William Fry

William Fry was an English-born boat builder and timber merchant who was contracted to supply sawn 'bullet wood' for the new barracks built in 1828 or 1829 at the junction of the Canje and Berbice rivers. Fry had a steam-powered saw mill. [Timehri, 1883]

After emancipation Fry established a small sugar plantation with a steam-powered cane mill on land close to New Amsterdam granted by Governor James Carmichael Smyth andnamed Smythfield. Fry emplyed formerly enslaved labourers and workers from Martinique. [House of Lords papers, 1839]

In 1841 Fry was resident at Icoroway Creek, on the Upper Canje, where he had a wood-cutting estate with a population of fifty-five. [National Archives of Guyana, 1841 Census]

From 1827 to 1830 a William and Thomas Fry of Berbice were pupils at Paisley Grammar School, along with the two sons of William Fraser of Goldstone Hall. [Robert Brown, History of Paisley Grammar School (1875)]