The White Witch of Rosehall (Unknown Binding)

~ Herbert G. de Lisser (Author) "ROBERT RUTHERFORD reined in his horse at the stone and iron gates that opened into the estate; half a mile away, on an eminence that..." (more)
Key Phrases: Annie Palmer, Great House, Montego Bay (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"de Lisser utilizes the conventions of a romantic entanglement to investigate and debate the wider socio-political issues within the novel that relate to colonialism, Jamaican identity and culture... The White Witch of Rosehall is a delightful read, written by an author who sought not only to entertain, but also to educate." Donna-Marie Tuck, Society for Caribbean Studies Newsletter" --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Description

A very striking and curious story, founded on fact, of the West Indies of the earlty nineteenth century. Robert Rutherford is sent to the Islands to learn the planter's business from the bottom. He becomes an overseer at Rosehall, the property of a young widow, Mrs Palmer, whose three husbands have all died in curious circumstances. She takes a violent fancy to Rutherford, who is also embarrassed by the attentions of his half-caste housekeeper, Millicent. His housekeeper is urging him, with some sucess, to fall in with West Indian habits, when Mrs Palmer arrives. Millicent defies her and threatens her with the powers of Takoo, an Obeah man. Mrs Palmer, herself skilled in Obeah magic, puts a spell on the girl, which Takoo's rites, shattered by the white woman's stronger magic, are powerless to remove.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Unknown Binding: 256 pages
• Publisher: Humanity Press (January 1, 1982)
• ISBN-10: 0333349695
• ISBN-13: 978-0333349694
• Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 5.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,083,921 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars White Witch of Rosehall, August 22, 2003

By A Customer

To many Jamaicans, the White Witch of Rosehall is considered fact, not fiction.

Having travelled to Jamaica on numerous occasions and studied Carribean Studies, particularly plantocracy, I felt compelled to read this novel.

In my opinion, the book is a combination of both fact and fiction - with some folklore thrown in for good measure.

It is a fascinating read leading up to the slave rebellions in 1831 on the island, focusing on Rosehall Estate and it's mistress, Annie Palmer. Legend says Annie murdered all three of her husbands and that she was a witch.

If any truth lies in this novel, which unfortunately, I suspect it does, Annie Palmer was a wicked woman, who relished the physical and psychological torture of her plantation workers. Their eventual uprising, although disturbing (because similar events really happened during this time period) was gratifying.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has travelled to Jamaica, particularly Montego Bay - which is the closest city to the estate. Regardless of fact or fiction, the book offers an interesting slice of Jamaican history.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Scariest Book Ever, April 17, 2004

By	Arlena Flanders (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

De Lisser did a magnificant job of capturing the story of Jamaica's infamous witch Annie Palmer. Based on a true story, which actually took place on the island of Jamaica. This was the most scariest book I've ever read being the fact that I am West-Indian, and I'm quite familiar with the story. De Lisser certainly set out to do what he intended; to scare the living daylights out of me. The White Witch of Rosehall is a brilliantly written fictional account of a true story which took place over a century ago on the beautiful island of Jamaica. De Lisser's captivating telling of this story will leaving you shaking and at the same time, it will leave you with a sense of knoweledge of part of the history of Jamaica's infamous Annie Palmer,"The White Witch of Rosehall."

For more on Annie Palmer you could visit Rosehall in Jamaica. Good Luck! Let me know how it goes.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The True Story of Rose Hall, May 8, 2008

By	Terry E. Hawkins (Miami, Florida, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: White Witch of Rosehall (Hardcover)

The Legend of the White Witch of Rose Hall is a lot of nonsense. It was completely debunked in the 1960s by well-known Jamaican historians such as Geoffrey Yates, Clinton V. Black, Glory Robertson and Freddie DuQuesnay, who is my Uncle's first cousin. The story currently being told by the Guides at Rose Hall Great House is simply rubbish, made-up and embellished to entertain and frighten gullible American tourists.

Annie Palmer was neither Irish nor French and she was not born in France or Haiti to mysterious unknown parents. Her real name was Ann Mary Patterson and she was born in 1802 at The Baulk Estate, her father's plantation near Lucea in Hanover Parish, Jamaica. Her family was both prominent and well-known in Jamaica. Her father was John Patterson, a Scottish planter, and her mother, Juliana, was the daughter of the Hon. William Brown of Kew Estate, Hanover, an aristocratic Anglo-Irish sugar planter who was the Custos and Chief Magistrate of Hanover Parish. His wife, Mary Kerr James, Ann's grandmother, was a descendant of one of the oldest English families in Jamaica who had arrived with Penn and Venables during the English Conquest of 1655.

Annie only had one husband, John Rose Palmer, Esq., the owner of Rose Hall and Palmyra Estates, St. James, who was a collateral ancestor of my Mother. They were married on the 27th of March, 1820, at Mount Pleasant Estate, St. James Parish, Jamaica, the home of Ann's mother and step-father. Following a honeymoon in England they returned to Jamaica and took up residence at Rose Hall Great House where they lived for almost eight years until John Rose Palmer died in 1827 at the age of 42. He was buried in the St. James Anglican Churchyard in Montego Bay by the Rev. Thomas Smith on the 5th of November, 1827.

Following the death of her husband in 1827, Mrs. Ann Palmer found that both Rose Hall Estate and Palmyra Estate were deeply in debt. Unable to cope with their management, she left Rose Hall and went to live at Bellevue Estate, a small coffee plantation in the hills south of Montego Bay. Bellevue belonged to her uncle Thomas James Bernard, who also owned the adjoing Bonavista Estate, a large sugar plantation. In 1829 Ann Palmer sold her rights to Rose Hall and Palmyra Estates for a mere 200 pounds sterling and both plantations, facing bankruptcy, were placed under the jurisdiction of the Court of Chancery. Mrs Ann Palmer never returned to Rose Hall and she never re-married. She died a widow at Bonavista Estate in St. James in 1846, leaving the remainder of her estate to her 2 year old goddaughter, Giulia Mary Spence, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Patrick Spence of Montego Bay. Mrs. Ann Palmer was buried in the St. James Anglican Parish Churchyard in Montego Bay by the Rev. Thomas Garrett on the 9th of July, 1846. Her marble tombstone in the Churchyard has not survived.

This then was the blameless lady who has been constantly slandered by generations of ignorant people and whose very name is still being exploited to sell admission tickets to Rose Hall Great House. I hope that both James Castello and H.G. DeLisser who originated amd embellished this
Legend in 1868 and 1929 respectively are spinning in their graves.

One more thing. Rose Hall Great House was never burned and destroyed during the Slave Rebellion of 1831 to 1832. After Ann Palmer departed from Rose Hall Estate in 1827, the Great House was locked up and left in the charge of a solitary Caretaker. Three years later in 1830 the Rev. Hope Masterton Waddell, a Presbyterian Missionary from Scotland, obtained permission to preach to the Rose Hall slaves in the mansion. He described it as being completely empty except for four large oil paintings of the
previous owners which still hung in the Ballroom. These four 18th Century portraits remained in the empty and decaying Great House until about 1918 when the Henderson family purchased the Rose Hall Estates. The Hendersons removed the four portraits and the grand mahogany staircase from Rose Hall Great House and placed them in one of their mansions in the suburbs of Kingston. Rose Hall Great House continued to slowly decay over the years, eventually losing most of its roof, until its impressive ruins were finally purchased in 1965 and restored by John Rollins, an American business tycoon and former Lt-Governor of Delaware. He restored Rose Hall Great House, he did not completely rebuild it as some people mistakenly think. My Uncle, Fred Benghiat, was the Consultant Engineer on the Rose Hall restoration.