William Knibb, the best known of the children, made an outstanding contribution to the emancipation of enslaved people in Jamaica, where he spent 21 years, dying in 1845 at the age of 42. What is not sufficiently known is the extent to which Knibb’s relatives came to live and work in Jamaica.
Knibb’s older brother, Thomas Billing Knibb, was the first in the family to come as a missionary in Jamaica. He was to be a school administrator. When he arrived, he was only 21, and he was assigned to serve at the school attached to East Queen Street Baptist Church. He was also put in charge of the Baptist church in Port Royal. His time in the country was brief – from January 20, 1823 to April 25, 1824, the date of his death. Disappointed, his wife Elizabeth and her infant son, Thomas, returned to England, where Elizabeth passed away in Northampton on January 31, 1825. In his youth, Thomas returned to Jamaica, arriving with Henry John Dutton, whom BMS had commissioned to serve in Jamaica, starting in 1840. Soon, Thomas was attached to Suffield School in Falmouth, Trelawny. He also served as an itinerant minister.
William Knibb volunteered to replace his brother in Jamaica. BMS accepted him and he sailed from Blackwell, England, arriving in Morant Bay, Jamaica on February 12, 1824. Few persons who have any knowledge of the history of the church in Jamaica are ignorant of William’s vital work to publicize the inhumanity of slavery and to advocate against it.
William Knibb’s twin sister Ann did not undertake missionary work in Jamaica. However, when, in 1829, she married Samuel Lea in Kettering, England, she did not know that one of her children would follow the example of her brothers Thomas and William into missionary service in Jamaica. The union of Samuel and Ann produced four children including Thomas Lea. Arriving in Jamaica in 1858, Thomas Lea worked successively in Stewart Town, Falmouth, Lucea and Spanish Town circuits. Notably, Thomas Lea was the founding pastor of the Gibraltar Baptist Church. He returned to England in 1881, after having become and Anglican who completed four years as curate at the Anglican church in Kingston and later at Mile Gully in St Elizabeth. In England, he served as curate at Anglican churches in Northamptonshire.
Yet another member of the Knibb clan who served as a
missionary in Jamaica was Benjamin Bull Dexter, Knibb’s cousin. The maiden name
of William Knibb’s mother was Mary Dexter. Mary’s brother had a son whom he
named Benjamin Bull Dexter. He was a BMS missionary to Jamaica from 1834 to 1853.
He served successively in the following churches – Salter’s Hill, Rio Bueno,
Stewart Town, the Alps, Crombie and Liberty Vale in south Trelawny. In 1834,
after Knibb returned from England, Dexter assisted him in processing a thousand
persons for baptism. While in Jamaica, Benjamin Dexter and his wife had a son
whom they gave the name William Knibb Dexter. After his father died suddenly in
1863, William went to live in England with his mother and brother. Later, he became
a Baptist minister and served in Bedford in the southeast of England and passed
away in 1891.
While in Jamaica, William and Mary Knibb had nine children, most of whom died by their fifth year. Anne, Knibb’s second daughter became the wife of Ellis Fray, Sr. of Falmouth. Fray, Sr. trained for the ministry at Calabar College and started his post-College career as pastor of Refuge Baptist Church in Trelawny. Fray was the first Jamaican to serve as chairman (now president) of JBU. Fray, Sr. developed significant work at Rio Bueno and Waldensia and planted a Baptist church in Clark’s Town in 1883. Fray and Anne had a son whom they named Ellis Fray, Jr. He also became a Baptist minister and served as Secretary of the Jamaica Baptist Missionary Society for several years. Ellis Fray Jr. also worked as a JBMS missioner in Cuba.
Edward Knibb, another of the children of Thomas and Mary Knibb, also came to live and work in Jamaica, but not as a missionary. Edward twice declared bankruptcy while he worked as a tailor and businessman in England. To improve his personal prospects, he decided to move with his family to Jamaica where he opened a shop in Falmouth where he sold farm produce. According to Cecily Knibb-Fray, William Knibb’s great grand-daughter, who was a former student of the Misses Knibb girls’ school in Falmouth, Edward’s daughters, Mary (Polly) and Lillie Knibb, managed the school. At one stage, Miss Annie Fray, a granddaughter of William Knibb, also worked as a teacher there. While Polly was indeed Edward’s daughter, I have not found sufficient evidence to confirm that Lillie had a similar status.
The Misses Knibb School ceased operation when the Knibbs refused to accede to the wish of the parents of the schools’ pupils that two Black girls who recently had been admitted to the school should be expelled on account of the colour of their skin. These students were the children of two pastors – one a Presbyterian and the other a Baptist, William Webb from Bethany, who was, at that time, serving as pastor of the Stewart Town Baptist Circuit. Webb went on to open the Manchester School, later named Westwood High School where the daughters of the peasantry in Trelawny and across Jamaica received a gracious welcome. Edward Knibb died in Trelawny soon after his 58th year. Hardly did he fare better in Jamaica than he did in England. He was not known to be a professing or committed Christian.
As
indicated earlier, William and Mary Knibb faced many disappointments in their
time in Jamaica. Five of their children, including their two sons, died in
their youthful years. On April 7, 1843, William addressed a letter to his
friend Dr. James Hoby, long-time supporter of the BMS, and minister of the
Mount Zion Baptist Church in Birmingham. This is what he said:
Our only boy, our fourth is gone. He was a second William, and in him my heart was bound. I do not think that ever a father lost a more sweet and lovely child. His almost seraphic tones in singing frequently enchanted us. Though not yet six years of age, he was just commencing to play the colophon [a two-stringed musical instrument]. I gazed upon my only son saying, “This same one shall comfort us after our affliction. Alas! In a few brief hours, from perfect health, he was a corpse. My dear wife in silent submission, bows beneath the stroke, and I hope we can both say, “It is the Lord; let him do what seemeth him good.” I am cut to the heart. All, all is a blank. But still, I do not repine at the dispensations of heaven.
The loss of so many of their children was a source of distress to the Knibbs; yet they faced their disappointment with monumental courage and kept on serving the Lord in the land to which they believed God had sent them. We thank God for their example of sacrificial Christian service. The story of the Knibb clan in Jamaica deserves to be popularized among young Baptist adherents in Jamaica.
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