A new Register of British Slave Traders identifies as many as 10,500 investors in Britain’s near-250-year transatlantic slave trade, from the first traffickers in the 1560s until abolition of the trade in 1807. British trafficking operations transported more than 3 million enslaved African men, women and children to plantations in the Americas and Caribbean.
Led by Professor William Pettigrew of King’s College London, the three-year project uses company records, certificates, wills and biographical material to build what its historians describe as the most comprehensive single picture so far of the people who participated in the trade.
A trade backed by the state and elites
The register documents the involvement of British monarchs, parliament, financial and business elites, and the church. King James II and Prince Rupert of the Rhine led the Royal African Company, which held a monopoly enforced with the Royal Navy, military and state legal power. The company transported at least 150,000 captive African men, women and children across the Atlantic.
After parliament approved full deregulation in 1712, independent traders could expand their operations. A 1750 act described the trade as advantageous and necessary for supplying plantations and colonies, and opened it to all the king’s subjects who joined the relevant company. Read the context: Dutch Government Approves Trade Ban on Goods from Israeli Settlements in Occupied Territories.
Key points
- More than 100 MPs were investors in slave-trading companies, including members of the Tory and Whig parties.
- Dozens of directors and original financiers of the Bank of England invested in the slave trade.
- More than 1,000 women invested in slave-trading companies.
- Forty-five Church of England clergymen invested in the Royal African Company.
Names, cities and financial connections
The register includes figures such as George Frideric Handel and John Locke, who held shares in the Royal African Company, and Edward Colston, an investor, company assistant and Tory MP for Bristol. It also records the involvement of more than 1,000 women, whose participation is often less visible in accounts of the trade.
Bristol, Lancaster and Liverpool became major centres of trafficking. The research identifies 51 Liverpool mayors who were traffickers and records individual operations including William Earle’s participation in 117 voyages carrying an estimated 36,565 captive African people, and Arthur Heywood’s involvement in 80 voyages carrying an estimated 21,648 people. Heywood’s bank later became linked to Barclays through takeovers.
The unresolved legacy
The research traces how wealth from enslavement helped fund hospitals, schools, welfare organisations, arts, science and culture. It also links the trade to British manufacturing during the Industrial Revolution, including goods exported from England to west Africa in exchange for enslaved people.
Parliament abolished enslavement in 1833 and paid £20m in compensation to enslavers for the loss of their human property; no compensation was paid to enslaved people. The historical record has since become part of calls for Britain and other European governments to acknowledge their role, apologise formally and discuss reparatory justice.
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