Our great appreciation goes to John Schultz of Canada for providing scanned copies of the Demerary and Essequebo Royal Gazette newspaper covering a range of years from about 1807 to 1835 ! As the amount of data is massive, transcription will be an ongoing project and updates will be posted as completed. Real Estate transactions are prolific and are covered in every issue. Due to their size and scope, the Transports (real estate transactions) will be the last project to be tackled.
Please note that the transcribed files are in PDF format, which requires the free Adobe Reader.
- Marriage Banns - Transcribed from: The Demerara and Essequebo Royal Gazette Newspaper; various years, printed in Georgetown, Demerara. Note that the Banns were legally required to be printed or publically posted three times; the date on the printing of the Banns represents only one of those printings. If known, the bann will include the number of the posting (1st, 2nd, or 3rd). The listing has been alphabetized for both Bride and Groom surnames (links on menu bar at left).
- Births - Very few births announcements have been found in these early colonial newspapers and most of the few printed were from other countries and from other newspapers.
- Obituaries - Through the early years (1815 to 1824) the paper would occasionally publish a monthly list of deaths and sometimes they would publish the deaths for two or three months. These listings are just that, a list of deaths occurring monthly; only a few (so far) have added the person's age at death. Later in the 1830s, there was no list, but rather a one-line (or, occasionally, two lines) notice of deaths.
- Port of Demerary - The Royal Gazette fairly consistently published a listing of vessels arriving and departing Demerara. These will be transcribed and updated here as transcriptions are completed. These data listed varied from year to year, with some years even prooviding some names of individuals aboard the vessels.
- Quitting the Colony - According to the historian, James Rodway, "Among the Proclamations of 1809 was one reviving the old law that prohibited anyone leaving the colony without due notification through the Secretary's office at least two weeks before. Masters of vessels taking any person on board without a pass or permit from the Governor incurred a fine for each of six thousand guilders. No slaves were to be taken away without the same notice except in the case of domestics leaving with their masters. The list of persons leaving was published in the Royal Gazette up to the time of emancipation, when that and so many other old usages fell to the ground." The History of British Guiana, from the Year 1668 to the Present Time, James Rodway, pgs 189-190.
The Royal Gazette, a government sheeet newspaper, published a listing of persons who had obtained the required pass or permit to leave the colony; whether to never return or left on holiday or business trip. Therefore, there are persons listed as leaving the colony more than once a year and some left the colony several times over several years. Only the rare entry informs the person's destination or intentions. The massive listings reflect how frequently these "colonists" traveled. This file will be updated as transcription proceeds and will be alphabetized for ease of finding surnames. - Transports (Sales) of Plantations and Property - The newspapers listed all sales and mortgages of real property in the newspapers. Transcripton has just begun on these extensive listings, beginning with 1815 and 1816.. The lists will be divided into sales of Plantations and sales of real property, such as lots in Kingston District, etc. The listings of Plantation sales are alphabetically sorted by Planation name. The sales of other property, Land sales, are sorted by name of seller.
