John Weskett


John Weskett was an English underwriter and merchant who contributed to the understanding of insurance law in the eighteenth century.
Weskett was probably born in Leeds. It is believed to have lived between 1730 and 1800.

Marine insurance average

Weskett offered a definition of the term average in A Complete Digest of the Theory, Laws, and Practice of Insurance, :

Criticism

Weskett has been criticised for normalising the dehumanisation and commodification of enslaved Africans, for example Robin Pearson and David Richardson in "Insuring the Transatlantic Slave Trade" or Saidiya Hartman in ''Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route''

Works

  • 1781 A Complete Digest of the Theory, Laws, and Practice of Insurance, London: Frys, Couchman and Collier, 1781.