London, Sugar & Slavery
Revealing our city’s untold history, a short walk that shows some of the city of London’s connections to transatlantic enslavement. Produced by Museum in Docklands 1. The Museum Of London Bank Station Take the DLR to West India Quay 200 ft 50m
ST MARTIN’S LE GRAND GRESHAM ST GRESHAM
LONDON WALL
GUILDHALL GRESHAM ST GRESHAM YARD
9. Bank Of England 2. Guildhall The Bank of England was set up The Guildhall is the headquarters
in 1694, to centralise and create of the Corporation of London, a viable financial system for LOTHBURY BANK the body which governs the City of
England’s expanding transatlantic London. During the 18th and DLR CORNHILL economy. As a result it was early-19th centuries shareholders instrumental in the funding of in the Royal African Company plantation slavery, the slave included many of the city hierarchy. THROGMORTON ST trade and financing the British in Sir William Beckford, who was European wars for dominance Lord Mayor twice, owned slave in the Caribbean. plantations in Jamaica. There is a THREADNEEDLE ST statue of him in the Guildhall.
ROYAL EXCHANGE BULIDINGS OLD BROAD ST
ST MICHAEL’S CORNHILL ALLEY
BISHOPSGATE LEADENHALL ST LEADENHALL
FENCHURCH 8. Royal Exchange LIME ST The Royal Exchange was the AVE 3. South Sea House building in which London’s South Sea House was the
merchant met to transact ST BILLITER headquarters of the South Sea business. The building played a Company. The company is mainly vital role in London’s slave and associated with the ‘South Sea West India trading activities. It Bubble’. This was probably provided a focus not only for the the first major financial scam. trading of commodities, but also Despite this the South Sea for finding shippers, insurance Company played an important underwriters, financiers etc. part in London’s role as a slave trading port. Between 1713-1736 the company dispatched 115 slave trading ships to the West Coast of Africa.
7. Jamaica Coffee House, 6. East India Company, East 5. Lloyd’s of London, 4. Royal African Company, Number 12, St Michael’s Alley India House, Leadenhall Street Royal Exchange Africa House, 44-46 The Jamaica coffee house was This is the site of East India The organisation of a business Leadenhall Street established on the site of London’s House, the headquarters of the in insuring ships evolved from This site in Leadenhall Street was first coffee house. It was used as a East India Company. The company Edward Lloyd’s Coffee House in the headquarters of the Royal meeting place for slave traders and was set up in 1600, to trade Lombard Street in 1688. African Company. The company West India merchants. It was also with the Indian subcontinent. The coffee house was used by was granted a monopoly over the used as a venue for advertising The company traded in slaves many different people, including slave trade on the west coast of the sale of enslaved persons through the island of Madagascar. marine underwriters, who would Africa by the crown. Under the and rewards for the recapture of Furthermore many of the goods insure all manner of ships, Royal African Company, London’s people who had run-away. used in the slave trade in Africa including those engaged in the slave trading activities escalated came from India. slave and West India trades. to industrial proportions and enormous profits were made by those involved. London, Sugar & Slavery
Revealing our city’s untold history, a short walk that shows the West India Docks connections to transatlantic enslavement. Produced by Museum in Docklands
1. West India Dock 2. Hibbert Gate, 3. Building Plaque, The dock basins and warehouses West India Docks West India Dock of the West India Docks were This site is a replica of the gate This is the huge foundation opened in 1802. The dock was of the West India Dock, which stone of the West India Dock. built to secure the profits from opened in 1802. Above the gate The dock was built as a result slave plantations in the Caribbean. is a model of the Hibberts, a ship of a campaign initiated by It was the first enclosed dock built which traded from this dock, London’s Committee of West India on the Thames for the purpose mainly to Jamaica. The Hibberts Merchants and Planters - which of cargo handling. The docks was named after the slave included many of London’s slave were the physical manifestation owner George Hibbert, traders and others profiting of London’s corner o the Triangle who was instrumental in the from slavery. trade. The Dock was used by development of the dock. at least 22 know slave trading vessels between 1802 and 1807.
LIMEHOUSE LINK W INDIA DOCK RD
HERTSMERE RD
W INDIA DOCK RD CASTOR LN
ASPEN WAY HERTSMERE RD DLR
BILLINGSGATE RD POPLAR
ONTARIO WAY HERTSMERE RD
DLR WEST INDIA QUAY
200 ft 50m
W INDIA AVE CABOT SQ
N COLONNADE
CANADA SQ
S COLONNADE
CANADA SQ
4. Statue of Robert Milligan, 5. Museum In Docklands West India merchant This site is the Museum in and Chairman of the Docklands. The museum is West India Docks. situated within Warehouse No. 1, one of two surviving warehouses of Robert Milligan (c1746–1809) the West India Dock, which opened was the son of a plantation owning in 1802. Originally nine Georgian family in the Caribbean. He was a warehouses were erected on the member of the Committee of West North Quay by the West India Dock India Merchants and Planters. Company to store sugar. The Committee raised the capital that funded the building of the West India Docks.