The Massiahs of Barbados - with Baruch Lousada, Barrow, de Peza, Lindo and Burgos connections

 

The chart (see note 1 below for why it was first prepared) shows how the Barbados Baruch Lousadas and the Barrows became linked through the Massiahs of Barbados (who are discussed in note 6 below). The descendants of Daniel Massiah had 1 Baruch Lousada marriage while the descendants of Simon Massiah also had 1 Baruch Lousada marriage but followed by 2 Barrow marriages (see note 13 for more details on the growing Barrow connection with the Baruch Lousadas).

Though the Barrows were probably descended from the remaining Livorno Baruch Lousadas, they probably came to Barbados as part of the Montefiore move from Livorno to London, in which case the rejuvenation of the link between the Baruch Lousadas and the Barrows in Barbados was fortuitous. In Barbados, the rise of the Barrows is reflected in property records which show that the Barrows grew their property holdings right up to the death of Simon Barrow of Barbados in 1801 while the holdings of the Barbados Baruch Lousadas declined from the peak reached by the first generation of the descendants of Aaron Baruch Lousada (see note 4 below). Perhaps the Massiahs came to effectively inherit the Baruch Lousada business interests in Barbados via their 2 marriages, while the Barrows benefited from the links brought to them by their 2 Massiah marriages!

The Massiahs almost certainly came from Morocco via Amsterdam (see ref 211 and 236). In Barbados the Massiah family had many connections with the de Pezas (see note 5 below) and also a connection with the Burgos and Lindo (see note 14) families.

Notes:

1. Central to first preparing the above chart was the puzzle posed by Claire Myers - namely, how it was that in the will of Isaac Lindo he describes himself, in effect, as uncle of 3 of the children of David Baruch Lousada (see note 10 for an account of all David's children). We noted that Simon Massiah d1775 had a Baruch Lousada nephew (see note 2) - Emanuel - who was a nephew because Esther Sarah Massiah was the wife (see note 11) of Aaron #714 who was the real uncle, so Simon d1775 was a brother-in-law of an uncle. We suggest a somewhat similar thing happened with Isaac Lindo, whose sister Esther married Judah Massiah, who was a brother of Abraham Massiah, who married the Baruch Lousada aunt of the 3 children referred to above, so Isaac Lindo was also an uncle by (one more) marriage (see our reasoning in note 12). The chart shows our resolution of the puzzle, but it also represents a great advance in the Lindo & Massiah ancestry of Claire Myers.

2. The will of Simon d1775 is somewhat peculiar - the only beneficiary is his spinster niece who is the daughter of brother Abraham whose wife was Rachel. The will is unclear as to whether both Abraham and Rachel were deceased - read literally only Rachel was. In any case it seems likely that Rachel was his second wife, and that his daughter Rachel from the first marriage required such solicitude from her uncle Simon that no other beneficiary appears in his will. The Lindo genealogy of Claire Myers shows that the (probable) first 2 sons of the Rachel Massiah/David Lindo marriage of 1783 were Isaac (born 1783) conventionally named after the paternal grandfather and Abraham (born 1786) conventionally named after the maternal grandfather. A most interesting feature of the will is that Emanuel Baruch Lousada, a nephew, was executor.

3. Simon Massiah d1787 was a witness to the will of Isaac Lindo and was a nephew of Isaac Lindo, because his aunt Esther was a sister of Isaac Lindo. Simon's wife was named Sarah but she was not Isaac Lindo's sister Sarah Belinfante who was widowed in 1752, appeared in her brother's 1780 will as Sarah Belinfante, and died as Sarah Belinfante in 1785 (dates of death from ref 61 #321 and #322).

4. Ref 207 gives an insight into the impact of Barrow presence in Barbados from the mid-1700s. Considering the 2 families as 1, the growing wealth of Simon Barrow of Barbados #64 - father of Joseph #238 and Baruch Barrow #234 who are shown in the chart - and also Joseph, made up for the decline in wealth of the Barbados Baruch Lousadas. The Barrow & Lousada business had its origins in Barbados. Jacob Barrow #60 moved to London by 1785 where he joined forces with Isaac Baruch Lousada #34, and after Jacob's death in 1798 Joseph Barrow #238 moved to London from Barbados to replace him. Jacob's daughter Bella #33 married Isaac's son Moses #32, and in the next generation Moses' son Jacob aka John #25 married Tryphena #26, a grand-daughter of Jacob via his son Simon Barrow of Bath #59 (who became the Barrow principal after the death of Joseph in 1806).

5. Abraham de Peza of Speightstown who died in 1736, and his descendants, were closely linked to the Massiah family. Abraham left behind a wife Esther, sons Isaac (the youngest) and David, and a daughter Sarah (ref 5). His will was (pessimistically) written in 1716. His will was witnessed and executed by 'Simeon Massiah' no doubt the person we show as Simon Massiah 1673-1746 (not however a son-in-law - see note 7 below). Judah Massiah had a de Peza witness his will, and Benjamin Massiah had Emanuel de Peza witness his will. Iberian naming tradition (male surname precedes the female) suggests that the 'de Peza Massiah' name (as reflected in the name of the Isaac de Peza Massiah - brother-in-law of Joseph Barrow) was adopted through a Massiah marriage with a male de Peza. But here the de Peza Massiah name appears to have arisen unconventionally for on p83 of ref 191 can be found a 1766 bequest of a Broad Street property by Isaac de Peza to his grandson Isaac de Peza, son of Abraham Massiah who married Esther de Peza. Perhaps Isaac de Peza in making this substantial bequest (ref 191 p83) wanted his (probable) first grandson Isaac to have his name. In any event the grandson became the 1st de Peza Massiah, albeit with an unconventional compound surname.

6. Claire Myers who descends from the 1783 marriage of David Lindo and Rachel Massiah provided her data on the Massiahs. Some of the data can be found here. It comprises some Barbados Massiah wills and will extracts, and has been put together with the wills of Aaron Baruch Lousada #376 and his wife Rachel Gomez Henriques (the founders of the Barbados Baruch Lousadas). From ref 205 we know that Judah d1747 had brothers Abraham and Benjamin (noting that Claire Myers advised by email 12 Jun 2016 that the will of Judah Massiah had been indexed under the name Judith Massiah and hence that ref 205 replicated this error). We have established that Esther Sarah, daughter of Daniel and Sarah Massiah, was the wife of Aaron Baruch Lousada whom we know to have been Aaron #714 (see note 11 below). The will of Joseph Barrow shows his wife, who had a father Abraham whose father was Simon (ref 132 #4), had a (half-)brother Isaac de Peza Massiah (see note 5 for a discussion of this name and his grandfather Isaac de Peza). Sarah, the wife of Baruch Barrow, is given a trusted role in the will of Simon Massiah d1787, and is shown above as a daughter, albeit probably of a 1st marriage - for she had the same name as Simon's (later?) wife Sarah. The will of Simon d1787 shows his father was Benjamin and Benjamin's will shows a son Simon. Daniel's will shows a son Simon whom we infer to have been Simon d1775. On 17 Jun 2016 Claire Myers by email advised that the 1736 will of Mordecai Burgos shows Abraham de Peza's son Isaac as a son-in-law and that Daniel Massiah was a brother-in-law; and that the will of Sarah Massiah who died in 1796 shows that Emanuel de Peza was her brother. Simon Massiah d1775 was the uncle of Rachel Massiah who was the daughter-in-law of Isaac Lindo, while Simon Massiah d1787 was a nephew of Isaac Lindo (see note 3). Claire Myers summarized her genealogical data on the Massiah, de Peza, Lindo and Burgos families as shown here.

7. See Massiah genealogy of Claire Myers.

8. The first Valverdes in Barbados brought the 'Jael' name with them from Brazil and were thus the source of the name which became quite common on Barbados (see ref 5 p25 - our page numbering) and appeared amongst both the Barbados Baruch Lousadas and the Barrows. This provides the basis for suggesting a Valverde link in Barbados from which it can also be seen that amongst all the children of Jacob and Elias Valverde we could find just 1 Sarah and no Judith and on this basis conclude that the Valverdes were not the link between Judith Lindo and Sarah Baruch Lousada (see note 1 for our discussion of the possible connections between Sarah and Judith).

9. In ref 132, Joseph's marriage is listed as #4 occurring on 29 Ellul 5541 ie in 1781. The earliest marriage in ref 132 is 1778, so Baruch's occurred before 1779. Their brother Jacob married Jael Nunes at Bevis Marks in 1786, being listed as #1214 in Bevis Marks Records Part II, with the date 15 Heshvan 5546; their 2 children Simon and Bella were born in 1787 and 1789 respectively. The marriage of Joseph may well have been for respectability, since he had 3 mulatto children whom he manumitted in London. His travel to London may have been necessitated by the early death there of his brother Jacob in 1798. John Griffiths, a descendant of one of the 3, has documented the marriage and descendants of the 2 daughters of Joseph Barrow.

10. Aided by our study of the Barbados Baruch Lousadas we see that David and Sarah had 7 children - 3 shown in the chart above and an additional 4 children - Jael, Solomon and Luna died young, but Esther #1998 (being less than 21 at the time of her father's will in 1759) was probably born in the 1740-5 period. The 3 children supported in Isaac Lindo's will were the youngest - being aged 4, 9 and 13 when they lost their father David in 1759 having already lost their mother Sarah in 1755. Perhaps the 3 were fostered by Isaac and Judith Lindo, with the assistance of the widow Esther Massiah nee Lindo. Esther #1998 may have been fostered as well but because she was probably the first to be married soon after 1759 she may not have developed the same close enduring relationship with her foster-parents as her 3 younger siblings. Eventually Rachel #1181 (one of the 3) married Daniel #1557 who died in 1779 and then married his brother Emanuel #1500 in 1783 - but Rachel's marriage did not preclude her from Isaac Lindo's will which was perhaps fortunate since she was a widow at the time of Isaac Lindo's death. Perhaps the deaths in 1749 of both Rebecca Massiah nee Baruch Lousada and Judah Massiah (who had married Esther Lindo) brought the Baruch Lousada and Lindo families closer together. However, neither of the 2 widowers ie David Baruch Lousada #1263 (in his 4 years of widowerhood) or his brother-in-law Abraham Massiah (who later married Esther de Peza) married the widow Esther Massiah, for she died in 1782 still the widow of Judah Massiah.

11. In the literature there has been a major confusion over this marriage. However, a bequest was made to Aaron #714 and his wife Esther Massiah from Joseph Suares - see ref 262 for a document Ton Tielen found in Amsterdam archives confirming Aaron #714 married Esther Massiah (daughter of Daniel) - though at present we cannot explain the Suares link. The Suares bequest nicely confirms the marriage. Earlier, Claire Myers pointed out the reference to his daughter Esther Baruch in the will of Daniel Massiah. Our earlier deduction of the Barbados marriage of Aaron #714 was made from the will of Rachel Gomes Henriques and from ref 61 #11 and #12, for he was undoubtedly Rachel's first grandson. Now it is abundantly clear who his wife Esther Sarah (Massiah) was.

12. There were many possibilities as to how Isaac Lindo could have been an uncle of the Baruch Lousada nieces and nephew Rebecca, Rachel and Ephraim. Some possibilities were quickly ruled out eg Isaac Lindo's will reveals a sister Sarah Belinfante who (see note 3 below) could not have been David's wife Sarah. If Sarah Baruch Lousada and Judith Lindo were sisters we cannot place them within the Massiah family nor in other families eg the prolific but more distantly-related Valverde family (see note 8 above). But it has been suggested that Judith Lindo was a Baruch Lousada (by ref 210 and the suggestion was inherited by ref 311 but it is nevertheless an over-reaction as we show below) as one of 3 previously unknown (to us) Baruch Lousada wives - Rebecca the wife of Abraham Massiah, Esther the wife of Benjamin Massiah and Judith the wife of Isaac Lindo - as the husbands were brothers-in-law to David Baruch Lousada #1263 (as shown by his will in ref 224). However we point out that the dates of the 4 London Baruch Lousada wills of Aaron #1174 and his 3 sisters fall within the 1764-88 period, and they should refer to all Barbados cousins who were alive after 1765 (on the basis that they refer to all the sons of Solomon - named in the chart above - and to all known married female cousins in Jamaica). Of the 3 ''Baruch Lousadas'' suggested by ref 210 only Rebecca d1749 died before this date range. Judith Lindo (wife of Isaac) and Esther Massiah (wife of Benjamin) died after it (see chart above), and because they do not appear in the 4 wills they could hardly have been Baruch Lousadas. We thus show only Rebecca in the chart as a sister of David Baruch Lousada #1263. It is her marriage to Abraham Massiah, who was a brother of Benjamin and Judah (the latter a brother-in-law of Isaac Lindo), which created the 3 brothers-in-law of David Baruch Lousada in ref 224. Our proposal that Rebecca d 1749 was a surviving daughter of Solomon #712 has a further implication - that there was a 1st daughter who would have been named Rachel. We do not know if she survived, but if so she is our preferred candidate in another context (go to note 14 and 16) in which case she lived until 14 Mar 1751 - also too young to appear in the 4 London wills discussed above.

13. By his Massiah marriage Joseph Barrow acquired a Baruch Lousada uncle Jeremiah and thus a Baruch Lousada cousin Emanuel. Of course, with his Massiah marriage occurring before his brother Joseph's (see note 9), Baruch already had Jeremiah as a great-uncle! Their brother Jacob thus acquired Jeremiah first as a great-uncle then as an uncle, and then Jacob's London marriage to Jael Nunes in 1785 created a further link this time via the Valverde family (see note 8). In 1806 Jacob's daughter Bella actually married a Baruch Lousada, followed in 1832 by a granddaughter who married another, though Jacob did not live to see either of these last 2 marriages. In London the connection may have been further enhanced by the Massiahs living in London. Bevis Marks Records shed a little light on the Massiahs of London with 12 marriages in 1693,1704 through to 1792; in the 1704 marriage, for example, Joseph de Jacob Massiah (probably the son of Jacob Massiah who heads the chart above) married Rachel de Jacob Gomez who perhaps was a niece of Rachel Gomez Henriques. Rachel's brother Isaac was in London around 1699, the year of the Baruch Lousada family settlement. In this settlement Isaac represented his sister's interests. Her husband Aaron #376 had died in 1695, and in his will he indicated knowledge of London relatives. Perhaps it was the Gomez Henriques connection of 1704 which led to the 2 Massiah & Baruch Lousada marriages in Barbados in the 1725-30 period.

14. The Barbados Lindos obtained their surname from Esther Lindo in Amsterdam as indicated in ref 222 in which data from Ton Tielen and Michael Waas may be found. The Lindos of Barbados had origins in Antwerp and Amsterdam, with no evident link to the better known Lindos of Jamaica.