Slave Trade and Slavery

Remembering Slavery Slave trade, slavery and abolition: the north east of England connections By John Charlton 2. Introduction It is two hundred years since Parliament ended British involvement in the slave trade. As part of the national commemoration of this important moment in history, a group of local archives and libraries in the north east established a project to search their collections for material connected to the slave trade, slavery and the movements for abolition. The Remembering Slavery 2007 Archive Mapping and Research Project led by the Literary & Philosophical Society (Lit & Phil) appointed Sean Creighton as Project Officer. Sean assembled a group of volunteers to search the collections. This brief guide indicates the areas covered and summarises the fully referenced guide or resource pack which will be lodged at the four participating institutions. In addition to this, Hidden Chains: the Slavery Business and North East England by John Charlton will be published by Tyne Bridge Publishing in Autumn 2008 ISBN 9781857951233; for further details, see www.tynebridgepublishing.co.uk. See www.rememberingslavery.com for more information about the Remembering Slavery project. Plan of accommodation for enslaved Africans on board the slave ship ‘Brooks’. © Tyne & Wear Archives Service 4. NEWCASTLE LITERARY NORTHUMBERLAND & PHILOSOPHICAL COLLECTIONS SERVICE SOCIETY Its library has a substantial Northumberland Collections amount of original and Service at the Woodhorn secondary material relevant Museum near Ashington, to slavery and abolition. For contains archive material an annual subscription fee, relating to the former and members of the library are able current Northumberland to borrow books and consult County areas. The Service items that are not available for has a sub-Record Office at loan. Special arrangements can Berwick. It has many items be made with the Librarian for of relevance including family researchers. papers, solicitors’ papers and the Newcastle Society of Further information about Antiquaries papers. The Service, the library, its opening times its opening times and conditions and conditions of use and its of use and its searchable web searchable web catalogue can catalogue can be seen on: be seen on: www.litandphil.org. www.northumberland.gov. uk/html_pages/LP_home.html uk/catalogue/. Newcastle Literary & Northumberland Museum, Philosophical Society Archives & Country Park 23 Westgate Rd, Newcastle QEII Country Park, Ashington, upon Tyne, NE1 1SE Northumberland, NE63 9YE E: [email protected] E: [email protected] T: 0191 232 0192 T: 01670 528038 www.litandphil.org.uk www.experiencewoodhorn.com www.northumberland.gov. uk/collections Remembering Slavery 5. ROBINSON LIBRARY TYNE & WEAR SPECIAL COLLECTIONS ARCHIVES Robinson Library at Newcastle Tyne & Wear Archives Service University has a large number has a range of relevant material, of secondary books and journals in its library of books and dealing with slavery and pamphlets, its microfilmed abolition issues. The Library’s records, family papers, papers Special Collections contain relating to the Non-Conformist a wealth of relevant books, religious groups and missionary pamphlets and other material. societies and a wide range of shipping records. Further Further information about the information about the Archives, Library, its opening times and its opening times and conditions conditions of use can be seen of use and its searchable web on: www.ncl.ac.uk/library/ catalogue can be seen on: specialcollections/. Its searchable www.tyneandweararchives.org. web catalogue can be accessed uk/. by clicking on the Library catalogue on: www.ncl.ac.uk/ library/. Special Collections, Robinson Tyne & Wear Archives Service Library, University of Newcastle Blandford House, Blandford Back Jesmond Rd West, Square, Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne, NE2 4HQ NE1 4JA. E: [email protected] E: [email protected] T: 0191 222 5146 T: 0191 277 2248 www.ncl.ac.uk/library/ www.tyneandweararchives.org.uk 6. Part 1: Slave trade and slavery Think slavery and the None have mentioned slave trade. Think Bristol, connections with the Liverpool, Glasgow. That abominable trade, the plantation was the starting point for economies of the New World, Remembering Slavery or their produce. 2007. The team of volunteers What about the north east of assembled last autumn by England? It faces east across the Sean Creighton joined the North Sea to Scandinavia and Remembering Slavery Archive the Baltic. It was a coal based Mapping and Research Project economy. Coal and ships. The with modest expectations. main ports of call for centuries Those expectations have been were London, Riga, Hamburg, confounded by the abundance Rotterdam, Le Havre. Coal out. of evidence turned up by Timber in. Simple. Simplified, of the archive search. Only the course. Many histories of the collections of the four project region have been written since partners have been rigorously the first accounts in the 18th searched. Two other large century. Fleshed out and rich in collections, Durham County detail, the stories have been told. Record Office and Durham Few have mentioned connection University’s Special Collections, with places further afield except have only had their catalogues as brief notes. scanned. Remembering Slavery 7. Big local studies collections in Newcastle, North Shields, Gateshead, South Shields, Sunderland, Carlisle and the whole of Teesside and North Yorkshire have hardly been touched. Close investigation of these would enormously augment the amount of material found. The volume of material already available suggests at least the possibility of a reassessment of the north east’s place in the Coal from local pits was shipped out emerging capitalist economy to the Caribbean islands. © Tyne and Wear Museums of the 17th to the early 19th centuries. Its relationship to the Atlantic world is the important part of that reassessment. This does not mean downgrading the well attested predominance of the links with the Baltic and northern Europe, but it does mean seeing these spheres as complementary. 8. Part 1: Slave trade and slavery A Sunderland connection Contact with the New links with the Caribbean. World came in many Anthony Hylton acquired a forms not necessarily tobacco plantation, was connected with slavery, at appointed Governor of St Kitts & least in the first instance. Nevis in 1625 and later became a One of the first with north east tobacco merchant selling on the connections was William Hylton London market. Hylton of the Sunderland family with descendants settled in Maryland, ancient roots. Through an Carolina and Jamaica before association with Sir Edwin 1700. Like many of the first Sandys, a counsellor of James I, settlers, involvement in the slave he went to New England in 1621 trade and slavery grew out of as part of a rescue mission for acute labour shortages in their the Mayflower settlers. William new lands. Members of several was said to be the first settler in other north east families were what was to become New early arrivals in America and the Hampshire. A number of County Caribbean, among them the Durham place names in the area Pinckneys of West Auckland, the he settled suggest there may Howards of Brampton, the have been more north easterners Colvilles of Newcastle and attracted to that area. A relative, branches of the Northumbrian Anthony Hylton of South Shields, Fenwicks, Ogles and Ordes. a master mariner, followed in In the eighteenth century 1623, taking settlers to migration from the north east Jamestown, Virginia. The Hyltons accelerated as opportunities were sea farers who also forged in the New World increased. Remembering Slavery 9. ‘ Like many of the first settlers, involvement in the slave trade and slavery grew out of acute labour shortages in their new lands.’ Members of reasonably well married a Carolina woman. to do families could launch Additionally the poorer sorts into business as planters and could accept indenture, like merchants. Edward Cook, of William Moraley, the watch farming stock from Togston, maker, of Newcastle, with near Alnwick, fulfilled both the hope of opportunity after roles in Baltimore, Maryland serving their time. Many who from the 1760s as had George had fallen foul of the law might Marr, a leather merchant from be transported as a welcome Morpeth in the 1720s. Military alternative to death on or naval activity was another the gallows. route to the colonies. From the Cromwellian period onwards Britain was serially at war for control of the Atlantic. Soldiers could play two roles apart from fighting. They could send regular news bulletins home, as did Lord Percy during the War of American Independence, perhaps advertising the advantages of colonial life. They could seek land grants on retirement from the service Cowrie shell snuff box. Cowrie shells were like John Ogle of Eglingham, used as a form of currency when trading Northumberland, or William for enslaved Africans. Hedley of Rothbury, who © Tyne and Wear Museums. 10. Part 1: Slave trade and slavery Gentry capitalists During the eighteenth century many of the region’s gentry acquired or increased colonial interests. Among the most significant were the Trevelyans of Wallington, Northumberland and Nettlecombe in Somerset. Beginning with a fortunate marriage in 1757, by the time of abolition of slavery in 1833 the family had become major sugar producers in Grenada making a substantial claim for loss of slaves under compensation under Parliament’s compensation

Load more