John Okill

John Okill (c.1687 – 20 August 1773) was a pioneering and successful 18th century shipbuilder from Liverpool, England. Not much is known about his early life, though by the time he was 50 years old, he was a leading citizen of the town, having undertaken the roles of timber merchant and shipbuilder.

His yard was on the south of the Salthouse Dock, Liverpool, and over the years he would build many coasting brigantines and sloops in alliance with William Marsh.

By 1739 his reputation an accomplished ship builder got him the first of many commissions by the Royal Navy to build ships of the line. The first was the "Hastings", a ship of 44 guns and weighing 682 tons.[1] He would build another eight ships between 1740 and 1758 for the navy.

His shipbuilding company saw several other partners over the years: by 1758 the firm was "Okill and Rigg", and in 1768 it became "Okill & Sutton".

John Okill was also a Liverpool member of the Company of Merchants trading to Africa, formed in 1750. The other merchants traded in African slaves; Gomer states that Okill's firm was "the only African Merchants not engaged in the slave trade". However, he was personally involved in five slave-trading partnerships in the last 1740s, carrying over 1,500 slaves to the West Indies [2]. Instead he "traded in wood and teeth (the ivory trade)".[3] (The ivory was heavy, and the trade depended on freshly-captured slaves who were compelled to carry the tusks to the ports where both the tusks and their carriers were sold.[4])

In 1747 Okill was the donor of the lease for the site upon which the original St Thomas's Church, Liverpool St. Thomas's Church was built.

In 1773 he started work on a manor home in Woolton called Lee Hall. He died later that same year, with work on the building completed by his inheriting nephew, James Okill. There were problems associated with the disposal of John Okill's estates, requiring an Act of Parliament in 1784, (24 Geo. [118] III, c. 1)[5] to enable the trustees to dispose of certain of them. James and his inheritors, the Dutton family, helped to plan and layout what would become Gateacre.

There was a monumental inscription to him at original St. Peter’s Church, Liverpool.[1] Lee Hall was torn down sometime after 1971. His commercial Day Book for 1752 – 1753, listing the daily transactions relating to his shipbuilding business can be found at the Liverpool Record Office and Local History Service.

References
  1. Stewart-Brown, R. (1932). Liverpool Ships of the 18th Century. Hodder & Stoughton. p. 117.
  2. Slavery and the British Country House, English Heritage
  3. Williams, Gomer (1897). The Liverpool Privateers and the Liverpool Slave Trade. London: William Heinemann. p. 472.
  4. THE IVORY TRADE. pp 7-11. A CONSULTANCY UNDERTAKEN FOR DR. IAIN DOUGLAS-HAMILTON ON BEHALF OF THE UNITED STATES FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE OF THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, AND THE INTERNATIONAL UNION FOR THE CONSERVATION OF NATURE AND NATURAL RESOURCES, MORGE, SWITZERLAND. June 1979 I.S.C. Parker Wildlife Services Ltd P.O. B0X 30678 NAIROBI, Kenya. "Typical are these comments from one Samuel Swan, trader, to his principal — merchant John Tidd in Boston :"May 16 1809...Since the destruction of the slave trade the Crew (= Kru, a West African people) Country is full of ivory" the gist of this being that now slaves were illegal, ivory was difficult to move." The captain of the British warship HMS Cyclops remarked: "but understand that the produce of the interior is conveyed to the Sea Coast by Slaves, and on arrival, the slaves themselves are disposed of by their Owners to the Slave Dealers, and their burdens generally consisting of Ivory, Coppir (sic) or beeswax, to the legal traders. It is clear therefore that the Slave Trade fosters the Legal one.. both quotations referenced to BENNETT, N.R. & BROOKS J.R. 1965. New England merchants in Africa. Boston Univ. Press, Boston.
  5. The Chronological Tables of the Private and Personal Acts.Part 20 (1783-1794), Acts of the Parliaments of Great Britain Archived 2005-07-21 at the Wayback Machine, accessed 11 September 2007

Further reading
  • Liverpolitana, Williams, Peter. Merseyside Civic Society. 1971.
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