Joseph Hadfield

(fl.1817 - 1844)

Crown Surveyor and Superintendent for Rivers and Creeks, for Demerara in the colony of British Guiana, Hadfield’s earliest known map is a Plan of that part of George Town (1817), and his best known is Arrowsmith’s Map of British Guiana From the latest Surveys of Schomburgk, Owen, Hilhouse, & others; & Those of Hancock, Van-Cooten, Bouchenroeder, & Bercheyck . . . (1838), which was compiled by him.

Hadfield was responsible for insisting on the revolutionary use of brick in construction of colonial buildings in Demerara, and criticized for turning a blind eye to the continued enslavement of indigenous people after emancipation in 1838.