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Slavery
and the slave trade contains material from the papers of a Somerset
family who owned plantations in the West Indies. There are statistics of
the numbers of slaves in Jamaica in 1734, 1740 and 1745 and of the
numbers of Jamaican slaves imported and exported annually 1702-1753. There are statistics for the number of slaves purchased for one
plantation in Antigua 1752-1767 and the number of slave births and
deaths on that plantation 1773-1775
Attitudes
in the abolition debate includes a slave owner's proposals for the
betterment of the slaves' conditions in 1791, letters and a petition
from the slave owners concerning William Wilberforce's attempt to
abolish the slave trade 1793-1794 and a
petition
to Parliament from the inhabitants of Watchet against the trade
1814. More unusually, there are three documents relating to "the free
people of colour" in Jamaica in 1792
The Royal Navy and the
suppression of the clandestine slave trade
includes an extract from a letter on the strategic value of the island
of St Thomas where slaves rescued from slaving ships could be settled
1822, an order to destroy the store houses of slave traders on the river
Congo with a report by the naval officer in charge of the expedition
1842,
a report on the seizure of a slaving ship 1843 and extracts from a
ship's log 1849 concerning the capture of an American brig with 801
slaves on board |
