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What is the real significance of the 1807 Act which introduced legal abolition of the slave trade in the British Empire? Read on!
The 1807 Adaptation:
how Britain benefited from
the abolition of the slave trade
You are invited to contribute to a Community Support project which will aim to explain:
· Why London expanded so spectacularly in the 1800s.
· How racism came to Lambeth.
· The origins of globalisation and the importance of the Corporation of London.
Issues
· Early British slave traders and investors: John Hawkins, Francis Drake, Elizabeth Tudor.
· How Britain seized control of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
· Potosí, Jamaica and Canton - tea with sugar for all.
· Westminster Bridge Theory.
· Lambeth Palace and the role of the established church.
· The birth of the USA and William Bligh.
· Williams Theory.
· The role of Black campaigners and organisers, both in London and on plantations, in securing legal abolition.
· Kew Gardens: breadfruit, rubber and cinchona.
· How Europe came to dominate Indonesia, the Americas, Australia, India, China and Africa.
· Social Darwinism and the origins of whiteness.
Places to visit in London
· National Maritime Museum: Trade and Empire exhibit, room 14.
· Museum in Docklands.
· Memorial to William Beckford, planter and Lord Mayor, in the Guildhall.
Resources
· The slave trade, by Hugh Thomas.
· Capitalism and slavery, by Eric Williams.
· An interesting life, by Olaudah Equiano.
· London slavery resource guide, by Nigel Pocock.
· London: metropolis of the slave trade, by James A.Rawley.
· How Europe underdeveloped Africa, by Walter Rodney.
· The scramble for Africa, by Thomas Pakenham.
· Port Cities site Port Cities Click on ‘Trade’ at left of screen.
Another anniversary in 2007: Four hundred years in Turtle Island
Europeans began the invasion of the Americas in 1492, but the key date which explains why English is spoken in North America, and why most people there have English names is 1607 - the date when three ships arrived from London to found the Virginia Colony.
In 1619 the colonists bought their first batch of enslaved Africans. Tobacco became a valuable import for England and later Scotland. The success of the Virginia colony inspired the Mayflower voyage which led to the birth of the Northern Colonies.
John Tradescant the Younger made three trips to Virginia. The Tradescants were early bio-pirates, before the founding of Kew Gardens. Their collection, which became the basis of the Ashmolean Museum, also included Powhatan’s Mantle.
Latest version: 20 Mar 2006.
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