Barbados Emigration and Immigration

Barbados   Emigration and Immigration

As a leg in the triangular trade, many ships traveling between the British Isles, Africa, and America stopped in Barbados during the colonial period.

1600-1700
The multi-volume Calendar of Colonial State Papers Colonial, America, and West Indies (1574-1739), which is available for free online (see discussion in Barbados Public Records), highlights many connections between England and Barbados.

A standard work on early Barbados immigrants, which is now also widely available on the Internet, is:


 * Hotten, John Camden. The Original Lists of Persons of Quality: Emigrants; Religious Exiles; Political Rebels; Serving Men Sold for a Term of Years; Apprentices; Children Stolen; Maidens Pressed; and Others Who Went from Great Britain to the American Plantations, 1600-1700, with Their Ages, the Localities Where They Formerly Lived in the Mother Country, the Names of the Ships in which They Embarked, and Other Interesting Particulars; from MSS. Preserved in the State Paper Department of Her Majesty's Public Record Office, England. London: the author, 1874. Digital versions at Ancestry ($); Google Books and Internet Archive; 1983 reprint: 973 W2hot 1983

Brandow published an addendum to Hotten's work:


 * Brandow, James C. Omitted Chapters from Hotten's Original Lists of Persons of Quality ... and Others Who Went from Great Britain to the American Plantations, 1600-1700. Baltimore, Md.: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2001. Digital version at Ancestry ($).

Cooper published a study of Cornish emigrants to Barbados 1634-1659:


 * Cooper, Cliff. "Barbados Connection," Journal of the Cornwall Family History Society, Vol. 79 (Mar. 1996). 942.37 B2cf

Murphy published a list of about a dozen English indentured servants shipped to Barbados in the 1680s:


 * Murphy, Nathan W. "‘To be sent to America,’ Indentured Servants Registered at Lyme Regis, Dorset, England, 1683-1689,” Genealogists’ Magazine, Vol. 29, No. 3 (September 2007): 101-102. 942 B2gm v. 29, no. 3 (Sept. 2007)

African Immigrants
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database Internet site contains references to 35,000 slave voyages, including over 67,000 Africans aboard slave ships, using name, age, gender, origin, and place of embarkation. The database is about the slave trade between Africa, Europe, Brazil, the Caribbean, and the United States.

Irish Immigrants
In their genealogical article on Irish settlers of Barbados, Radford and White conclude that Barbados probate records offer the most likely prospects of connecting a Barbadian back to the Emerald Isle.

Sheppard wrote a history of the Irish in Barbados. Many of the Irish were indentured servants brought to labor in sugar plantations. Because their pale skin burned red in the tropic climate, they were dubbed "redlegs" by the English.


 * Sheppard, Jill. The "Redlegs" of Barbados, Their Origins and History. Millwood, N.Y.: KTO Press, 1977. 972.981 H6s

Scottish Immigrants
David Dobson has dedicated many years to establishing links between Scotland and their dispersed Scottish cousins who made their homes throughout the world:


 * Dobson, David. Barbados and Scotland Links, 1627-1877. Baltimore, Md.: Clearfield, 2005. 972.981 W2d

American Emigrants
The constant arrival of shiploads of African, English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh immigrants during the colonial period quickly led to overcrowding on this tiny island. Many people left to seek brighter futures on the North American mainland in colonies such as South Carolina and Massachusetts. Genealogists often encounter references to Barbados in colonial American sources. Published Barbados genealogies identify many such emigrants. Several histories chronicle these Atlantic World links:


 * Alleyne, Warren and Henry Fraser. The Barbados-Carolina Connection. London: Macmillan Publishers Limited, 1988.
 * Kent, David L. Barbados and America. Arlington, Va.: C.M. Kent, 1980. 972.981 X2b

There are very few records of people leaving Barbados during the colonial period. One exception is an original "list of tickets granted to people leaving the island in 1679" is kept at the Barbados Department of Archives. The collection has been microfilmed: 1162149 Item 1