Places in the City of London Connected to the Slave Trade

In the 17th century the Jamaica Wine House, located in St Michael's Alley in the City of London, was called the Jamaica Coffee House. In this scene we see why there was such demand for two of slavery’s principal products - sugar and coffee. 


 

William Courteen, who was a City merchant, financed the initial settlement of Barbados. 80 of his employees settled the island in 1627 with a view to growing cash crops, principally tobacco. They brought with them 10 enslaved Africans and used indigenous labour to cultivate and harvest the crops. Later, in the 1640s, an employee of Courteen’s, James Drax, is said to have been the first in the English Caribbean to develop the sugar plantation system, knowledge of which he obtained from the Dutch in Brazil who, in turn obtained it from the Portuguese.

A court case concerning the legitimacy of an insurance claim filed by the Liverpool-based Gregson slave trading syndicate.  A claim had been filed for the ‘loss’ of 133 enslaved Africans who had been thrown off the Zong slave ship into the ocean on  the orders of Captain Luke Collingwood. This was on the basis that there was allegedly not enough water to support the lives of the crew and remaining  slaves on board, and under the principle of ‘jettison’ this was supported by maritime law of the time. 

The ship had been filled with more enslaved Africans than it could safely carry - a total of 442. The voyage from Cape Coast Castle (in modern day Ghana) to Jamaica took much longer than expected due to navigational errors. The first trial, which was heard in Guildhall by Lord Chief Justice William Mansfield, found in favour of the shipowner with insurers being ordered to pay. This was appealed and a second court case was held before the Court of King’s Bench in Westminster Hall on 21-22 May 1783. 

Further evidence had by now come forward from the Zong’s First Mate, James Kelsall, that there was adequate water on board the ship at the time of the drownings. The court this time found in favour of the insurers due to errors made by the ship’s crew and captain. Following the proceedings, was a formerly enslaved African man, Olaudah Equiano who sensed the injustice of the matter in that the case was heard not as one of mass murder but of business and insurance.

He took the news to his friend Granville Sharp, a prominent abolitionist who attempted to bring a case against the ship’s personnel for mass murder, but this ultimately failed. The sense of injustice over the trial is said to have provoked public outrage and furthered the abolitionist cause. 

Where, in a small printing shop, the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade was established in 1787. 

In 1787 a group of 12 men, 9 Quakers and 3 Evangelical Anglicans met in a small printing shop at 2, George Yard and formed the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Among their ranks was William Wilberforce, who would become the parliamentary representative for the movement. 

From 1789 onwards he would introduce regular motions into parliament for the abolition of the British slave trade. Thomas Clarkson, whose main contribution as one of the co-founders of the London Committee for the Abolition of Slavery, came in the form of the extensive research he carried out for the campaign. He also argued that an alternative trade with Africa could be had, other than that in human beings. From 1765 Granville Sharp devoted himself to defending the rights of Africans in Britain who were faced with the threat of deportation to the colonies.

A debate was held here which called for the abolition of West Indian sugar, in favour of East Indian sugar which was associated with free labour. This debate was led by women and the motion passed with a unanimous vote of 600. This was a powerful moment in the abolition campaign, as women were by and large the principle buyers of household groceries, so they could bring real pressure to bear on the West Indian slave owners. 

In 1780, the slave trader turned clergyman John Newton becomes the rector of this church. Newton entered the slave trade in his early 20s as a crew member on the Pegasus, a slave ship. However, he was unpopular with his crew and was abandoned, ending up as the servant of the wife of a slave trader - Princess Peye of the Sherbro people (modern day Sierra Leone). During this time, he was brutally treated but was eventually rescued by a friend of his father and went on to become the Captain of his own Slave Ship.

However, later in life, Newton expressed deep regret about his involvement in the slave trade and became an active supporter of the abolition campaign, producing his own tract - Thoughts upon the African Slave Trade - in 1787 to bring to light the horror of the trade.
He produced a series of hymns whilst a clergyman including, in 1779, ‘Amazing Grace’ which was about his salvation at sea and also, it is said, his repentance over slavery.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu unveiled this poignant sculpture commemorating the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade on 4 September 2008. The granite sculpture consists of a number of columns surrounding a podium, which symbolises either a church pulpit or a slave auctioneer’s platform. The columns conjure the image of stems of sugar cane and the way they have been positioned simulates a crowd that has perhaps congregated to listen to a priest or engage in the buying of enslaved Africans at an auction.

Calls have been made by a group called Memorial 2007 for a national memorial dedicated to the millions of African victims of slavery to be erected in Hyde Park, which were renewed in light of the murder of George Floyd and resultant Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.