Voices from the Past: Slavery and Politics in the British Empire 1600-1850

• Arrival of Slaves in America: In 1619, approximately 30 African people from the Kingdom of Ndongo in Angola were traded by British colonizers in Virginia, marking the beginning of chattel slavery in America.

• British Colonization and Slave Labor: British traders profited greatly from the labor of African slaves, particularly in colonies like Barbados and Jamaica, where sugar and tobacco were primary exports.

• Abolition of Slavery: William Wilberforce and the Clatham Sect influenced the British parliament to abolish slavery in 1833, despite opposition from those benefiting from the slave trade.

• Olaudah Equiano's Influence: Olaudah Equiano, an African man who wrote an autobiography about his life as a slave, played a significant role in the abolitionist movement in Britain.

This paper argues for more inclusion of African voices and experiences in the story of the transatlantic British slave trade in the 17th and 18th centuries.  Slaves arrived in North American in 1619, aboard the White Lion, a pirate ship that landed at Point Comfort in modern day Hampton, Virginia. Needing to trade something for supplies, they offloaded approximately 30 African people to English colonizers there.  While British people did not invent slavery, their efforts amplified the slave trade and left a dark legacy across the Caribbean and North America that we still live with today. 

The people sold into bondage that day in 1619 were from West Central Africa, from the Kingdom of Ndongo in Angola, a mature and sophisticated society that had a population of 20-30,000 people. These individuals likely were farmers, harvesters, and iron workers in their native land, which was ravaged by the nearby Kingdom of Rwanda, and they were captured by warriors in 1618 and sold to Spanish merchants.  Approximately three hundred Ndonga people were loaded onto a ship named the San Juan Baptista, which was subsequently captured by the White Lion and her British crew off the coast of Mexico.  After realizing it was not a Spanish galleon, the pirates took approximately sixty enslaved people from the Spanish in lieu of gold, with the intention of trading thirty of them in Virginia for enough supplies to return to Britain.  The trading of these men, women, and children would set the stage for chattel slavery in America in the 17th century.  Once in Virginia, these slaves set about farming and exporting tobacco.  By detailing their experience, we shine a light on the people involved and add texture to our historical analysis.

Sugar and tobacco were the two primary exports from the Americas, and British traders were very eager to profit from it.  South of the Virginia colony and into the Gulf of Mexico, Britain was busy colonizing other places too, including Jamaica, Providence Island, and Barbados.  From 1640 to 1660 English planters spent a million pounds on African slaves, and by 1680 there were 38,000 slaves on Barbados.  Amidst this activity, Britain became a leading exporter of sugar in the late 17th century using the labor of African slaves. 

To cultivate and harvest sugarcane required enormous amounts of heavy labor in the hot sun.  Slaves on Barbados experienced a mortality rate of 3-5% and contended with brutal conditions in Barbados as slaveowners adopted a “siege mentality.” In Jamaica, one slaveowner, Simon Taylor, became fabulously wealthy off the labor of slaves.  By 1792, “Taylor became one of the biggest slaveholders in the Caribbean. His Jamaican properties eventually had a combined workforce of more than 2,000 slaves – men, women, and children," and eventually earned an income of 50,000£. Men like Taylor were angry and upset as parliament moved to abolish slavery in the late 18th century, offering insight into their mindset regarding human bondage.

It was William Wilberforce in Britain, a wealthy Londoner who headed up the Clatham Sect that influenced parliament to abolish slavery in the British empire.  Fighting people including sugar and religious interests, and delayed by the French Revolution, Wilberforce and the Clatham Sect persuaded parliament to finally abolish slavery across the British empire in 1833. But the 18th century saw England engaged in empire building in India and Southeast Asia, and with it a form of “wage slavery” that persisted throughout the empire going into the 20th century. 

During this parliamentary process of abolishing slavery, a figure named Olaudah Equiano rose to popularity with the English public.  This young African man wrote an autobiography describing his life as a slave and his adventures onboard ships, where he saved enough money to earn his manumission.  By 1789, during the parliamentary activity surrounding abolition, Equiano had settled in London, and “the Interesting Narrative, the biography [he wrote], was a key element in that great surge of abolitionist activity of that year.” Equiano died in 1796, after a long-running speaking tour and marrying, and even though his fame faded over time, it’s critical that historians illuminate stories like Equiano’s so that individual voices can be heard and to add texture and context to their analysis.