Thomas Shields and the Machinery of Sugar Processing
Thomas Shields: 1837-1905
Thomas
Shields, John Shields Aird’s grandfather, was an engineer whose knowledge of
sugar processing machinery led him to South America and a new life. The
equipment he installed and maintained had the power to transform sugar cane
into sugar and molasses, and also had the power to change the destiny of the
Shields family.
Thomas
Shields was born in the West Lothian area of Scotland in 1837. According to
John Aird’s Aunt Ruth Shields MacNiven, he came from an engineering family. My
examination of Scottish census data, marriage records and death records casts
doubt on this. Thomas’ father, Archibald Shields, born in 1806, was listed on
most documents as a “farm servant”. Thomas appears to be the first engineer in
the family. During the mid-nineteenth century, most engineers trained through
apprenticeship, so he didn’t need expensive schooling or a university
education.
Thomas
married Margaret Sutherland on December 20, 1861; he was 24 and she was 23. Her
family owned a foundry in the town of Airdree, so Thomas may have used his
father-in-law’s connections to advance in the engineering field.
According
to Ruth Macniven, Thomas went to work for the company of McOnie Harvey.
According to Grace’s Guide to British Industrial History,
“In 1883,
McOnie Harvey and Co., Glasgow engineers, was formed by the amalgamation of Robert
Harvey and Co. and McOnie’s. By 1907, after Harvey’s death, his son Robert took
over and developed the business as Harvey Engineering Company, Ltd., makers of
sugar machinery and erection of central sugar factories, with a high reputation
in all sugar-producing countries.”
Thomas
obviously went to work for the company well before the 1883 merger, back when it was called A & P W McOnie, for by the
1871 Scotland Census, when he and Margaret already had five young children
ranging from age eight to one, he was listed as an “engine smith employing 3
Nat men”, which I assume meant three “native” men. It isn’t clear if Thomas had
brought South American natives back to England, or if the entry meant he
employed them abroad.
According
to Ruth McNiven, McOnie Harvey sent Thomas to the Demerara region of what was
then British Guiana and is now the South American county Guyana, probably in
the 1860s. He was charged with installing sugar processing equipment for a
large sugar plantation there. Demerara was a sugar cane growing region along
the Demerara River. A type of raw cane brown sugar became known as Demerara
sugar because it was processed from cane grown in this region. Most Europeans
reached the area by sea, landing in the city of Georgetown and then proceeding
inland to the sugar plantations.
It appears
that most plantations had their own sugar processing equipment. Rather than
ship the raw cane for miles in rugged territory, the cane would be processed into
a more easily shipped product—raw brown sugar and molasses. This led to a
booming business for the equipment manufacturers. As you can see from the
illustrations, the equipment was huge and complex. An expert like Thomas Shields
would have been essential to correctly assemble and train operators of the
equipment on the plantations.
According
to Ruth, Thomas was so well-thought of by the plantation owners that he was
asked to stay on as Consulting Engineer for the Crum Ewing estates, which
comprised five sugar plantations. Many owners would amass more than one
plantation, and would centralize the sugar production plant on one or two of
the properties. The Crum Ewing plantations were owned by Scottish businessman
Humphrey Crum-Ewing and the James Ewing & Co. According to a biography of Crum-Ewing,
“With the abolition of slavery the
value of plantation land (in the West Indies was) reduced substantially and
Humphry took the opportunity to purchase a series of plantations for the
company in British Guiana (now Guyana, South America). The purchases included
the plantations on the Atlantic coast east of the Demerara River known as
Better Hope, Vryheid’s Lust, Brothers, Montrose and Felicity.”
Thomas made his headquarters at
Vryheid’s Lust, which is Dutch for “Freedom’s Hope”. This sugar plantation
still exists today just outside of Georgetown, Guyana, and the plantation name
is also shared by a desperately poor, mostly black community.
 |
| Canal along edge of Vryheid's Lust Plantation, circa 1890 |
Eventually,
Thomas Shields decided to purchase his own plantation in the neighboring
country of Suriname. Alliance Plantation also had its own sugar processing facility,
a photo which is below.
Thomas
Shields’ life, and those of his children, were transformed by the powerful
McOnie Harvey equipment. Thomas’ training and skill in assembling and maintaining
the desperately needed equipment transformed him from an engineer employed by a
Scottish manufacturer into a wealthy landowner in colonial South America in a
matter of two decades.
Sources:
https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Robert_Harvey_and_Co
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