History
Slaves? Birmingham?
How Odd. In a city that screams of ethnicity, with so many races and faiths...Slaves really?
Well...it's true! Birmingham was one of the Slaves Markets of the World.
While I was talking with the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery curator, she told me a lot of interesting things and darker that Birmingham History contains. (wait for the Next posts!).
Birmingham was the Revolutionary city of the World, where the Modern age Industry began. The Industrial Revolution started here and then spread to the rest of the world.
But It appears Birmingham's industrial sector also made huge profits from the slave trade.
Professor David Dabydeen of Warwick University says: "Birmingham was the main supplier of iron and ironware to Africa... padlocks, irons, chains and muzzles - all the instruments to police the slave trade. Of course that made an enormous amount of money."
From the 1760s onwards, there was also a large trade in weapons, with 150,000 guns made in Birmingham and believed to have been sold to West African rulers.
Guns were exchanged for enslaved Africans and it was a common saying that the price of a slave was one Birmingham gun.
"Birmingham armed the slave trade," adds Professor Dabydeen.
It now appears though that even some of the key figures instrumental in bringing about the end of slavery may have had blood on their own hands.
The Lunar Society, which met regularly in Birmingham, is known for its role in the abolitionist movement.
Among the group of influential industrialists and thinkers were prominent abolitionists including Thomas Day and Josiah Wedgwood.
But the stance of other members of the group is less clear-cut, clearly because some of the were in favor of Slavery.
In the Abolition process, we found supports from the Lunar Society and also the "Female Society for Birmingham", and Joseph Sturge.
Joseph Sturge was an activist and abolitionist, that founded the Anti-Slavery society in 1831. He was a "pacific" fighter and helped in the law of the slave emancipation.
Birmingham's Connecting Histories Project has unearthed a pro-slavery petition which was delivered to the Houses of Parliament in 1789.
The registry of that petition belong to the Women in Birmingham Society and the Lunar Society.
Slaves? Birmingham?
How Odd. In a city that screams of ethnicity, with so many races and faiths...Slaves really?
Well...it's true! Birmingham was one of the Slaves Markets of the World.
While I was talking with the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery curator, she told me a lot of interesting things and darker that Birmingham History contains. (wait for the Next posts!).
Birmingham was the Revolutionary city of the World, where the Modern age Industry began. The Industrial Revolution started here and then spread to the rest of the world.
But It appears Birmingham's industrial sector also made huge profits from the slave trade.
Professor David Dabydeen of Warwick University says: "Birmingham was the main supplier of iron and ironware to Africa... padlocks, irons, chains and muzzles - all the instruments to police the slave trade. Of course that made an enormous amount of money."
From the 1760s onwards, there was also a large trade in weapons, with 150,000 guns made in Birmingham and believed to have been sold to West African rulers.
Guns were exchanged for enslaved Africans and it was a common saying that the price of a slave was one Birmingham gun.
"Birmingham armed the slave trade," adds Professor Dabydeen.
It now appears though that even some of the key figures instrumental in bringing about the end of slavery may have had blood on their own hands.
The Lunar Society, which met regularly in Birmingham, is known for its role in the abolitionist movement.
Among the group of influential industrialists and thinkers were prominent abolitionists including Thomas Day and Josiah Wedgwood.
But the stance of other members of the group is less clear-cut, clearly because some of the were in favor of Slavery.
In the Abolition process, we found supports from the Lunar Society and also the "Female Society for Birmingham", and Joseph Sturge.
Joseph Sturge was an activist and abolitionist, that founded the Anti-Slavery society in 1831. He was a "pacific" fighter and helped in the law of the slave emancipation.
Birmingham's Connecting Histories Project has unearthed a pro-slavery petition which was delivered to the Houses of Parliament in 1789.
The registry of that petition belong to the Women in Birmingham Society and the Lunar Society.
I am learning new things...Lunar Society? (wait for the next posts).
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