Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery

Last updated

Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery
TypeResearch Institute
Established2010;13 years ago (2010)
DirectorMatthew J. Smith
Location
London
,
United Kingdom
Website www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/

The Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery, formerly the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slave-ownership, is a research centre of University College, London (UCL) that focuses on revealing the impact of British slavery and, in particular, the implications of the Slave Compensation Act 1837. The Centre's work is freely available online to the public through the Legacies of British Slavery database.

Contents

History

The Centre was established at UCL with the support of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. [1]

It incorporates two earlier projects: the Legacies of British Slave-ownership project (2009–2012), funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Structure and significance of British Caribbean slave-ownership 1763–1833 project (2013–2015), funded by the ESRC and the Arts and Humanities Research Council. [1] The first project started with the slave compensation data, identifying slave-owners and the estates on which enslaved people lived. (As land owners in the British West Indies were losing their unpaid labourers, they received compensation totalling £20 million. [2] )

The second project charted the ownership histories of approximately 4,000 estates, going back to around 1763 but focusing primarily on the years of the slave registers, 1817–1834. The second phase added another 4,000 estates, and another 20,000 slave-owners. The current project continues to add information and build the database created in the second phase, aiming to identify of all slave-owners in the British colonies at the time slavery ended (1807–1833), creating the Encyclopedia of British Slave-Owners, as well as all of the estates in the British West Indies. [3] During early 2021, the Centre announced a shift in emphasis towards researching the lives of the enslaved rather than slave-owners. [1]

Staff

The centre's inaugural director was Nicholas Draper and its chair Catherine Hall. In June 2020 Matthew J. Smith, formerly of the University of the West Indies, took over the directorship. [4] Other key researchers include Keith McClelland and Rachel Lang. [5]

The database

Slaves working on a plantation in Antigua (1823) Slaves working on a plantation - Ten Views in the Island of Antigua (1823), plate III - BL.jpg
Slaves working on a plantation in Antigua (1823)
Greys Court House, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua Greys Court House.jpg
Greys Court House, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua
Farley Hall, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua Farley Hall, Farley Hill (geograph 3342576).jpg
Farley Hall, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua
Brentry House, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua Brentry House - geograph.org.uk - 387710.jpg
Brentry House, whose owners benefitted from slave compensation from Antigua

The centre's work is freely available online to the public through the Legacies of British Slavery database. [6] [7] This database aims to record all those individuals who were recompensed by the British state at the abolition of slavery in 1833. (Although the Atlantic slave trade had been abolished in 1807, it took another generation for the British government to manumit the enslaved people within its Empire, and even then it did not tackle slavery in India till 1843.) This flow of money was, as the original title of the project indicated, to the slave owners, and not to the newly freed individuals: the liberation of the slaves was treated legally as the expropriation of their masters. A very large sum was paid by the British state to thousands of its subjects; most of the erstwhile owners received compensation for only one or a handful of slaves, but a small number of families owned large plantations with hundreds or even thousands of enslaved workers, and so received substantial amounts of money.[ citation needed ]

Inaugural director Nick Draper and chair Catherine Hall have said that the central purpose of the Legacies database is to counter "selective forgetting", whereby society forgets the human cost of slavery but celebrates its abolition. [6]

The project builds on a wider re-examination of Britain's links to slavery and its abolition, some of which was stimulated by the 2007 bicentenary of the Slave Trade Act 1807. For example, English Heritage held a conference on "Slavery and the British Country House: mapping the current research" in 2009. The papers were compiled into a book of the same title, with an opening chapter to set the scene by Nicholas Draper describing the legacies project, then in embryo. Madge Dresser's introduction acknowledges that "Academic research takes time to feed through into the public domain, where such links [to slavery] had so often been either studiously ignored or actively repressed." Compensation money was received by the owners of "well-known sites of slave ownership such as Dodington Park... the National Trust’s property at Greys’ Court... and Brentry House in Gloucestershire", not far from the slave port of Bristol. [8]

The research upon which the Legacies database is based revealed that some 46,000 people received compensation under the Slave Compensation Act 1837. The Slave Compensation Commission established a sum equivalent in today's money to about 17 billion pounds, the largest payout until the bailout of the banks in 2008. [9]

As Hall has stated, beneficiaries of slavery were not only people who owned slaves, but also those whose business dealings derived benefit from slavery. [10] This included merchants who were involved in industries such as sugar processing and textile manufacturing.[ citation needed ]

One of the purposes of the legacies project is to research how the families spent their compensation. Some of the money went to pay for the education of sons and grandsons (including grand tours of Europe) and to consolidate their professional and political power:

The man who received the most money from the state was John Gladstone, the father of Victorian prime minister William Ewart Gladstone. He was paid £106,769 in compensation for the 2,508 slaves he owned across nine plantations, the modern equivalent of about £80m. Given such an investment, it is perhaps not surprising that William Gladstone’s maiden speech in parliament was in defence of slavery. [11]

Money was also invested in the Railway Mania of the 1840s (the mania tipped the transportation balance away from the Golden Age of the British canal system) and in the factory system. "As well as paying for the building of dozens of country houses and art collections, the money also helped fund railways, museums, insurance companies, mining firms, merchants and banks." [12]

Some streets and statues in the United Kingdom are named after slaveholders and beneficiaries of slavery. [13]

Slavery generated immense wealth. For example, the London business district known as the Isle of Dogs, where the three West India Docks were built, profited heavily from the slave trade. [14] Another example is New Town, Edinburgh. [15] [16]

United Kingdom

Guy Hewitt, High Commissioner of Barbados, compared the project to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, [17] run by the Emory Center for Digital Scholarship [18]

A two-part television programme, Britain's Forgotten Slave-owners, was broadcast by the BBC to accompany the public launch of the project. It was presented by the historian David Olusoga and won a BAFTA award and the Royal Historical Society Public History Prize for Broadcasting. [19]

Organisations that existed at the time of slavery have begun to examine their histories and search for any connections. For example, the University of Glasgow launched an enquiry to understand the impact of slavery on the institution. [20] [21] A number of business still in existence have been shown to have benefited from slavery: "Among the names the UCL project has turned up are the Bank of England, Lloyds, Baring Brothers and P&O." [22]

Australia

The centre's work has been considered by scholars, including Catherine Hall, Humphrey McQueen, Clinton Fernandes and C. J. Coventry, in relation to Australian colonial history. The Legacies database revealed numerous connections to slavery that had previously been overlooked or unknown. For example, the colony (now state) of South Australia may owe its existence to slavery finance, through George Fife Angas and Raikes Currie, who gave large sums of money without which the colony would not have been created in 1836. [23] [24] [25] [26] This body of research generated media attention. [27] [28] [29] Another Australian state, Victoria, has been shown to have had many former slaveholders and beneficiaries of slavery in its history, a number of whom are recognised in public honours, including place-names and statuary. [23]

The Australian Dictionary of Biography (ADB) has been criticised for its failure to mention connections to slavery in the biographical entries of notable Australians. However, the ADB was as of 2019 undergoing a review that aims to address this and other deficiencies. [30]

United States

Actor Ben Affleck apologised after WikiLeaks revealed that he had attempted to stop a genealogy television show revealing his ancestral connection to slavery, which had arisen as a result of the Legacies database. [31]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catherine Hall</span> British academic (born 1946)

Catherine Hall is a British academic. She is Emerita Professor of Modern British Social and Cultural History at University College London and chair of its digital scholarship project, the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery. Her work as a feminist historian focuses on the 18th and 19th centuries, and the themes of gender, class, race and empire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery Abolition Act 1833</span> Law which abolished slavery in most of the British Empire

The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which provided for the gradual abolition of slavery in most parts of the British Empire. It was passed by Earl Grey's reforming administration and expanded the jurisdiction of the Slave Trade Act 1807 and made the purchase or ownership of slaves illegal within the British Empire, with the exception of "the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company", Ceylon, and Saint Helena. The Act was repealed in 1998 as a part of wider rationalisation of English statute law; however, later anti-slavery legislation remains in force.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Fife Angas</span> Australian politician

George Fife Angas was an English businessman and banker who, while residing in England, played a significant part in the formation and establishment of the Province of South Australia. He established the South Australian Company and was its founding chairman of the board of directors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Hibbert</span>

George Hibbert was an English merchant, politician, slave-owner, ship-owner, amateur botanist and book collector. With Robert Milligan, he was also one of the principals of the West India Dock Company which instigated the construction of the West India Docks on London's Isle of Dogs in 1800. He also helped found the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in 1824.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slave Compensation Act 1837</span> United Kingdom legislation

The Slave Compensation Act 1837 was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom, signed into law on 23 December 1837. With the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, it authorized the Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt to compensate slave owners in the British colonies in the amount of approximately £20 million for the freeing of slaves. Based on a government census of 1 August 1834, more than 40,000 awards to slave owners were issued. Since some of the payments were converted into 3.5% government annuities, they lasted until 2015. Most were sold and the money sent abroad for investment.

Benjamin Greene was an English businessman, newspaper owner and the founder of Greene King, one of the United Kingdom's largest brewing businesses. He later became the owner of multiple plantations in the British West Indies and supported slavery.

Sir John Rae Reid, 2nd Baronet (1791–1867) was a Scottish merchant and financier. He was a Tory and Conservative politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1830 and 1847.

Benjamin Buck Greene was a British banker, plater, and financier. He inherited a large fortune derived from the Atlantic slave trade and the sugar industry in the Caribbean, later becoming one of London's leading merchants and shipowners. He served as a director of the Bank of England for fifty years from 1850, also serving as deputy governor (1871-3) and governor (1873–5).

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Samuel Sandbach was successively Bailiff, Coroner and Mayor of Liverpool, as well as High Sheriff of Denbighshire and a Justice of the Peace for Lancashire. He made his fortune as a merchant in a partnership that traded with the West Indies and owned slaves.

Sandbach, Tinne & Company, together with its associate firms McInroy, Parker & Company and McInroy, Sandbach & Company, was a business whose roots can be traced back to 1782. Having begun business in the cotton trade, the firms moved into sugar products and exported coffee, molasses, rum and sugar from the West Indies. They owned ships and plantations, and engaged in both slavery and transport of indentured labour.

Eleanora Atherton was an English philanthropist best known for her work in Manchester, England. At the time of her death, she was one of the richest British women in the nineteenth century.

Charles McGarel (1788–1876) was an Ireland-born Ulster-Scots merchant and slave owner. In 1833, the British Government abolished slavery and compensated owners, such as McGarel, who became a major beneficiaries of this scheme. With his wealth he conducted business in the City of London, funded civic works in his home town of Larne, County Antrim and bought land and property in Ireland. Having no children, he left his estate to his brother-in-law, James Hogg, on condition that he integrate McGarel into his family name, becoming James McGarel-Hogg, later Lord Magheramorne.

William Hibbert (1759–1844) was a British merchant, slave trader, and slave owner. He was the sixth son of Robert Hibbert (1717–1784) and Abigail Scholey. With his brother George Hibbert and cousin Robert Hibbert (1769–1849), William was a partner in the West Indian merchant house Geo. Rob. & Wm. Hibbert. The firm was involved in the slave trade and principally with the shipping, insurance and distribution of sugar from the West Indies.

William Atherton, was a merchant and wealthy landowner from Lancashire, England, who operated and co-owned sugar plantations in the former Colony of Jamaica. He was a slave owner, as well as an importer of slaves from Africa.

Anna Eliza Brydges née Gamon, formerly Elletson (1737-1823) was an English aristocrat and plantation owner. She married James Brydges, the third Duke of Chandos.

Green Park Estate was one of several sugar plantations owned by William Atherton and his heirs. It was located in Trelawny Parish, south of Falmouth, Jamaica. By the early nineteenth century, at least 533 people were enslaved there producing mainly sugar and rum.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Home". Legacies of British Slave-ownership. University College London. Retrieved 12 December 2020.
  2. ↑ Oldfield, John (17 February 2011). "British Anti-slavery". BBC History. BBC. Retrieved 12 December 2020. ...the new legislation called for the gradual abolition of slavery. Everyone over the age of six on August 1, 1834, when the law went into effect, was required to serve an apprenticeship of four years in the case of domestics and six years in the case of field hands
  3. ↑ "LBS Centre Overview". Legacies of British Slave-ownership. University College London. Retrieved 12 December 2020.
  4. ↑ "Leading Caribbean scholar appointed director of UCL centre examining the impact of British slavery". UCL News. 3 July 2019. Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  5. ↑ "Matthew Smith - looking forward". UCL. 12 June 2020. Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  6. 1 2 Draper, Nick (15 July 2015). "Britain has a selective memory of its slavery past. Our project will help us to remember". The Guardian .
  7. ↑ Hall, Catherine (26 September 2016). "The racist ideas of slave owners are still with us today - Catherine Hall". The Guardian .
  8. ↑ Dresser, Madge (2013). Slavery and the British Country House. English Heritage. ISBN   978-1-84802-064-1 . Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  9. ↑ Olusoga, David (11 July 2015). "The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed". The Guardian . Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  10. ↑ Coventry, C.J. (2019). "Links in the Chain: British slavery, Victoria and South Australia". Before/Now. 1 (1). doi:10.17613/d8ht-p058.
  11. ↑ Olusoga, David (11 July 2015). "The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed". The Guardian . Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  12. ↑ Jones, Sam (27 August 2013). "Follow the money: investigators trace forgotten story of Britain's slave trade". The Guardian . Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  13. ↑ Saner, Emine (29 April 2017). "Renamed and shamed: taking on Britain's slave-trade past, from Colston Hall to Penny Lane". The Guardian .
  14. ↑ "Dealing with the legacy of slavery - Letters". The Guardian . 16 September 2018.
  15. ↑ "Edinburgh's New Town 'built on black slavery'". The Scotsman . 25 October 2018.
  16. ↑ Shedden, Sam (22 August 2016). "Edinburgh slavery map offers glimpse into city's dark past". The Scotsman . Archived from the original on 1 April 2019. Retrieved 6 January 2023.
  17. ↑ Hewitt, Guy (1 August 2018). "Windrush is a chance to end British intolerance dating from slavery". The Guardian .
  18. ↑ "Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database | Emory Center for Digital Scholarship | Emory University". digitalscholarship.emory.edu. Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  19. ↑ "Britain's forgotten slave-owners: BBC TV broadcast | Legacies of British Slave-ownership". UCL. Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  20. ↑ Ross, Elliot (26 November 2018). "It's time for Scotland to make reparations for slavery". www.aljazeera.com.
  21. ↑ "University of Glasgow publishes report into historical slavery". www.gla.ac.uk. 16 September 2018. Retrieved 2 July 2020.
  22. ↑ Jones, Sam (27 August 2013). "Follow the money: investigators trace forgotten story of Britain's slave trade". The Guardian .
  23. 1 2 Coventry, CJ (2019). ""Links in the Chain: British slavery, Victoria and South Australia," Before Now".
  24. ↑ McQueen, Humphrey (2018). "Chapter 4: Born free : wage-slaves and chattel-slaves". In Collins, Carolyn; Sendziuk, Paul (eds.). Foundational Fictions in South Australian History. Wakefield Press. pp. 43–63. ISBN   9781743056066.
  25. ↑ Hall, Catherine (2016). "Writing History, Making 'Race': Slave-Owners and Their Stories". Australian Historical Studies. 47 (3): 365–380. doi:10.1080/1031461X.2016.1202291. S2CID   152113669.
  26. ↑ Fernandes, Clinton (2018). Island off the coast of Asia : instruments of statecraft in Australian foreign policy. Monash University Publishing. pp. 12–16. ISBN   9781925523799.
  27. ↑ Goers, Peter (19 January 2019). "South Australia founder George Fife Angas and his dark links to slavery". The Advertiser . Retrieved 1 April 2019.
  28. ↑ Daley, Paul (21 September 2018). "Colonial Australia's foundation is stained with the profits of British slavery". The Guardian . Retrieved 1 April 2019.
  29. ↑ Kemp, Miles. (April 2019) "How SA Would Sound Without Our Famous Slavers," The Advertiser (Adelaide)
  30. ↑ Daley, Paul (16 February 2019). "Decolonising the dictionary: reclaiming history for the forgotten - Paul Daley". The Guardian .
  31. ↑ Olusoga, David (11 July 2015). "The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed". The Guardian .
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