History of Clifton

“Here, among ruins and trails, beaches and coppice, you’ll walk through centuries of Bahamian history, each step a reminder of the lives, cultures, and traditions that shaped our nation.”

People have lived at Clifton for nearly 1,000 years. The first inhabitants of The Bahamas were the Lucayans, whose ancestors carried the Taíno culture from South America throughout the West Indies. Tragically, within just a few decades of Columbus’s arrival, the Lucayans were wiped out by slavery and disease. Centuries later, in the 1780s, Loyalist planters fleeing the newly formed United States resettled Clifton. Granted Crown Land to establish plantations, John Wood became the principal landowner, building the Great House near the cliffs. Cotton, however, quickly depleted the thin soil, and by the early 1800s, the land passed to William Wylly, an Attorney General whose abolitionist leanings made him unpopular among his peers. Though a slave owner himself, Wylly used his plantation to experiment with reforms in the slave-based economy of the time.

After emancipation, Clifton transitioned into a working farm, but by the 1950s, much of its land returned to natural coppice growth. Recognizing its cultural and ecological value, the government acquired Clifton in 2005 to create The Bahamas’ first national heritage park preserving its plantation ruins, diverse landscape, and centuries of human history for future generations. Today, Clifton Heritage National Park invites you to walk through history, explore the beauty of the land, and experience the stories that shaped The Bahamas.