Estate Mount Stewart
Mount Stewart is estate 8-9 in St. Croix’s Northside A Quarter. Based on appearances on historic maps, the windmill was likely built in the late 18th century and was decommissioned before 1856. Field reconnaissance failed to locate ruins identifiable as a windmill.
Mount Stewart, like many other estates in the highlands of Northside A quarter, showed relatively late settlement. The first appearance of sugar machinery is an animal mill in estate 8 on the second printing of the Beck maps, likely from information in the mid-1750s.
While the animal mill on the second Beck printing also appears in estate 8 on the annotated versions of that map, the 1766 annotated map includes a hand-drawn animal mill in estate 9, a feature repeated on Zöllner’s manuscript copy of Beck. A windmill appears on the 1799 Oxholm map at Mt. Steward while a decommissioned windmill tower appears on the 1856 Parsons map.
The only indication on the 20th-century topographic maps is a mill in ruins on the 1920 map. McGuire geographic dictionary of the Virgin Islands (p.132) indicates a Mill, Estatehouse, and orchard in valley 750 yards southwest of hill, assertions not supported by the topographic map. Evidence of this mill has not yet been found in the field.
The annotated and manuscript copies of the Beck map consistently attribute ownership of both estates 8 and 9 to Robert Stewart, indicating the genesis of the name Mount Stewart in honor of the original proprietor according to McGuire. By 1790, ownership transitioned to Robert Thompson.
Historic Maps of Mount Stewart
