Submitted by Charles Knighton
“Jesus was the first gene-spliced man. Human mother, divine Father.” Shekinah Medical Centre advertisement, “Gene Therapy“, April 14 Sunday Sun
The idea of divine beings producing children with human mothers is as ancient as mankind itself. Zeus was so prodigious in the siring of offspring with human mothers that an entire cadre of Immortals, such as Hercules, came to permeate much of Greek mythology. That such beliefs are scoffed at today by many of the same individuals who believe their God impregnated Mary simply demonstrates the grip superstition continues to hold on minds that should have evolved more fully over the millennia.
The action of a man who volunteers to die for his fellow men is universally regarded as noble. The extra claim not to have “really” died makes the whole sacrifice tricky and meretricious. (Thus, those who say “Christ died for my sins,” when he did not really “die” at all, are making a statement that is false in its own terms.)
Having no reliable or consistent witnesses, in anything like the time period needed to certify such an extraordinary claim, we are finally entitled to say that we have a right, if not an obligation, to respect ourselves enough to disbelieve the entire claim of Jesus’ Resurrection.
Hercules was not the son of Zeus. Jesus is not the Son of God. Can we not believe this and yet still find his precepts for living with Earth’s fellow inhabitants worthy of emulation? Or are Jesus’ prescriptions and proscriptions only valid if tinged with the Divine?
Hal
Here is a suggestion.
Surnames in St. Vincent and Grenada might help,
Check these links for most common surnames.
https://forebears.io/saint-vincent-and-the-grenadines
https://forebears.io/saint-vincent-and-the-grenadines
For Grenada the top 5 are Charles, Joseph, Thomas, Williams and Alexander.
For St. Vincent the top 5 are Williams, John, Browne, Lewis and Charles.
Take say Williams and go to Ellis Island records, put in Williams in the surname field,
https://www.libertyellisfoundation.org/passenger
Go to the wizard and put in Grenada in Port of Departure.
Pick a Williams that left Grenada
Look at the ship’s manifest and see who paid for the trip, or to whom they were going.
Takes a little time to master but you can see family links unfold … great tool.
May take a few tries before you get someone who left Grenada, went to New York and are connected to Barbados.
@ John,
Many thanks. I suggest you t am up with Elombe Mottley and write a cultural and social history of Barbados. It is much needed. You do brilliant work. If our newspapers were any good they would give you a weekly column instead of some of the crap they have..
I suggest you t am up with Elombe Mottley and write a cultural and social history of Barbados. It is much needed. You do brilliant work. If our newspapers were any good they would give you a weekly column instead of some of the crap they have.. (Quote)
I have read contributions by Austin in which he tells people they Google too much and should think. In fact, I have seen him criticise Googling.
The majority of John’s contributions are based on information taken from Google.
Now Austin is saying John, who is a Googler, does brilliant work and should be given a newspaper column.
Is it Googling that is the issue or validating the database to ensure quality. Was it Peter or John who posted a links to the JSTOR database which is reported to have stored 12 million academic articles and books. Universities and places of higher learning routinely store information in electronic databases. It is leveraging the technology to ensure easy access. It does not mean the information is suspect because of the format it is presented.
King James Bible
Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Does this mean that Christians will always be persecuted in Christ’s name?
I think it does.
I think the attacks on the African American Churches and the churches in France relate to the persecution that Christians can expect.
The Sri Lanka bombs likewise.
I see the explanation that the Sri Lankan bombing was in retaliation for the Mosque shooting in New Zealand.
Where is the proof that the Mosque shooting was masterminded by Christians?
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/sri-lanka-easter-bombings-retaliation-for-christchurch-mosque-shootings-says-official/ar-BBWa1GU?ocid=spartandhp
I think what Hal may be saying is that he wants to get at the raw unprocessed data and see for himself.
He does not want to rely on the sweeping generalisations which you get from a learned paper.
The way to do this is to use source data … baptismal, marriage and burial certificates from the period and to track the movements of the families (eg Ellis Island).
Another way is through wills and deeds.
What I have found is that many families and persons interested in those families have done genealogies which allows a researcher to see where the source data is and indeed if it exists.
Much of the source data and many genealogies are on the web.
This is a good site where Grenada source documents can be found.
https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1520618
For the Williams family here are just a few indexed from the 1800’s
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
7 September 1866
Saint George, Saint George, Grenada
residence:
1866
Grenada
father:
James Williams
mother:
Julia Thomas
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
christening:
19 May 1869
Villa, Saint George, Grenada
residence:
Grenada
father:
William Williams
mother:
Eve Baptiste
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
10 February 1878
Saint Johns, Grenada
residence:
1878
Grenada
father:
Loftus Williams
mother:
Elizabeth Andrew
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
22 November 1866
Grand Roy Village, St. John, Grenada
residence:
1866
Grenada
father:
John Williams
mother:
Matilda
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
29 April 1875
Saint George, Grenada
residence:
1875
Grenada
mother:
Mary Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
27 December 1881
Saint George, Grenada
residence:
1881
Grenada
father:
Alexis Williams
mother:
Mary
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
1 January 1886
Saint George, Grenada
residence:
1886
Grenada
mother:
Jane Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
24 August 1877
Saint Georges, Grenada
residence:
1877
Grenada
mother:
Elizabeth Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
1 July 1866
Capitol, St. Andrew, Grenada
residence:
1866
Grenada
mother:
Eliza Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
8 June 1874
Saint Patrick’s, Grenada
residence:
1874
Grenada
father:
Will Williams
mother:
Lucretia Chaddick
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
17 August 1866
Saint George, Saint George, Grenada
residence:
1866
Grenada
mother:
Rose Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
14 September 1877
Saint Georges, Grenada
residence:
1877
Grenada
mother:
Mary Williams
Williams
Grenada Births and Baptisms, 1866-1891
birth:
29 December 1871
Saint Andrew, Grenada
residence:
1871
Grenada
mother:
Amelia Williams
This methodology forms part of identity falsification for witness protection matters and government espionage as it relates to creating false passports and backstories.
Then you have to create cross references, independently verifiable records, physical records, school, church, driver’s licenses, hospital files, school pictures, memories by teachers, friends and mechanisms that auto detect checking of these records.
Light water gas bills, Facebook and other social media fingerprints all which now feed into your USCIS Visa application and the Unites States Advanced Passenger Information System.
Big data and Big Brother and “no man shall buy without a number…”
@ the Honourable Blogmaster your assistance please with an item here thank you
@ John 7.21
You should read the reports of the governors of Barbados during the mass migration to Panama. In those days governors had to submit regular reports to the Foreign and Colonial Office on their ‘subjects’.
Sometime ago I did some research in the F&CO’s library and was surprised by the language used, similar to YOURS.
Hal Austin
April 23, 2019 1:35 PM
@ John 7.21
You should read the reports of the governors of Barbados during the mass migration to Panama. In those days governors had to submit regular reports to the Foreign and Colonial Office on their ‘subjects’.
Sometime ago I did some research in the F&CO’s library and was surprised by the language used, similar to YOURS.
++++++++++++++++++++++
Is that good … or bad?
@ John,
Perceptive. It is an area crying out for proper sociological analysis.
Hal
I’ve been through the lists of persons who went to Panama trying to locate a great grand father who I was told went to Panama – Source Documents !!
In no time at all I knew he hadn’t and I was being led up a garden path by an elder in the family.
The people who went to Panama were mostly younger than 25.
He would have been in his 40’s, perhaps 50’s!!
I knew I would not find his name but still diligently looked.
Up to now I can’t locate a record that would suggest where he went and when.
I know for sure he was in Barbados in 1914, when he would have been in his mid 50’s because he witnessed a deed – Source Document!!
My other local GG father had in 1903 taken his two eldest sons to New York, eldest was in his late teens!!
Got that info through Ellis Island Records – Source Documents
Through the US census of 1910 (Source Document available through Google) I know one was a conductor on a tram car in New York.
The elder was from what I can determine in the 1910 census was an actor, residing in prison!!
The elder next shows up as a Royal Marine aboard a British warship in WW1.
The younger one I discovered died in 1917 of consumption, an extremely common malady at the time.
He was married by then and had produced a daughter.
Met his Grand Daughter online purely by chance through one of the genealogy websites.
Turns out my great grand father who went to New York seeking employment for his sons, had a brother there already.
A descendant of his brother married someone from Brazil.
I was in contact with a “cousin” recently in Brazil, completely by chance through a genealogy website.
So I know from simply digging into my family’s past how difficult it was to find employment in Barbados and how emigration was used to overcome the problem.
I think I will look for that missing GG father in other islands in the Caribbean.
Those records (Source Documents) seem to be more available now … on Google.
If you simply try to create a genealogy of yourself, in so doing as you uncover source documents, you will realise how things really were in a bygone era.
You do not have to rely on any sweeping generalisations of Historians who did their research with little knowledge of the computer and at a time when source documents were not available through Google!!
Google works and it obsoletes many of our historians unless they learn how to use it!!
Hal
Your family, the Austin’s, went to Guyana and did well from the 1790’s onward!!
They were also in shipping and trading and became one of the BIG SIX who formed BS&T, now a distant memory!!
@ John,
I knew of the Gardiner Austins of BS&T and of Austin, who headed the Guyanese special branch in the 1960s. But no relations. The Austins of BS&T were the plantation owners, and wrong ethnicity, and the Guyanese ones came from the wrong tribe. My ethnic links are in Cuba and Panama.
Hal Austin
April 24, 2019 11:17 AM
@ John,
I knew of the Gardiner Austins of BS&T and of Austin, who headed the Guyanese special branch in the 1960s. But no relations. The Austins of BS&T were the plantation owners, and wrong ethnicity, and the Guyanese ones came from the wrong tribe. My ethnic links are in Cuba and Panama.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Bajans who went to Panama and Cuba also have an ancestry!!
Do not write off the possibility of being family unless you do the digging!!
Have you had your DNA checked?
Quite amazing what is being done with DNA these days.
You may find you have cousins you never even imagined you had!!
https://www.wired.com/story/the-future-of-crime-fighting-is-family-tree-forensics/
Watch how you leave your DNA knocking around!!
The Austins of BS&T were the plantation owners
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Gardiner Austin became a part of BS&T not because of the plantations it owned in Barbados, but rather because of the fact that it shipped the sugar Barbados produced to England.
Barbados
Shipping and
Trading
BS&T came into being because the large plantation owners had in 1917 formed Plantations Ltd. to avoid being forced to use the merchants.
The men behind Plantations Ltd. were Julian Mahon from St. Thomas, Dr. Hawkins from St. Philip, Stanley Robinson and Torrance Skeete from St. George, Howard Smith from St. Philip and Edmund Ward from Christ Church.
Edmund Ward was the father of Sir Deighton Ward, a previous GG of Barbados.
Dr. Hawkins I was told introduced the condom to Barbados as a means of family planning and population control.
It’s introduction was met with fear and revulsion an old cane cutter once told me because it was thought he was trying to kill out “black” people in Barbados.
The major sugar planters depended on Da Costa and Musson, Gardiner Austin & Co., Jones and Swan and H. Jason Jones to ship their sugar and sought through Plantations Ltd. to break the monopoly..
Your namesake!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Austin
Austin was the son of John Gardiner Austin, a shipper connected with the sugar trade, and his wife Dorothy and was educated at Harrison College, Barbados. He married Lillian Marie Dennehy in St. Lucia in 1904 and had two daughters.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
His wife was from St. Lucia.
He served on the first board of directors of BS&T, first chairman was Dudley Leacock.
Is Hal short for Harold?
Samuel Paynter Musson came to Barbados from Bermuda about 1830.
David DaCosta came from Madeira via St. Vincent and founded DaCosta and Co. in 1868.
He was the first person to bring a regular shipping service to Barbados, The Harrison Line.
He also opened up the Barbados sugar and molasses market to buyers from New York and Canada.
The earliest Dacosta mentioned in a will was a David DaCosta, he was a witness in 1679.
There is a will of David DeAcosta in 1685 which was translated from Portuguese.
Sephardic Jewish Family for sure.
However David Campbell DaCosta, born in St. Vincent was in fact married and his children baptized in the Anglican Church in Barbados.
Good project worth doing ….. follow the family from the 17th Century and see when some members (who) converted to Christianity.
No doubt the DaCosta name was revered in Barbados … I know of several people with DaCosta as a Christian name.
So …. it looks like the most successful family in Barbados may have been of Sephardic Jewish origins.
It’s success seems to have come after emancipation!!
Unable to contribute..
🙂 It would be funny if Hal tested his DNA and discovered 9%% European ancestry; 2% African and they don’t know what the hell is the other 3% 🙂
Unable to contribute.
9=95%