Slavery and the Railways, Part 1: Acknowledging the Past

1. Oh dear;
   Correction:
   “Back in 1833, the UK government partiallycompletely abolished slavery” … outside the UK.
   Of course, unmentioned in the article, it had already been ruled illegal in Britain in 1772.
   And, of course, slave TRADING was then ruled illegal by Act of Parliament in 1807.

   So, “they” compensated owners, who then put some of their money into the Iron Road – so what? And that “slave” money was, even in the projects you have listed was about 29%, so the actual amount was obviously considerably less.
   Also, any reference to making money in Britain out of slave trading was already over 20 years out of date by the start of construction of the L&MR.

   Yes, slaveowning & trading was a great evil.
   It was nearly 200 years ago & none of us are responsible.
   I am seriously annoyed by this, not only for attempting to shift blame onto living people, but for the gross historical innacuracies.
   For another view on getting rid of the slave trade, & the effort put into suppressing that trade, may I recommend the following You Tube documentary:
   HERE

2. @Greg,
   I think it is a reasonable opinion of the writer that it was a partial abolition. He might have in mind a number of points:
   – The abolition did not extend to all of the territory under the crown’s jurisdiction.
   – The apparent need for recent legislation against modern slavery would seem to imply that in reality it wasn’t thoroughly abolished.
   – You could still outsource to or import the fruits of slavery from other jurisdictions where it remained legal. (Always a tricky one that. How do we distinguish an extra-territorial imposition of our morality on other people, and a failure to properly prevent something intolerable?)

3. So, “they” compensated owners, who then put some of their money into the Iron Road – so what?

   That’s basically the point.

   It’s not about making moral judgements, it’s about recognising that this is part of railway history. People thinking it’s about ‘goodies’ or ‘baddies’ (and which ones we, the country, or the industry are) is the problem. It prevents reasonable assessment of a thing that undeniably happened.

   It’s simply about accepting that this is as much a part of railway history as the terrible conditions the navvies worked in, the slum and rookery clearances that were part of railway (and particularly Underground) construction, and (later) both the opportunities and barriers that Windrush arrivees found on the railways.

   So that would be my comment to you, and any others who feel the need to debate the ethics of slavery and the minutae of what was, or wasn’t, abolished when.

   That’s not why these pieces exist.

   This is LR. What we’re doing is flagging that there is part of our railway history which we are not fully considering, and that is always a bad thing if we are collectively committed to creating a better railway going forward, and to understanding where we came from.

   I should add an official note here, while I’m at it:

   Mod note: Remember this is LR

   If you want to discuss the different financial impacts and intertwined relationships of the 19th century economy and the birth of the railways then go for it.

   But comments ‘well actually’-ing the underlying premise, or trying to rules lawyer the abolition of slavery will be quietly modded out. This isn’t Facebook.

4. Ivan
   I don’t want this discussion to get involved in the legal niceties & long history, so:
   – I will say that the abolition in England ( And similarly in Scotland) was the result of a High Court Judgement – “The Mansfield Decision” in England.
   SO – no subsequent legislation was seen as necessary, until very recently.
   Lord Mansfield ruled slavery illegal in England & that was it – game over, no Act of Parliament necessary.

   JB
   Ah but is it “Part of our railway history”?
   In the numbers given, above, the maximum extent of “ex-slavery” money is put at under 30% – & that is assuming that every single penny of said money went into financing the railways – which it obviously did not.

   More general point: Finding fault with what your grandfathers’ ( Or, in this case several generations even before that ) did is all very well, but carrying the “guilt” forward to now is …
   Very similar to what two utterly revolting regimes did & still do – you are blamed & shamed & persecuted for deeds for which you have no responsibility at all.
   [ Those regimes are, of course the DPRK & Nazi Germany ]

   I will add that, AFAIK, none of my ancestors ever had anything to do with the main subject, but I still find this discussion very unsettling, because of the apparent desire to persecute innocent people, just so that some other people can participate in empty virtue signalling.

5. “It’s not about making moral judgements, it’s about recognising that this is part of railway history.It’s simply about accepting that this is as much a part of railway history as the terrible conditions the navvies worked in, the slum and rookery clearances that were part of railway (and particularly Underground) construction, and (later) both the opportunities and barriers that Windrush arrivees found on the railways”.

   “This is LR. What we’re doing is flagging that there is part of our railway history which we are not fully considering, and that is always a bad thing if we are collectively committed to creating a better railway going forward, and to understanding where we came from”.

   So why Part 2: “We sit down with Loraine Martins, Network Rail’s Director of Diversity and Inclusion, to discuss the importance of acknowledging the past and how the rail industry can use it to help create a better future”.? A moral judgement is implied

   I fail to see the relevance of railway funding two centuries ago in terms of the future railway unless you are seeking to atone for historic wrongs. The impact of Victorian rail infrastructure on the future railway in the light of Carmont is what I would have expected expected from LR.
   I’m with Greg T and commend him for sticking his head above the parapet.

6. I don’t understand the vitriol in these comments. Acknowledging that an event happened is completely different from apportioning blame. This article clearly does one and not the other, what’s so triggering about it, and why?

7. Thanks Mr Dennis for a rather sobering article.

   I went to the BLM protest myself and I’m shocked that people feel the need to question that people’s lives matter!

   My actual question is… what’s the “smart” method of calculation please to convert railway mania pounds to value today? It’s rather necessary to my inner mathematician to know please.

8. Thanks for a really interesting article, with which I have no problem whatsoever. Although railway financing was where those compensated chose to direct the funds, one can construe that early railways were effectively part-government funded to a greater extent than we’d otherwise think.

9. The total investment in UK railways in the 1840s was around £100 million, so abolition money clearly only played a marginal role in the railways.

   However, if slavery had continued, perhaps the growth of the UK’s railway network would have been marginally retarded (though other investors may well have come forward). So we can be happy that some of the track we ride on total is a minor positive legacy of abolition.

   The abolition of slavery was only partially completed in 1833 – the Act did not apply to India, which had to wait another decade.

10. An interesting and thought provoking article, Thank you.
    While we can quibble over the method, and how much of the funding for our railways came from slaving profits / government compensation / ‘clesn’ funding, it is undeniable that slavery provided at least some of the capital for the railways. This is not something I had considered before.
    What does this mean for today? It is very tempting (and easy) to say”so what?” or “does it matter?” and dismiss it out of hand. However, doing so is an expression of the privelege we experience, and without examining how it contributes to this privilege, we cannot understand the totality of the inequality inherent in society.

11. An illuminating post; and indeed, and illuminating sequence of comments. And whilst there are strong feelings on both sides, it is good to see civility nonetheless.

    It is, I feel, a good thing to have an awareness of the darker elements of our history, even if we do not bear that guilt – far less responsibility – ourselves. However, to avoid or duck awareness of that darkness, of evil acts and bad actors in our history, would be a moral failure on our part. That would be appear to be the least we can do.

12. I’ve killed a few comments which talk about ‘snowflakes’, ‘virtue signalling’ and similar. There’s no need for that kind of loaded language here. It demeans the discussion.

    To answer some fairly made (and linked) points:

    In the numbers given, above, the maximum extent of “ex-slavery” money is put at under 30% – & that is assuming that every single penny of said money went into financing the railways – which it obviously did not.

    Fair enough. Let’s say that’s half that (15%) for the subject of debate here.

    In what world is it not interesting or useful – in the context of our ongoing need to study (and often collective enjoyment of studying) railway history – to not look at what that impact actually was?

    We look at everything else. We look at the impact of an increasing ability of investors to lobby Parliament. We look at the impact of the various critical pioneers like the Stephensons. We look at changing societal and economic needs as locality gives way to nationality.

    Why is this the one area where apparently it’s not worth looking at what the impact actually was?

    This isn’t an episode of Perry Mason. It’s not about assigning blame. It’s about taking the opportunity to expand our knowledge of our industry and passion even further. Because the idea that we already know everything there is to know about our railway history is just silly. If that were true, why would any of us still be studying it and why would people still be publishing papers or books about it?

    Which is my point, in my original reply about the dangers of doing this:

    More general point: Finding fault with what your grandfathers’ ( Or, in this case several generations even before that ) did is all very well, but carrying the “guilt” forward to now is …

    This is what the majority of criticism here, and on Twitter, always comes back to. That somehow every discussion of a topic like this is an overt or covert attempt to ‘name and shame’ or ‘name and blame’.

    That is not what matters. Someone want’s to go and make a terrible Channel 5 documentary about how the railways are only built on the profits of slavery then you’ll find Gareth and me standing beside any of you deriding it as ridiculous, wrong and a pointless moral judgement to make on people from a different time.

    But that cuts both ways. You do need to ask yourself why you feel such a need to make this a moral debate around guilt.

    As I said in my earlier comment. We talk about how terrible conditions were for the navvies regularly. You and I have done so in the pub. At no point has anyone felt the immediate need to go:

    “Woah, woah, there’s no point looking into this at all. All industrial employers were rubbish. It would be judging our grandfathers by the standards of today and finding them guilty.”

    We seem to manage to talk about that particular brand of exploitation within railway history as grown adults. All that’s being highlighted here is that it is the right time to start discussing slavery’s impact exactly the same way.

    So why Part 2: “We sit down with Loraine Martins, Network Rail’s Director of Diversity and Inclusion, to discuss the importance of acknowledging the past and how the rail industry can use it to help create a better future”.? A moral judgement is implied.

    For the very reason that you use in your next sentence. Because when events highlight a current problem, they get society thinking. And during that thinking it is good to have conversations about similar inequality in the past, and explore further how those current problems impact ourselves and our work. That’s how learning – and journalism – works.

    The impact of Victorian rail infrastructure on the future railway in the light of Carmont is what I would have expected expected from LR.

    And you’ll almost certainly get that, in time, once RAIB’s accident reports – and frankly your own writing, and others, on the subject – is available to us.

    The two aren’t mutually exclusive topics. We don’t have to only write about one or the other. And again – and I mean this in a respectful way – you need to ask yourself why the idea of writing about the possibility of the latter is fine, but writing about the possibility of the former topic is apparently not even worth contemplating.

    Because what all of this comes down to is something that Anonymike has put into words better than I could:

    What does this mean for today? It is very tempting (and easy) to say”so what?” or “does it matter?” and dismiss it out of hand. However, doing so is an expression of the privelege we experience, and without examining how it contributes to this privilege, we cannot understand the totality of the inequality inherent in society.

    Everything he says there is correct. We all have, and continue to, benefit from a wide variety of privileges. That is not our fault. We should not feel guilty about that as a result. To do so would be silly. Nor does it mean we’re not smart, or good at our jobs, or haven’t worked hard for what we have in life, or whatever.

    But those privileges affect our worldview, our judgement over what is and isn’t worth investigating (historically and actively) and more. They can, and do, make us get things wrong or miss things, without realising.

    Again, that’s natural. It will always happen and that’s fine. As long as we recognise that we can be wrong. And that the easiest way to keep testing whether we are or not is to further our knowledge and constantly reassess it.

    That’s all that needs to happen here. It’s not about putting someone long dead like John Moss on trial. It’s simply about learning whether we missed a bunch of stuff we should know about him, simply because we haven’t really thought it worth looking into before.

13. It’s a topic well worth exploring, but I tend to side with Captain Deltic in questioning whether it is should be debated here in London Reconnections (whose focus is – or has generally been- primarily on the capital’s railways).

14. I agree with much that John Bull has said – that it is right that we recognise the involvement and consequences of slavery on the railway system. Just as we should also recognise the impact of colonialism generally or, indeed, market forces as a whole. But Captain Deltic is also right in suggesting that this is the wrong place. In other threads broader comments about societal impacts or consequences on the subject have been struck out by moderators on the basis that this is not the right place to discuss them. Perhaps the most pertinent question for this column in the historical sense might be: without the slavery compensation paid by the government, would the development of the railways in this country be very different? To which I suspect the answer would be ‘no’. Looking forward, the issues raised in part 2 seem to me to be far more relevant and purposeful.

15. The examination of the National Archives has begun at UCL
    https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/
    The BBC made documentaries about it
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b063db18

    The York archives will have family names that can be matched for railway schemes’ promoters, sponsors, and subscribers.

16. There was a loophole in the Mansfield decision which meant that the remaining serfs in Scotland could be (and sometimes were) sold into slavery abroad, which wasn’t corrected until London noticed that serfdom still existed and banned it. More importantly, english investors could own slaves in the colonies where the charter allowed it, and it was the compensation for those slaves that is the subject of this article.

    OTOH, aside from the construction companies (in particular the McAlpine family), the modern railway industry has been severed from the beneficiaries of slavery and the slave owners compensation by nationalisation, even where the former slave owners weren’t wiped out by one of the real bankruptcies in the 19th century (though many were engineered to rip off creditors and small investors). That means that any attempt to claw back that compensation or pay reparations to descendants of slaves should be taken from the heirs of the people who were paid, or just from general revenue, not from the railway industry. I worry that talking about this will give credibility to an attempt to make NR pay for reparations out of its budget, thus appeasing the BLM protestors, notionally increasing railway spending, and actually reducing it.

17. In para 2: ‘George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin’. It is a good job that this did not happen under UK jurisdiction or else the author and publisher may well find themselves charged with Contempt of Court. At the time of publication Chauvin had not even appeared in court, let alone been found guilty of anything. In fact he appeared for a preliminary hearing 2 days ago. In any case, he is charged with 3rd-Degree Murder which is an Americanism for what we call Manslaughter, so no-one ’murdered’ anyone.

18. No denying that this is an interesting historical topic. What concerns me that it it’s being linked to current issues. I would argue that the source of finance for railways in the early 19th Century, while of historical interest and worthy of study, it is of no more relevant to diversity in the 21st Century railway than the contemporary Rainhill Trials are to the current problems with the introduction of new train fleets.

    As for talk of the ‘privilege’, we enjoy!! Then LR has begun proselytising when I regard it as a source of expert, and dispassionate analysis and debate.

19. The payment of compensation for the abolition of slavery did not create money. It was a “transfer payment” (as the jargon has it) moving money from UK taxpayers (one set of what would have been in those days generally well off people) to former slave owners in the UK (a smaller set of generally well off people). It is hard to see how this would have significantly affected the availability of capital or entrepreneurs for the development of the railways. Let alone how it is relevant to diversity in the 21st century railway.

    Although the sub judice law is different in relation to actions being tried in US courts, the UK libel law still applies to the UK publication of statements about US events.

20. A very important and well researched article, which hits the points I was looking to see.
    It is a common historical point that slavery financed the industrial revolution, notably in Britain but also elsewhere. This article and the background research shows how some of this was done.
    Along the way, it also eliminates the long held incorrect belief (including by myself) that small railway investors played a significant role.

    If this series continues past Part 2, perhaps the author could discuss the links between railways and sugar – the primary slavery commodity – including port and refinery development.
    British railway investment in the nineteenth century was not confined to Britain and Ireland but was global. Of course, much investment went to the British Empire but also to South America, Belgium and its colonies and elsewhere. It might also be worth examining the links of this investment with capital of slavery origin.

    The idea that we should not explore the ramifications of slavery in the railways in a general transport forum seems to me a very oddly politicised viewpoint. Slavery happened; it had very important consequences that lasted for a long time. Perhaps it is only now that there is enough distance in time so that the issue can be discussed. On the other hand, some of the attitudes that supported slavery clearly last to the present day. The best way to combat them is through openness about the dark chapters of history.

    In this respect, I note that in France, the role of the SNCF in the Jewish deportations during the occupation has been examined by the historian Christian Bachelier and is the subject of continuing discussions in the journal ‘Rails & Histoire’. See links below. His report ‘Le rôle de la SNCF dans les déportations 1942-1944’ opens with the following quote from the British historian Ian Kershaw, “the road to Auschwitz was built by hate, but paved with indifference.” Similarly, we should not be indifferent to the history of slavery.

    https://www.ahicf.com/une-entreprise-publique-guerre
    http://www.archives-historiques.sncf.fr/pdf/Bachelier_rapport_fin_contrat.pdf

21. Gareth knows I don’t subscribe to his point of view; as others have commented tracing the flow of money is difficult and only seems to provoke more questions than it does answers.

    Where I find the greatest difficulty is the notion that the railways blossomed only because of “slave money”. I believe that the establishment of the Royal Navy’s West African Squadron in 1808 but not particularly effective until after The defeat of Napoleon In 1815 when further resources could be allocated to the pursuit of all slave traders. This gradual process of attrition of the slave trade accreted in 1820 when the US joined in the operation to capture and release slaves (The Americans in Liberia and the RN in what is now Sierra Leone).. This broke the profitability of trading in slaves from which characters such as Edward Colston had profited from some 109 years earlier.

    One has to ask WHY? Why were railways “born” in Britain? Why not France or Germany or even America. Much funding of early railways came via Quaker owned banks, with, as far as I can detect, no funds based on slavery. But it needed to be much mor3 than cash; irrespective if it came from Quakers, small scale investors or rich merchants with interests in sugar plantations in the West Indues. Rather it was the habit, created during the latter half of the 18th C, in getting things done. Most notably the skills associated in creating Turnpike Trusts. Needed were committees of local businessmen who could gain the necessary parliamentary approval, organise road repairs, collect tolls and repay loans.

    This local ‘activism’ created the backbone of the new railway companies. Money, where is came from ‘slavery, simply helped the new industry to flourish.

22. “It is a common historical point that slavery financed the industrial revolution”

    Really? Within what was a single economy, money inevitably moved between slave owners and industrialists, but this is a long way from saying that the profits from slavery were a necessary or significant factor in the birth and growth of the industrial revolution. Some individuals reinvested capital in some individual industrial enterprises, but that is not the same thing. Some specific activities were however more connected – the UK cotton industry relied on imports of slave grown cotton.

23. Ans=42
    Correction:
    It is a common historical point unsupported assertion that slavery financed the industrial revolution, notably in Britain but also elsewhere. OK?
    I note that ML has also raised this point.
    By the time the railways were carrying any significant amount of goods, including sugar inbounbd at Liverpool, slavery had ended – OK?
    The Death Camps analogy is false, for the reason given above.
    The time of slavery & the time of the raiways overlapped for less than 3 full years.

    Gordon Dudman
    The Royal Navy’s W African Squadron
    A better analogy to the Turnpike Trusts might be the Canals, yes?
    A LOT of practice in building major transport links was got in, doing that, in the period approx 1790-1830

24. GREG Re CANALS

    I need to spend more time reading and researching that. Broadly the very first canals were financed by landowners who wanted to get minerals to new or growing markets. Coal and the Duke of Bridgewater come straight to mind. Many were, I agree, promoted by merchants who wanted to move finished products to markets. This latter group were probably very much the same types of individuals who had got together to promote Turnpike Trusts – possibly the fathers’ of the canal promoters?

25. The origin of the historical linkage of slavery with the British industrial revolution lies with Eric Williams’s thesis and book ‘Capitalism and Slavery’. While still contentious, very considerable research has been built up. Two summaries of both critical and supportive research are:
    ‘Slavery and British Industrialisation: The ‘New History Of Capitalism’ and Eric Williams’ Capitalism and Slavery ‘ at https://www.labor.history.ucsb.edu/news/event/456
    and
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism_and_Slavery
    A perhaps more radical paper that makes useful points is at:
    https://www.historyworkshop.org.uk/slavery-coerced-labour-and-the-development-of-industrial-capitalism-in-britain/

    Whatever else this research is, it is absolutely not unsubstantiated.

26. “On 25th May 2020, George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin”

    I believe it’s important to keep facts accurate. Derek Chauvin is awaiting trial.

27. I’m very happy to accept that there are links between slavery and UK finances, including the financing of industrial enterprises. I’m also happy to agree that arguments have been put forward as to the extent of those links. All I dispute is that it is “commonly accepted” that “slavery financed the industrial revolution”, at least in the sense that it is undisputed that the industrial revolution would not have largely developed to a similar extent and over a similar extent otherwise.

28. Ans=XLII & ML
    There is a very important Historical & Economic argument at stake here, which I have been trying to address, & obviously not succeeding.
    And that is, as shown 30 years later in the US Civil War, that slavery is the “enemy” of Industrial & economic development – & probably, the other way around, as well.
    And where I disagree, at the most fundamental level with Eric Wiliams apparent argument – or so it seems.

    In 1860, on paper, the US “South” was immensly richer than the “North” – but almost all of that wealth was tied up in the bodies & services of the slaves & not in railroads or industries or manufactures, other than that absolutely essential for the South’s cash crop – cotton.
    If you have 3.9 million slaves (! & note), you do not need industrial mass-production machinery & conversely, if you have mass-production machinery, slaves are an economic drag – it’s cheaper & more “efficient” to pay people semi-starvation wages & let them fight for the available jobs in the factories.

    Because Britain was first in the field, this economic divergence had become apparent, if not at the timne of the actual Mansfield Decision, in 1772, then almost-certainly by 1784, the date of Watt’s parallel motion, & definitely by the date of the very first mass-production machinery, devised by Marc Isambard Brunel ( Isambard Kingdom’s father ) between 1802 & 1805. That machinery produced sheave-blocks for the navy’s ships.
    Said sheave blocks, required in the hundreds of thousands by the RN for the Napoleonic Wars, could not be made, at all, or not to a consistent standard, even by paid workmen, never mind slave labour.
    From then on, slavery was an economic total dead-end & industrialisation was the way forward.

    ( ! Note: The 3.9 million slaves figure is from wikipedia )

29. Greg, I think you are right in your assertion that slavery did not encourage industrial development. The American North, and Britain before it, were driven towards such industrialisation as they did not have slaves in the same numbers as the American South. If you were paying people to work for you, anything that improved their productivity was a good thing (cruel overseers, spinning jenny’s, model villages – depending on your views). Slavery didn’t need such productivity boosts.

30. I think it is (a) correct and (b) much under-acknowledged that many Brits got rich on slavery, and that subsequently pretty much all development that relied on private investment was at least partly paid for by slavery. You have demonstrated that this is actually the case that the railways were also partly paid for by slavery, and I think that is worth pointing out and something that the railways (and specifically Network rail) should recognise.

    But it is my view that the thesis that “Britain’s railway exists as a legacy of slavery” is just not supported by the evidence shown here, and in fact is simply not correct. (For example a number of key early proof-of-concept railways were not financed by slave profits, and railways exists in many other countries which profited far less from the slave trade.)

    Furthermore I believe that making totally exaggerated claims does undermine the serious point that the railways were partly paid for by slavery. Do you really want to have a pointless argument where (in my view) the facts just aren’t your side, or do you want to see the real link between slavery and the railways recognised?

31. In fact, maybe ‘Slavery and the Railways’ could be a travelling exhibition making it’s way around Briatin’s main stations? I am thinking of something akin to the holocaust train exhibitions they had in Germany a few years ago. I wonder if that would be more visible than a scholarly article and maybe a book or a plaque somewhere?

    But please make the subline something like ‘How slave money helped to finance the early railways’ and not ‘Britain’s railway exists as a legacy of slavery’

32. Really enjoyed this article. Ignore the people who aren’t interested!

33. That funding from former slave owners was not the _majority_ of funding for early railways can’t be denied, however then as now when people with smaller amounts of cash to invest see where ‘the rich folks’ are putting their own money they will tend to follow suit. Cash begets more cash. Without that slave ‘compensation’ going in the early railways it’s quite probable that the balance wouldn’t have either.

34. Cash from the compensation received following the abolition of slavery wasn’t the majority of large investments either. So it is hard to see how it set any kind of influential example. And as I noted above, the compensation payments just transferred cash from set of rich people to a different set. It did not increase the amount of cash available for investment. And there is no obvious reason to believe that the one set of rich people were more likely to invest in railways than the other set.

35. At the start of the chain there were black Africans who sold their fellow black Africans to mostly white traders to export. Few whites ever ventured inland to capture slaves. Without those black African sellers the slave trade would have been minimal.
    Some of the proceeds were invested in railways.
    Now, it seems, we are expected to feel guilty about a process we, and for most of us, our ancestors had nothing to do with.
    Which was the greater evil – black Africans selling people into slavery, or white profiteers investing the proceeds? Difficult to judge.
    Applying modern views and standards to the past is fraught with problems.

36. Historical Note, following Dave Russell’s comment.
    I recently read a book – “Parting Shots” on the leaving remarks made by British Ambassadors to various countries, amusing, frightening & enlightening in turns. The section that is relevant here, referred back to the Arabian Gulf in the period 1950-60, where a principle had been established – that anyone who entered the Brit. compund & touched the flagpole was automatically freed from slavery. At the start of that period, over a dozen a year were being liberated from bondage by that method, in more than one Gulf state. All of this well within living memory.
    Now then, who will be blaming whom over these recent documented events, as opposed to hypotheticals, from 187 years ago?

    ^^^^^- – – – – – – – – – – – – –
    ^^^^^^^Subsidary note ….
    I would really like to hear from the original author, ( G Dennis ) actually.
    Defending his position & arguments?

37. Dave Russell makes the point that he feels that we are being made to feel guilt over the involvement of the country in slavery. And he also seems to seek to blame others in areas of Africa for being the real culprits here for offering for sale others. I don’t think this is a profitable approach at all and all who undertook this abhorrent practice carry responsibility for their own actions but that is surely as far as anyone is expecting the actual guilt/blame to go. Acknowledgement that it was a practice that was abhorrent and that we now would seek to stop any similar activity anywhere is how we should behave. It is a long historical episode as far as this country is concerned and merits close study and has impacted greatly on our society. Can we not just accept that discussion over such episodes is bound to be fraught but differing viewpoints are, like reflection on many past episodes, never likely to be resolved and our own views are a primarily a product of our own current upbringing and as such in the main subjective.

38. Gareth, I’m sure there are those who will have read the first couple of paragraphs and rolled their eyes, muttering under their breath about another leftie malcontent droning on about racism.
    However I hope that most will have stopped to think carefully about the implications of your logic.
    In these days when the vested interests which look backwards rather than forward (fossil fuels seeking to sabotage rapid adoption of renewables, for example) are covertly financing disruptive populist politicians in the hope of distracting attention from the climate crisis and the gross inequality it causes, it is essential that dog-whistle politicking is vigorously exposed and neutralised.
    Thank you for your pertinent analysis. Regardless of their origins, it is clear that railways are capable of facilitating far more good than evil, and so I hope that all rail professionals, campaigners, supporters and enthusiasts will have their attention drawn to your conclusions and support the campaigns for equality and human dignity regardless of race, faith (or none), and personal life choices. Regards, Steve Boulding

39. PS I’ve only just discovered London Reconnections via a reference on the Southern Railway E-Mail Group (SREmG), a stimulating online forum for all those interested in everything to do with the Southern Railway, its predecessors and successors, and just about any other peripherally-related subject that crops up in it’s lovely exchanges.
    It seems to me that LR has similar characteristics, and I hope to continue to read stimulating articles such as those currently on the site.
    I have a couple of idess I would like to share – please can anyone give me an e-mail address for the editor? Thanks
    Steve Boulding
    [email protected]

40. PPS A pox on the inventors of predictive text!!
    In previous PS “it’s lovely exchanges” should have read “its lively exchanges”.. I’d already corrected it once but it sneaked its version back in while I wasn’t watching. If anyone can tell me how to permanently remove this arrogant intervention from my “smart” (ha ha) phone I’ll buy them a drink.

41. Gareth, this is a great piece, particularly making the links between slave-produced cotton and the railways!

    In June 2020 I wrote this for a Geography list, and my counting of the individuals and sums seems a lot different from yours – your eventual sum is bigger! Could we cross-reference this to help me get a better picture?

    “Looking through the UCL database of the legacies of British slave ownership (https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/), particularly the commercial legacies (https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/commercial/), is a harrowing task – the purpose of the commercial legacies section is to trace the ‘evolution of firms receiving slave compensation and their redeployment of slave wealth into other investments.’ The sheer variety of investments forces the realization that profits from slavery percolated into every area of economic activity in Britain and the Empire, particularly the banking and insurance sector after the first industrial revolution ended (late 1840s). A whole range of precursory banking and insurance companies that were absorbed into today’s behemoths were funded directly by slave profits or slave compensation.

    The Royal Bank of Liverpool was acquired by Barclays, London Assurance, the Royal Insurance Company and the Sun Fire Office all later became part of Royal and Sun Alliance group, Lloyds evolved from operations such as Simpson and Maddison, the Glasgow Bank and the Bank of London and South America Limited, Cazenove was acquired by JP Morgan Chase, Denison, Heywood and Kennard, Drummonds were predecessors to RBS. All were initially founded on or invested in by profits from slavery or the compensation given after slavery ended.

    Virtually the entirety of the British railway system seems to have been built substantially using slavery profits/compensation. Between 1825 when the first steam railway built in Britain (the Stockton and Darlington) and 1870 by which time Britain had about 13,500 miles of steam railways, money from slavery profits and compensation flooded into the new-born railway system (see the list of branches, lines and junctions below), particularly after the compensation process was agreed with the Treasury.

    Sadly, the landed and commercial elites of Scotland are substantially (over-?) represented in the investment of slavery profits in British railways, all the more poignant when it is realised that after Scottish merchants gained access to the slave trade, the victims included many of their own people. According to the Douglas family website (http://www.douglashistory.co.uk/history/Histories/slavery/slave_trade.htm#.XuuLrxpKjIU), not only did Scottish concerns own a third of all the slaves on Jamaica by 1817, as many as 100,000 Scottish people were sold into slavery. To put this in context, in 1801 just before slavery was ended in Britain, the population of Scotland was only 1,608,420.

    Enslavement of the Scottish people began in the 1600s but accelerated following the Act of Union in 1707 and the Proscription Act of 1746 (after the 15 and the 45); according to the Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, America and West Indies of 1701 for instance, at that time there were 25,000 slaves in Barbados, 21,700 of which were white. These white slaves were known locally as ‘redshanks’, reflecting their continually sun-burnt legs. Scottish people walking down the streets of Glasgow may therefore be walking on streets and past buildings named, not only after people who profited from slavery, but who may have sold their own ancestors as slaves.

    According to the UCL database some 155 individual slave-owners (see the list of names below) invested some £4,174,792 in the nascent British railway system, in quantities spread geographically so that most of the new branches and lines received some portion of money derived from slavery. Just to give a better idea, using the UK Inflation Calculator based on the value of the British Pound in 1832, in today’s terms that means that over £470,488,203 in money derived from slavery profits and compensation was invested in British Railways

    Individual slavers

    Peter Abbott, Rowland Alston, Raynes Appleton, James Baillie, Samuel Baker, Andrew Bannatyne, Henry Barkly, Thomas Bartrum, John Benbow, Charles Bernard, Charles Bernard Jr, Charles Bigge, David Blair, Thomas Boddington, Archibald Bogle, Andreas Boode, William Borradaile, Thomas Bouch, Peter Brancker, Robert Browne, Henry Bruce, George Burrow, Henry Bush, Donald Cameron, Andrew Campbell, James Campbell, Mungo Campbell Jr, John Campbell, James Cavan, Nathaniel Cave, Edward Chard, James Cheyne, Edward Codrington, Stapleton Cotton, William Coulthurst, Luke Crossley, John Crosthwaite, Patrick Cruikshank, James Cunningham, Isaac Currie, John Deacon, Bonamy Dobree, Archibald Douglas, James Douglas, Thomas Douglas, Thomas Duncan, John Dutton, Hardman Earle, William Earle, Wilbraham Egerton; John Elin; James Ellice, Russell Elice, James Esdaile, William Esdaile, James Ewing, William Ewing, William Feilden, Ebenezer Fernie, George Forsyth, Charles Freeman, George Gibbs, John Gladstone, John Neilson Gladstone, Robertson Gladstone, George Grant, Robert Innes Grant, John Greatheed, Pascoe Grenfell, James Groom, John Hall, Richard Hall, John Hankey, Thomson Hankey, Simeon Hardy Jr, Herman Hendricks, William Hervey, John Hibbert, John Nembhard Hibbert, Thomas Hibbert, Jonathan Higginson, Jonathan Hopkison, Charles Horsfall, Thomas Horsfall, Ambrose Humphrys, Frederick Huth, Michael Impey, David Johnston, Alexander Jopp, Samuel Kekewich, George Kinderley, William Kirkland, John Lane, Alfred Latham, Charles Lawrence, George Lawrence, James Lawrence, James Leman, Edward Littleton, Emmanuel Lousada, Henry Luard, Alexander MacDougall, Edward Marjoribanks, Thomas Martin, James McCall, Charles McGarel, Peter McGarel, George Medley, Edward Monk, Jacob Montefiore, Ambrose Moore, Charles Morris, John Moss, John Palmer, Charles Parker, William Parker, Archibald Paull, Charles Percy, Thomas Phillpotts, James Pownall, Daniel Pretyman, Robert Pulsford, William Pulsford, Richard Quarrell, George Rainy, Divie Robertson, Henrietta Rosco, John Ross, William Boughton, Samuel Sandbach, Henry Sealy, Francis Shand, William Shand, Archibald Smith, George Smith, James Smith, John Smith, John Stewart, Patrick Stewart, William Stirling, Alexander Stronach, Robert Sutton, James Swaby, John Talbot, James Tasker, Rees Thomas, Netlam Tory, Edward Tunno, Charles Turner, John Turner, Edmund Waller, Richard Ward, William Whyte, Daniel Willink, Melvil Wilson
    155 individuals

    Railways invested in by slavers

    England
    Portsmouth Junction; Direct London and Portsmouth; Cambridge and Oxford; Tean and Dove Valley and Eastern and Western Junction; Cheltenham, Oxford, and London and Birmingham Union; or Charlton Kings and Marsworth; Gloucester and Dean Forest; Grand Connection; or Worcester and Wolverhampton; Worcester, Hereford, Ross and Glouster; Shrewsbury and Herefordshire (Nos 1 and 2); London and York; South Eastern; Bristol and Gloucestershire Extension; Diss and Colechester Junction; Axholme, Gainsborough, Goole and York and North Midland Junction; London and Norwich Direct; Irish North Midland; Tottenham and Farringdon-street Extension; Guildford, Chichester and Portsmouth; North Staffordshire (Pottery Line); Shrewsbury and Birmingham; Direct Northern; Eastern Counties (Cambridge and Lincoln Line); Chester, Manchester and Liverpool Junction; Liverpool and Manchester; London, Worcester and South Staffordshire (Extension from Dudley to Wolverhampton); York and Lancaster; Ely and Huntingdon; Huntingdon, St. Ives and Wisbech Railway, &c.; Bath and Weymouth Great Western Union; Midland (Ely to Lincoln); Lynn and Ely (Extension to March); North-Western; Lancaster and Preston Junction; Morecombe Harbour and Railway; London, Chatham and North Kent; Wells and Dereham; Sheffield and Lincolnshire Junction; Leeds and Thirsk; Liverpool and Bury; Birmingham and Oxford Junction; London and Brighton (Stephenson’s); Gravesend and Rochester; Derby and Crewe Junction; Lliverpool and Preston, and Manchester and Southport; Charlton Kings and Marsworth; Shropshire Union Railway and Canal; Cornwall and Devon; Bridgewater and Minehead Railway and Pier; London and Exeter; or Exeter and Falmouth; Blackburn, Darwen and Bolton; City Railway; or Southwark and Hammersmith; Portbury Pier and Railway; Direct London and Manchester; Shrewsbury, Oswestry and Chester Junction; West Yorkshire; Trent Valley; York and Carlisle; Shrewsburt, Wolverhampton, and South Staffordshire Junction (Coalbrookdale Branch); Shrewsbury and Grand Junction; Birkenhead, Manchester and Cheshire Junction; East and West India Docks and Birmingham; Worcester and Porth Dyallaen; Junction; Great North of England; or Hurworth and York; South-Eastern, Brighton, Lewes and Newhaven; Sunderland, Durham and Auckland Union; London, Salisbury and Yeovil Junction (Basingstoke to Yeovil); London, Shoreham and Brighton (Mills’s); or London and Brighton without a Tunnel; Birmingham and Gloucester (Wolverhampton line); London and South Western (Metropolitan Extension); Warwick and Worcester; London and Birmingham Extension – Northampton, Daventry, Leamington and Warwick; South-Western, or Kingsworthy and West Monkton; Birmingham and Derby Junction; or Tamworth and Rugby; East Coast; Hull and Gainsborough; Buckinghamshire (Tring to Banbury); Buckinghamshire (Oxford and Bletchley Junction); North Devon; Birmingham and Gloucester (Worcester Deviation); Macclesfield and Lichfield (Nos 1 and 2); Wilts, Somerset and Weymouth; Leicester and Bedford; Northumberland; Exeter Great Western; Birmingham, Bristol and Thames Junction; London, Warwick, Leamington and Kidderminster; London and Worcester and South Staffordshire (Extension from Dudley and Sedgley Branch); Cornwall; Great Eastern and Western; Ulverstone, Furness and Lancaster and Carlisle; West Cornwall; Brighton, Lewes and Hastings (Keymer Branch); Newark and Sheffield; Rugby and Huntingdon; Warwickshire and London; Kent; or Deptford and Dover; Liverpool, Warrington, Manchester and Stockport Direct; Direct London and Brighton (Rennie’s); Westminster Bridge, Deptford and Greenwich; Harwich and Eastern Counties Junction Railway and Pier; Norfolk Extension; Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle-upon-Tyne Junction; Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle-upon-Tyne Junction; Liverpool, Orm-kirk and Preston; South Yorkshire Coal Canal and Railway

    Wales
    South Wales; Llynvi Valley and South Wales Junction; Newport, Abergavenny and Hereford; Monmouthshire; North Wales; Welsh Midland;

    Ireland
    Waterford, Wexford, Wicklow and Dublin; New Ross and Carlow Junction; Dundalk and Enniskillen; Dublin, Belfast and Coleraine Junction; Dublin and Belfast Junction (Branch to Kells); Great Southern and Western (Extensions to Limerick and Cork); Great Southern and Western Extension (Carlow to Kilkenny); Great County Down; Great Western (Ireland) (Dublin to Mullingar and Athlone); Cork and Waterford; Dublin and Kilkenny; Enniskillen and Sligo; Great Munster; Killarney Junction; Wexford, Carlow and Dublin Junction; Waterford, Wexford and Valentia; Dublin and Belfast Junction, and Navan Branch Extensions; Belfast and Ballymena; Irish Great Western (Dublin to Galway); Galway and Kilkenny; Waterford and Kilkenny

    Scotland
    Ayrshire, Bridge of Weir and Port Glasgow Junction; Glasgow, Airdrie and Monkland Junction; Glasgow, Dumfries and Carlisle; Perth and Inverness; Caledonian; Glasgow and Belfast Union; Glasgow, Paisley, Kilmarnock and Ayr; Edinburgh and Dunbar; Scottish Grand Junction; Glasgow, Paisley and Greenock; Paisley, Barrhead and Hurlet; Ayrshire, Bridge of Weir and Port Glasgow Junction; Lanarkshire and Lothians; Strathtay and Breadalbane; Glasgow and Dundee Junction; Caledonian and Dunbartonshire Junction; British and Irish Union; Caledonian (Carlisle Deviation); Edinburgh and Glasgow; Airdrie and Bathgate Junction; Glasgow, Strathaven and Lesmabagow Direct; Glasgow Harbour Mineral; Wilsontown, Morningside and Coltness (Knowton Branch); Wilsontown, Morningside and Coltness (Bathgate Branch); Wilsontown, Morningside and Coltness (Caledonian Railway Junction); Stirlingshire Midland Junction; Glasgow, Dumfries and Carlisle; Wishaw and Coltness (Greenhill Branch); Perth and Crieff Direct; Edinburgh and Leith Atmospheric; Forth and Clyde Junction; Caledonian and Dumbartonshire Junction; Edinburgh and Northern (No. 1); Edinburgh and Northern (No. 2); Caledonian Northern Direct; Aberdeen; Slamannan (Bathgate and Sancraig Branches); Monkland and Kirkintilloch [No contract]; Clydesdale Junction; Glasgow, Kilmarnock and Ardrossan; Hamilton and Strathaven; West of Scotland Junction; Scottish Midland Junction; Glasgow, Barrhead and Neilston Direct (Branches to Paisley); Glasgow, Paisley and Greenock (Harbour Branch); Glasgow, Barrhead and Neilston Direct (Branches to Thornliebank, Househill and Hurlet); Glasgow, Paisley and Greenock (Polloc and Govan Branch); Great North of Scotland

42. The White Rose university consortium is examining links between the steam-powered rail of the past and its links to colonialism and the slave trade. Its project will look at the “economic, social and infrastructural legacy of steam and slavery across the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries”.

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