mann
Richard Brock
Sweetings Layne
John Loving
Edward Castell
Mark Har[?]on
Thomas Price
John Braylie
Mark Harrison
William Morris
William Harris
Thomas Paine
Nicholas Philpot
William Kellington
John Turner
Edward Wyllys
Major John [L..m..ing?]
Church Street
Queene Street
John Pullin
Thomas Lynch
John Loveing
Richard Riply
[Lover?] Street
Dove Lane
Risby's Alley (aka Love Lane & Afello's Lane)
John Fletcher
Capt [Hannes?] Fuller
Capt Edward Walrond
Thomas Bespham
New Street (aka Jew Street)
Thomas Paine
Mr Blacker
Arthur Towne
John [Hilojee?] Esqr
David Houston
Smiths Lane
John Pitts
James Galloway
Ben Tillington[?]
Samuel [Sage/Page?]
It is important to be aware that some people were awarded several pieces of land. On some occasions this was merely an extension to their existing land; on others it was entirely elsewhere. As you can see it is not feasible to be able to place everyone onto the land ownership map due to the vague or incomplete directions in the Patents themselves; the same goes for the placement of streets and roads. We can see how densely populated some areas were due to the lack of available land, many of these pieces of land were awarded later on in this period when land was become more scarce. It is important to note however that some of the density may be due to several people owning the same or partially same pieces of land during this period.
Simon Benning
Coort Johnson
Land Ownership and Street Map of Port Royal, 1661 - 1677
Below is a land ownership map of Port Royal between the period 1661 to 1677. For conformity I have used the same base map as the building map on the previous page. All the information on this map has been sourced from the National Archives of Jamaica, Spanish Town, (hereafter NAJm) Patents Book 1B, 4 and 6. Please click on the buttons below to identify whom owned the land. Further buttons will link you to the databases page where there is a database of the exact transcription of the Patent Books and a database of the individual plots drawn out to scale.
I used the Patent Books primarily to identify residents of Port Royal during this period that had been granted land and to then collect the exact data of the land awarded to them. It was important to collect the data of land awarded prior to 1692 as I am focussing on Port Royal before its collapse during the Earthquake as over 33 acres of the estimated 58 acres that made up Port Royal was lost. The points of land ownership below are only an estimate based on the data provided as it is impossible to clearly identify the exact placement due to the frequent changing of land and the obscure lengths awarded. Due to this factor is also not possible to place everyone on the map as their coordinates are too vague. The buttons connect to the name of the individual who owned that land, which in turn corroborates with the databases on the database page defining the exact transcription of land awarded and a plot drawn thus. You can see by the density of clusters of buttons on individual areas how built up the land was even by 1677. Architect and Historian Oliver Cox suggested that Port Royal's 'net residential density would have been about 47 dwellings or 150 persons to the acre'.22 There are also a large number of smaller streets and lanes whose names (which are potentially colloquial and may change depending on whom is referring to them) can be seen in both the transcription and plot databases. Due both to the incomplete data of residents and land ownership in Port Royal as well as the base map itself which is a recreation of Port Royal in the 1690s and therefore not wholly accurate in terms of small streets and roads, it is impossible to plot exactly which of these lanes are which. However, without the manuscripts we would not know of their existence in the first place.