Thomas Craskell

Thomas Craskell (d. 1790)[1] was an engineer and painter active in Jamaica in the eighteenth century.

He was a military engineer for much of his life. He was a lieutenant in the Engineer corps amongst the troops Major-General Peregrine Hopson led in the invasions of Martinique and Guadeloupe in early 1759.[2] His career as a marine painter involved working alongside Peter Monamy and Samuel Scott in the mid-eighteenth century. He was familiar with naval technology, and showed precise rendering of sails and rigging in his paintings. There are only four known works of Craskell, two of these are in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.[3]

In 1758 he started the supervision of the King's House in Spanish Town.[4]

His son, also called Thomas Craskell, was a Captain in the army who was appointed Superintendent General of the Maroons to replace Major John James.[5]

Survey of Jamaica

From 1756 to 1761 he worked with James Simpson in conducting a survey of Jamaica which resulted in three maps which could be combined to create an overall map 90 x 38 inches in size.[4]

  • Cornwall
  • Middlesex
  • Surrey

Paintings

References
  1. "Obituaries of Considerable persons with biographical anecdotes". The Gentleman's Magazine. 70: 467. 1790.
  2. Porter, Whitworth (1889). History of the Corps of Royal Engineers. London: Longmans, Green and Co. p. 189.
  3. "Thomas Craskell biography". Rountree Tryon. Rountree Tryon. Retrieved 9 June 2019.
  4. "Thomas Craskell & James Simpson: To the Right Honorable Wills Earl of Hillsborough". Rare Maps. Barry Lawrence Ruderman Antique Maps. Retrieved 6 January 2016.
  5. Kaifala, Joseph (2016). Free Slaves, Freetown, and the Sierra Leonean Civil War. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. ISBN 9781349948543. Retrieved 9 June 2019.
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