Christopher Bethell-Codrington (until 1797 known as Christopher Codrington; October 1764 – 4 February 1843) was a British politician, planter and amateur cricket player who served as a MP in the

British Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprem ...

. In 1792, he inherited from his uncle

Sir William Codrington, 2nd Baronet Sir William Codrington, 2nd Baronet (1719–1792) was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1747 and 1792. Codrington was the eldest son of Sir William Codrington, 1st Baronet of Dodington Park and his wife Elizabeth Betha ...

, sugar plantations in Antigua and the

Dodington Park Dodington Park is a country house and estate in Dodington, South Gloucestershire, England. The house was built by James Wyatt for Christopher Bethell Codrington (of the Codrington baronets). The family had made their fortune from sugar pl ...

estate in

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

. In 1797 he inherited further Caribbean property from his uncle Christopher Bethell, who had changed his name after inheriting the estates from his maternal uncle Slingsby Bethell in 1758. He then changed his surname to Bethell-Codrington.

Parliamentary career

Later in 1797 he was elected as a

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) for

Tewkesbury Tewkesbury ( ) is a medieval market town and civil parish in the north of Gloucestershire, England. The town has significant history in the Wars of the Roses and grew since the building of Tewkesbury Abbey. It stands at the confluence of the Ri ...

, holding the seat until 1812. In 1806 he rejected pressure from his constituents to support the

abolition of the slave trade Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people. The British ...

, but denied being motivated by his self-interest as a plantation-owner. Later in 1832, he had a very public debate in the newspapers with Sir Fowell Buxton on abolition, quoting a letter from his attorney and resident manager for Barbuda in 1825, John James, detailing the supposed contentedness of the slaves there. In 1817, he purchased further lands at Wapley in Gloucestershire, which made his estate "extend upwards of 15 miles in one continued line".

Caribbean estates

Christopher Bethell-Codrington's sugar estates included

Betty's Hope Betty's Hope was a sugarcane plantation in Antigua. It was established in 1650, shortly after the island had become an English colony, and flourished as a successful agricultural industrial enterprise during the centuries of slavery. It was t ...

, Clare Hall, Garden, Cotton, New Work, Bolans, and Jennings, on the island of Antigua and also the island of

Barbuda Barbuda (), is an island located in the eastern Caribbean forming part of the sovereign state of Antigua and Barbuda. It is located north of the island of Antigua and is part of the Leeward Islands of the West Indies. The island is a popula ...

which was used to supply the sugar estates with provisions and also earned commissions by salvaging the many ship wrecks on its reefs. These estates were managed by resident managers and attorneys. Many of their letters back to Christopher Bethell-Codrington at

still exist and are available to read on microfilm and PDF in a collection known as the Codrington Papers. In the 1830s, the British government emancipated the slaves, and Bethell-Codrington was compensated over £30,000 for nearly 500 slaves in his ownership.

Cricket career

He was mainly associated with

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...

(MCC)

Arthur Haygarth Arthur Haygarth (4 August 1825 – 1 May 1903) was a noted amateur cricketer who became one of cricket's most significant historians. He played first-class cricket for the Marylebone Cricket Club and Sussex between 1844 and 1861, as well as num ...

, ''Scores & Biographies'', Volume 1 (1744–1826), Lillywhite, 1862 and made five known appearances in

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officia ...

matches in 1797.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bethell-Codrington, Christopher 1764 births 1843 deaths British MPs 1796–1800 English cricketers English cricketers of 1787 to 1825 English landowners Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies British slave owners Sugar plantation owners UK MPs 1801–1802 UK MPs 1802–1806 UK MPs 1806–1807 UK MPs 1807–1812 Christopher Colonel C. Lennox's XI cricketers