Low’s Pocket Companion, and Complete Annual Leeward Island Register for MDCCXIV

(AMERICAN JUDAICA)

Edward Luther Low

Basseterre (St. Christopher)

1794

Numerous manuscript inscriptions on the blank leaves that were originally bound into the almanac, and on other front and rear blank pages. Many of these are ownership inscriptions related to residents of Burlington County, New Jersey. These include the purchase note of William Ridgeway, who bought the volume in St. Kitts in 1793, and Joseph A. Duzdale, who received the volume from Ridgeway in Burlington, New Jersey in 1820

An 18th-century Caribbean-Printed Almanac with a Listing of Jewish Festivals for the year 1794. An Unrecorded, Significant Surviving Imprint From the Early Years of Printing on St. Christopher. All 18th-century Caribbean imprints are rare, and those from St. Kitt's remarkably so. Only a few substantial works were published before 1800. Other than a newspaper and a government act, OCLC lists just four 18th-century titles printed in Basseterre, three of these printed by Edwad Low in 1790. The present edition of Low's Almanac is entirely unrecorded. Although printed in St. Christopher, the almanac was clearly intended for use throughout the Leeward Islands. In addition to standard calendar information for the year, the volume includes court days for 1794 for St. Christopher, Nevis, and Tortola. Government officials and clergy for Antigua, Montserrat, the Virgin Islands, as well as St. Kitt's are also provided. Most surprisingly and importantly, there is a page here devoted to"Jewish festivals, to be observed in the year 1794." This is extremely rare evidence of the Jewish community in this British sugar colony. Jews accounted for a quarter of the white population of Nevis at the time, they perfected the technique for crystallizing sugar. Of interest, Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804), who went on to become first Secretary of the Treasury of the United States was born on the island of Nevis and educated in the Jewish school there. (Having been born out of wedlock, he was denied admission to the local Anglican school). Of related interest, the marriage registry for St. Eustatius records that four young women born in St. Christopher or St. Kitts were wed between the years 1787-92: “Zipporah De Leon,” “Grace De Leon (age 23),””Mary Ann de Abraham Abendanone (nearly 17),” and “Gratia de David Abendanone (about 19).” Furthermore, the Jewish community of St. Kitts would have received an infusion of new lifeblood in 1781. In that year, the infamous British Admiral Rodney took hostage thirty heads of family from the island of St. Eustatius and deposited them on the island of St. Kitts (see Lot 160). See I.S. and S.A. Emmanuel, History of the Jews of the Netherlands Antilles, Vol. II, pp. 524-525, 837, 1050-1051; Malcolm H. Stern, “Portuguese Sephardim in the Americas,” American Jewish Archives, Vol. XLIV (1992), No. 1, pp. 151-2, 177; M. Arbell, The Jewish Nation of the Caribbean (2002), pp. 218-224. See also Thomas, History of Printing in America, pp. 607-8; Swan, Caribbean Printing, p.30; Cave, Printing and the Book Trade in the West Indies, pp.21-2.