In 2007 I bought at auction a set of three portraits of Mr & Mrs John Cuthbert and Mrs Hopkins, painted around 1700.  I would be very interested if anyone on the internet can provide any information or a guess as to who these people were.  My interest is in my ancestor Arthur Cuthbert (1734?-1788) who was a very wealthy man but I have no knowledge of who his parents or grandparents were.  Arthur married Sarah Hopkins the daughter of Capt Charles Hopkins and Phillis Hopkins.  Could Mr & Mrs John Cuthbert be the grandparents of Arthur?

I have done a bit of searching on the internet and have found a few other Cuthberts of interest.

There was a John Cuthbert of Castle Hill in Scotland.  He was born around 1668 and married Jane Hay ( Daughter of Rev. Wm. Hay, Bishop of Murray). He is mentioned in a letter in the book 'The Cuthberts Barons of Castle Hill and Their Descendants in South Carolina and Georgia' by J.G.B. Bullock, M.D.  Their children were possibly:
1. George Cuthbert d. 1748, married Mary McIntosh.
2. Lachlan Cuthbert, described as a general officer in the King of France's service d. 1770, in France.
3. Alexander Cuthbert (Also known as Abbe Colbert) d. 1782, leaving no issue.
4. Dr. James Cuthbert, married Mary Hazzard.
5. Possibly other children in addition.
John also had a grandson called Lewis Cuthbert (see more below) and there was a Lewis Cuthbert who witnessed Arthur Cuthbert's will.  It is highly likely that the family in the above portraits are related to Arthur Cuthbert (1734?-1788).  Another relative of Arthur Cuthbert is James Ramsay (Ramsey?) of Edinburgh who Arthur mentions in his will as a cousin.

In the Portsmouth Record Office there is a document PCRO X/11A/P/4/5 which is the Carter Pedigrees by AT Everitt.  The Cuthbert pages are at p33 and 34.  This lists a Robert Cuthbert of Castle Hill.  He had a son William Cuthbert.  William in turn had two sons:
1. James Cuthbert of Marton Hall, Clevedale (born 1670 and married ? 1694).
2. John Cuthbert of West Herrington, Durham (born 1675, possibly died 1724), Sergent at Law, Recorder of  Newcastle upon Tyne.  John married Dorothy Spearman daughter of John and Elizabeth Spearman. 

One thing to note is that in the above portrait John Cuthbert is pointing to a place on a map of Europe so presumably he had some link or association possibly with Germany, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Scandinavia, Prussia?  It would appear that he also had a sister or a daughter who was later Mrs Hopkins.

Lewis Cuthbert of Castle Hill and Jamaica

This is probably the Lewis Cuthbert of Bath who witnessed the will of Arthur Cuthbert (1734?-1788).

Probably born 1737.

In 1792 Lewis Cuthbert was examined by a House of Lord enquiry into the possiblity of abolishing the slave trade.  He gave 60 pages of evidence part of which reads as follows:
I went to Jamaica in the 1760, under the patronage of Mr Dawkins, a very great proprietor in Jamaica; I was employed and appointed by him one of his attornies for conducting his property in the 1761; and in the 1763 I entered into a very large extensive commerce in a house in Kingston as a partner, which partnership continued till the year 1769.  I then purchased a sugar estate.  In the year 1772, I was obliged to come to England for ill health.  I returned in the year 1774.  A number of adverse circumstances and misfortunes obliged me to sell my estate, after having brought it forward very much.  After this I was principally employed as an attorney for conducting the property of a absentees in Jamaica.  In the year 1777 I returned to England upon particular business, and went to Jamaica in the year 1778.  In that year Mr Neville, the patentee of the provost marshal general's office in Jamaica, was pleased to appoint me his deputy, to act and officiate in that office, which I entered upon in December 1779.  In the year 1780 [September] very ill health obliged me to return to England, and I put my brother into the office to execute it in my room.  I continued in England until January 1788, and arrived in Jamacia in February of that year.  I resumed the execution of the office, and continued to execute it until the 16th of September last [1791], when ill health again obliged me to quit the island.  During my last residence in Jamaica I was very much engaged in planting concerns for gentlemen of this country, who were so good to appoint me to take care of their property.

There was a company trading in slaves in Kingston, 1764, called Beam & Cuthbert.  I have been told that this could have been the partnership between Lewis Cuthbert and David and Samuel Bean (sic), which seems to have foundered around 1766 or a bit later as in 1766 it was apparently still able to trade in slaves in partnership with a number of Liverpool associates, three of whom eventually became Mayors of Liverpool.   Others claim the partnership was in existence in 1762, and that at some point Lewis Cuthbert also had a store.  However the narrative in Walker v Witter, an action of the 1770s in which Lord Mansfield laid down that if you were bankrupt in any single British or other location it could be accepted by a court anywhere else that you were bankrupt without anyone bringing an action against you first having to prove your bankruptcy in the court he had come to before the action could be heard by it, mentions Lewis and the Beans by name as bankrupts in Kingston.   Witter had been an associate of Cuthbert and the Beans, and seems to have been involved in their bankruptcy.  Walker was pursuing him in London and was faced with a claim by Witter that a Kingston bankruptcy did not apply in London.  

Lewis Cuthbert of Castlehill raised money in Jamaica for Inverness Royal Academy in the period 1786-92.  Lewis married Jane Pinnock.  There is also a record of Lewis and Jane Cuthbert having a son Seignelay Thomas CUTHBERT born in Walcot, Somerset, 4 Jan 1786 and baptized 15 Feb 1786 (British Library J/1/19 f.216).  The will of Lewis Cuthbert is in the National Record Office and is dated 26 July 1803. 

There is also a record of a Lewis Cuthbert of Bath, subscribing for a book 'The History of Dahomy, an inland kingdom of Africa; compiled from Authentic Memoirs; with an introduction and notes'. By Archibald Dalzel, Esq. Governor at Cape-Coast castle., 1793, London.  Printed for the author, by T. Spilsbury and Son, Snowhill; and sold by G. and W. Nicol, booksellers to His Majesty, Pall-Mall; C. Dilly, Poultry; and W. J. and J. Richardson, Royal Exchange.

Inside the Bristol Cathederal there are a number of memorials to the family of Lewis Cuthbert.  These are located in the South aisle towards the front.  These are the wife and daughters of Lewis Cuthbert but I was not able to find one for Lewis (is he buried at Clifton?).  The tablets read:
Sacred to the memory of Jane widow of Lewis Cuthbert Esquire of Castle Hill in the county of Inverness and of the island of Jamaica.  She departed this life on the 28th of September 1830.  Also to the memory of their daughter Mary Hay Cuthbert who departed this life on the 22 of February 1819. Their remains are interred in a vault near this spot.
Also to the memory of Elizabeth Pinnock Cuthbert daughter of the aforesaid Lewis and Jane Cuthbert who died at Clifton on the 9th day of February 1855.  Also to the memory of Ann Murray Cuthbert, daughter of the aforesaid Lewis and Jane Cuthbert who died at Clifton on the 29th day of May 1855. Her remains are interred in a vault in Clifton Churchyard.
Mary Cuthbert departed this life at Clifton February ?? 1819. Daughter of Lewis Cuthbert of Castle Hill in the county of Inverness and of Jane his wife.
Jane reliec of the above Lewis Cuthbert departed this life September 28, 1830,  aged 86.

There is also a Lewis Cuthbert noted as a Bengal Writer in 1805.

Can anyone on the internet tell me more about Lewis Cuthbert?

In a reply to Alan Jackson, the Earl of Harewood said the attorneys in charge of the Harewood plantations (and the slaves working there) on Jamaica were Lewis Cuthbert & Alexander MacLeod (1790s), Francis Graeme (c.1799-1817) and George William Hamilton (c.1817-).

Other Cuthberts

There is a brief reference in a record at Kew to a John Cuthbert Serjeant-at-Law, early 1700s.  
There is a memorial to a John Cuthbert inside St Nicholas Cathedral, Newcastle upon Tyne, 5 April 1724.

John and Dorothy Cuthbert had issue:
1. William Cuthbert, Recorder of Newcastle upon Tyne.  He married 1st Jane Stephenson.  He married 2nd Dorothy Robinson.
2. Richard Cuthbert AM, Vicar of Penvith.  He married the daughter of Christ Mickleton of Durham.
3. George Cuthbert MD of Portsmouth, Physician to the Garrison, died 3 June 1772 aged 66.  Married Ann Jones.

On a seperate note; in 1743 Witton Castle was sold to a William Cuthbert (died 1747), a barrister and Recorder of Newcastle.   William's will is at the National Record Office at Kew and is very detailed.  His first wife was Jane, daughter of John Stephenson.  William and Jane had a daughter Margaret.  Jane then presumably died and William married Dorothy and then had two sons and a daughter, Philidelphia, William and John.  William also mentions his brother Rev Richard Cuthbert of Kendall, Westmoreland (who's wife was Margaret).  His other brother George Cuthbert, Physician of Portsmouth.  His sister Margaret who married James Nelson of London.

John Cuthbert (died 1782) of Witton Castle, near Durham.  Son of William Cuthbert.  Member of the Royal Society Club and of the Society of Arts. Fellow of the Royal Society (1765).  A governor of the Inner Temple and of Magdalen Hospital, a London institution for the relief of penitent prostitutes. The castle was sold after John had died presumably in 1782.  Witton Castle is located near Bishop Auckland, which is halfway between Darlington and Durham

There is a will of a John Cuthbert, Gentleman of Wisbech in the Isle of Ely, Cambridgeshire, died 16 May 1729.  He made his wife Anne Cuthbert his executor and left her his money.  He also left his son Sowter (John) and daughter Anne Cuthbert the sums of £500 each and 5 guineas to his brother Thomas Fairfax.  He first refers to his son as Sowter and then as John?  John signed his will in Feb 1728.

There is an inscription of a J Cuthbert, 10 March 1715, inside an old book Historiae Anglicanae Scriptores 1651.  The inscription also mentions what looks like Hannington which was presumably where this J Cuthbert lived.

There was a John Cuthbert who died in Madras, 24 Jan 1728 (British Library N/2/1 f.99).  He was noted as being a soldier.

There was also a John Cuthbert buried in Madras 29 November 1754.  He is noted as a Sailor, HMS 'Bridgewater'.

Were any of the above Cuthberts related to Arthur Cuthbert (1734?-1788)?  Are there any more John Cuthberts?  Perhaps Arthur Cuthbert's parents were Scottish and hence there are no records of them at Kew.

If you have any information to add to the above please contact me on jj@jjhc.info
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