Betty's Hope - History

History

History of the sugar plantation at Betty’s Hope is traced to 1650 when Governor Keynel founded it in Antigua. After his death, his wife inherited the estate, in 1663. However, she abandoned the estate during the French occupation of the islands, in 1666. The British recaptured the island and decided to award the estate, in 1674, to the Codrington family who were then resident in Barbados, as the British considered the earlier owners as disloyal to the British Crown having deserted the estate before the French occupied the territory.

Under the ownership of the Codringtons, the emphasis centered on sugar, in an otherwise earlier dominance of tobacco, indigo and ginger crops in Antigua.

The Codrington family distinguished themselves by ensuring that Betty’s Hope was developed and functioned as the most efficient large-scale sugar estate in Antigua. Two of their family members had the distinction of holding posts of the Governor General of the Leeward Islands during 1689 to 1704; even subsequently the members of the family also had their name established as one of the most influential and prosperous planters during the colonial rule. The estate was managed by a few Europeans but the basic hard skilled and unskilled labour force was provided by the African slaves, which brought accolades to the estate (and then known as the "flagship estate of Antigua"); the slaves were later emancipated in 1834 and they continued to serve the estate as freed labour. The Codringtons had 150 sugar mills in Antigua of which Betty’s Hope was the first one where they had introduced technology innovations and ideas to carry out large scale cultivation, extraction and manufacture of sugar. In 1680, there were 393 slaves working on the estate. However, from 1921, sugarcane was extracted at the Central Sugar Factory, even though the Betty's Hope sugar mill was functional. After the Codrington family returned to England, the estate was managed by attorneys, till early 1900s. In 1944, Betty's Hope was sold by the Codringtons to the Antigua Sugar Estates Ltd.

The reasons for discarding the windmill technology for cane juice extraction was the introduction of steam. Consequent to this change, the machinery in the windmill was shifted to the boiling house complex and reinstalled next to the new steam engines. The buildings, however, became storerooms for scrap iron and other debris. As result, the Antiguan economy is no more sugar centric but is now more dependent on tourism, and Betty's Hope now remains a part of this economy.