looking up East Street, ca 1856
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Planter's Punch, vol III, no 4, 1935-6
'It was built in the latter part of the 18th century, with a great dining room, upper sitting room, a wide enclosed verandah, many bedrooms, and a spacious attic for the storing of odds and ends.'
There is more than one reference to Date Tree Hall having been built in the late 18th century, but so far no references to it have been found before the mid-19th century; the similarity of its architecture to that of Hibbert/Headquarters House, which definitely dates from the late 18th century, certainly suggests that it was built in that period.
'It was built in the latter part of the 18th century, with a great dining room, upper sitting room, a wide enclosed verandah, many bedrooms, and a spacious attic for the storing of odds and ends.'
There is more than one reference to Date Tree Hall having been built in the late 18th century, but so far no references to it have been found before the mid-19th century; the similarity of its architecture to that of Hibbert/Headquarters House, which definitely dates from the late 18th century, certainly suggests that it was built in that period.
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Date Tree Hall, 14 East Street
Date Tree Hall was a large, solidly constructed two-storey building, with a sloping shingled roof, its facade lined by sash windows and jalousie blinds. It stood on a rising above the street, protected by a brick wall surmounted by a wooden fence set between alternate brick pillars and topped by a series of decorative wooden urns painted white. F. J. duQuesnay, Daily Gleaner, June 21, 1966 |
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Some early references
The Western Literary Messenger, Buffalo, 1849
From the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser Sketches and Incidents from Abroad BY THE LATE EDITOR Years ago, in the days of great prosperity, when gold and silver were shovelled into barrows and wheeled through Harbor and Port Royal streets, an ambitious man would occasionally lavish great expense on his house, poor as most of the dwellings look from the street. The house where I am staying, known as Date Tree Hall, from a large date tree growing in front of it, is a specimen of this kind. It was built by a merchant for his own residence, and cost fifty thousand dollars. It is two stories high. A hall, some twenty-five feet wide, by fifteen high, runs through both stories, opening upon verandahs in front and rear, and on each side of these halls are sleeping rooms of ample dimensions. The doors and the casings of the doors and windows, the window blinds, the entire staircases, indeed most of the woodwork, is of solid mahogany of the most beautiful kind. The floors, innocent of carpets - which in a climate like this would be intolerable are - polished like glass. Meals are served in the verandahs, changing from one to the other to avoid the sun. Surrounding a court in the rear, are the offices of the house, servants apartments, stables, &c. This is the general style of all the good houses I have seen, but, of course, most of them are built at much less cost than the one I have described. . . . . . . . . . . There seem to be very few mentions of Date Tree Hall as a lodging house before the 1860s. One reference I have seen, in the London Morning Post, is of Commodore Henderson, who had been second-in-command at Port Royal, writing his farewell message from Date Tree Hall on September 8, 1855; presumably the East Street house had been the Kingston base for Henderson and his wife.
In The Knickerbocker for December, 1863, Kinahan Cornwallis, British writer and world traveller, wrote in his piece 'Glimpses of the West Coast' of a brief stop-over in Kingston, 'I dined that evening and slept at the Date Tree Hall, where the turtle-soup was excellent, and the rooms large and airy.'
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from Stone & Webster Journal, 1930
Some of these were public wells and pumps, as old prints illustrating the life of Kingston a century ago show plainly. To these public pumps would go the poorer classes of Kingston for the necessary domestic water supply; the bigger people had private pumps and private wells. There was a well, for instance, in the grounds now occupied by the buildings of the Institute of Jamaica; formerly there stood on that site a great lodging house known as Date Tree Hall, and the pump which was used by the occupier of Date Tree Hall is still preserved in the yard of the Jamaica Institute. |
public pump, c 1830
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Faustin Soulouque stays at Date Tree Hall
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In 1859 the ex-Emperor of Haiti, Faustin Soulouque, took up residence as an exile in Kingston, as many other deposed political leaders from the region did, before, and for many years into the future. He lived at Date Tree Hall when he first arrived, having, it was said, been turned down by the owner of Blundell Hall just further down East Street. Louisa Grant, sister of Mary Seacole, proprietress of Blundell Hall, told Anthony Trollope, as he reported in The West Indies and the Spanish Main, "I won't keep a house for black men"; she seems to have been consistent in this policy.
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Reports from the time claim that Haitians in Kingston, who had been forced into exile during Soulouque's regime, took up residence in a lodging house opposite Date Tree Hall and noisily celebrated Soulouque's removal from power. It may be that the Haitians were in what was then Barkly Hall and later became Clarendon House/Hall, the lodging house directly across East Street.
I'm not entirely clear whether Soulouque stayed at Date Tree Hall until his return to Haiti, to die, in 1867, as some accounts suggest, or whether he bought a house elsewhere in the city, or lived somewhere on King Street; it is also not clear if he had plenty of cash, or was fairly poor.
I'm not entirely clear whether Soulouque stayed at Date Tree Hall until his return to Haiti, to die, in 1867, as some accounts suggest, or whether he bought a house elsewhere in the city, or lived somewhere on King Street; it is also not clear if he had plenty of cash, or was fairly poor.
Revd Robert Gordon and Date Tree Hall
Robert Gordon, ordained in Canada, was the first Black Anglican clergyman in Jamaica, where he never held any office in the church. He was Headmaster of Wolmer's School from 1862 to 1867.
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This letter raises several interesting points: who was Gordon's English friend, perhaps first met in England in 1858? I am trying, so far with no certain success, to identify this individual (more on him later, I hope). What was he doing in Jamaica, and how long did he stay? So far there seems no way to discover anything on these points. It is also of considerable interest that the 'Miss Grant' of Blundle's Hall, who would not have a Black man in her house, as mentioned above in connection with Soulouque, was the sister of Mrs Mary Seacole. It is also an interesting sidelight on the situation in Jamaica at the time, that Date Tree Hall, just up East Street, apparently had no problem with entertaining Black people. I am still trying to clarify some of these details. |
after the 1907 earthquake
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