Wales and Slavery-2007

A Wales Office Publication Wales and SLAVERY Marking 200 years since the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act Foreword The Slave Compensation Commission here can be few episodes in the history of the world that Thave been more shameful or inhuman than the The Wales Office has its own direct historic link with the abolition transatlantic slave trade. of the slave trade. Gwydyr House – home to the Wales Office in Whitehall, London Wales was part of this: Welsh men and women made large – was used to accommodate the Slave Compensation Commission profits from slavery. Equally people from Wales fought hard for for part of its life in the 19th Century. its abolition, with 1807 marking the beginning of the long road to the eventual abolition of slavery within the former British The Commission was one of the more controversial outcomes Empire by 1833. of the abolition of slavery. It was established in 1833 following the decision by the British Government to set aside £20 million Today, it is difficult to understand how this appalling crime to compensate planters, slave traders and slave owners for the against humanity - fuelled by racism and greed - was ever abolition. Today that figure would equate to £2billion. Nothing acceptable, let alone legal. But what is even harder to was ever awarded to a former slave. comprehend is that, although slavery was finally legally abolished after a long struggle in the Americas in 1888, it still continues in practice today. Over 20 million people across the world are estimated still to be suffering in the miserable daily reality of slavery and servitude. Modern day slavery – including human trafficking, enforced prostitution and bonded labour – remains a lucrative industry, generating an estimated £24.6 billion in profits every year. So the international battle against slavery must continue. Just as people in Wales joined the campaign against apartheid in South Africa – and were thanked for doing so by Nelson Mandela when he received the honorary freedom of the City of Cardiff in 1998, so we must expose and fight all such oppression Gwydyr House, London today and in future. This bicentenary provides our nation with the opportunity for The Wales Office would like to thank: National Museum Wales, a salutary visit back to acknowledge our debt to those who The National Trust, Swansea University, Bangor University, the Paul Robeson Wales Trust and Hywel Francis MP for their help in suffered and died as a result of this vile trade in Wales, and producing this booklet. those of different races, faiths, and classes who fought for its abolition. For further information on the “Everywhere in Chains...”: Wales and Slavery exhibition being shown at the National Waterfront It reminds us to redouble our efforts to combat racism and Museum, Swansea from May 07 go to: www.museumwales.ac.uk to assert our insistence that every human being is equal, regardless of race, gender, sexuality, age or disability. For further information on events being arranged by the National Trust to mark the bicentenary please go to: As we reflect on the achievements of the abolitionists, we www.nationaltrust.org.uk should also recognise the contributions of Black African, For further information on Paul Robeson Wales Trust events go to: Caribbean and other minority ethnic communities in making www.croesoproject.org Wales the modern, vibrant, richly multi-racial, multi-cultural and multi-faith country it is today. For further copies of this booklet please email: [email protected] The most fitting way to mark this 200th anniversary and pay tribute to the struggles of the abolitionists – both black and Or write to: white – is to celebrate our diversity in Wales and increase our Slavery and Wales booklet determination to tackle global injustice and poverty across Wales Office the world. Gwydyr House Whitehall Peter Hain MP London SW1A 2ER Secretary of State for Wales March 2007 To tell us what you are doing to commemorate the bicentenary please email: [email protected] Cover image: ‘The Negro Coach Boy portrait’ hanging at Erddig Hall, Wrexham Wales and the Slave Trade t was at the end of the fourteenth century when the first in history. The record of Wales – and of Britain generally – in IWest Africans were forcibly seized from their home villages, its links with the slave trade is hardly a proud one. On the chained up in the bowels of stinking ships, and transported contrary, a great many Welshmen prospered from slavery across the sea to be sold into lives of slavery. and much of the wealth of Wales at that time was based on the trade. For generation after generation afterwards, millions of Africans followed this grim route, clamped with leg irons and traded like However, many prominent Welshmen and women supported pieces of personal property right across the world, to toil for the 1807 Bill to abolish British involvement with the trade and their mostly white masters. In total, some twelve million were many joined the campaign for the abolition of slavery transported - and some three million died during passage. in America. Those who survived were bought and sold by families, by It seems extraordinary today, to consider how many Welsh employers, by rich individuals. They were forced to endure people benefited – directly or indirectly – from the slave trade. lifelong violence and racist abuse, treated as a subhuman They included Welshmen who owned plantations and slaves species. When they were sold on, slaves became the literal abroad; Welsh captains and seamen serving on ships that property of their owners, living in squalid conditions as transported slaves; ship builders and their workmen, making servants, gardeners, plantation workers, chattels, often raped or ships used in the trade; people living in stately homes financed beaten. by the slave trade; labourers in industries financed by money The transatlantic slave trade followed a triangular route. from the slave trade; and crafts people making trinkets and Traders set out from European ports towards the West African other goods to be sold in exchange for slaves. coast. There they bought people in exchange for goods – It could be argued that the Welsh and, more generally, British including copper bracelets produced in Swansea’s many copper involvement in this shameful trade helped to fuel the industrial works – and loaded them onto the slave ships. After a voyage of revolution. With the money that was being made through some six to eight weeks, they arrived in the Americas and those slavery, they were able to develop new machinery and build new Africans who had survived the journey were offloaded for sale. factories and, with the vast plantations owned by Welsh people, The ships then returned to Europe with sugar, coffee, tobacco, they also had access to a cheap source of raw materials such as rice and cotton, the products of the slaves’ harsh labour. sugar and cotton. Britain was right at the centre of this trade – one of the most Many people, however, thinking about links between Wales shameful acts of exploitation and oppression in the history and slavery, would look no deeper than pondering on how of humankind. British industry and ports were intimately many African American families have surnames considered intertwined in it and enormous wealth generated from it. traditionally Welsh. Yet, to our eventual credit, the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act Some argue that the reason for this is their slave ancestors of 1807, famously championed by William Wilberforce, made took the name of their slave owner. No doubt this would be Britain the first country in the world to abolish the whole so in some cases. However, it may well be that many names barbarous business. came about by converting Christian names of John, William and David to Jones, Williams and Davies or Davis, for example. 2007 marks the bicentenary of Parliament’s abolition of Others could have taken their surnames from Welsh preachers the slave trade. It meant that it was illegal to trade in slaves and others after Welsh people who helped them escape from throughout the British Empire and banned British ships being slavery, sometimes providing a ‘safe house’ as they made involved in the trade. their getaway. Two hundred years on, the transporting of slaves across the What is certain is that the names of some plantations in the Atlantic still stands as one of the most inhuman enterprises Caribbean were linked to Welsh owners, such as Llandovery and Cardiff Hall in Jamaica. And some slaves were even named Captured slaves aboard a ship Captured Slaves Penrhyn Castle ...the names of some ‘ plantations in the Caribbean were linked to Welsh owners... Poster promoting a thanksgiving service in Carmarthen ’ after places in Wales – a plantation owner in Jamaica had slaves opposed a measure which would have reduced the number of he called Monmouth, Pembroke, Newport and Cardiff. slaves allowed on board a ship. This arose partly for geographical reasons, as the three main Richard Pennant inherited not only the plantations in Jamaica British ports in those days were convenient for Welsh captains but also Penrhyn Castle near Bangor, where paintings included and seamen – London, where many Welsh people lived, and idyllic plantations – far removed from the harsh misery of the Bristol and Liverpool, with their close proximity to south and slaves’ lives. Penrhyn Castle is now owned by the National Trust north Wales. and is a popular tourist attraction for people visiting North Wales. Further proof of the wealth created in North Wales The slave ships returning to Britain carrying goods, such as by the slave trade can be seen in Chirk Castle. Leg irons on sugar, cotton and tobacco, landed at Welsh ports as well as the show at the castle are a weighty reminder of the source of the main English ones, bringing trade to Holyhead for example.

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