Slavery connections and new perspectives: English Heritage properties, Conservation Bulletin, Issue 58 (Summer 2008) pp. 10-11.
Brodsworth Hall, South Yorkshire
‘Leaving this room, we arrive in the colonial suite, inlaid entirely with rarest marble and raw silk wall coverings. At today’s prices, this room would cost over £40M to decorate. And how did Sir Henry earn this sort of money? Slavery. So if you like this room, if you even for a fleeting instant thought ‘Ooh, looks nice’, then you like slavery. You racist! ’
- ‘Audio guide to “Historic Hibsworth Hall”’ audio-guide parody, That Mitchell and Webb Sound, (broadcast on BBC Radio 4 21/7/07, 18.30).
Inspired by the bicentenary of the Parliamentary abolition of the British slave trade, English Heritage recently commissioned a survey to identify links between 33 of its properties which were been built or occupied in the main era of English slave trading (c 1640–1840) and slavery or abolition. The intention was to establish what form any such links took and to add this to the bank of historical research on which future site interpretation can be based. Of the 33 properties surveyed, 26 were found to have some sort of link to the history of slavery and abolition. The kinds of connections uncovered were much more diverse than the stereotype of a wealthy slave trader or colonial plantation owner building himself a country house on the profits of exploitation. In fact none of the properties were directly built from the proceeds of slavery in this way. Peter Thellusson (1737–97) who bought the South Yorkshire estate of Brodsworth in 1790 is an interesting case in point. Though he did not build a new house with his riches, his career encapsulates three ways in which a property could financially benefit from slavery: trade with the West Indies, serving the banking needs of planters and ownership of colonial properties. Estates could also benefit from slavery-derived wealth through their masters’ marriages to an heiress or their holding official colonial posts. Thus, Godfrey Webster of Battle Abbey in Sussex married the Jamaican sugar plantation heiress Elizabeth Vassall in 1786, and Richard Aldworth Nevile, who inherited Audley End in Essex in 1797, had been appointed Provost-Marshal of Jamaica in 1762 – a lucrative post which is thought to have yielded £120,000.
As the exhibition ‘Slavery and Justice: the Legacies of Dido Belle and Lord Mansfield’ last year at Kenwood showed, places can be linked to the history of slavery in more positive and perhaps surprising ways. Lord Mansfield, who built much of Kenwood House, presided over the Somersett legal case of 1772, and the Zong case of 1783 – both important milestones on the road to abolition. Robert Henley, Lord Northington of Northington Grange in Hampshire, declared in the 1762 case of Shanley v. Harvey that ‘as soon as a man sets foot on English ground he is free . . . a negro may maintain an action against his master for ill-usage, and may have a Habeus Corpus if restrained of his liberty.’ Charles James Fox, a key parliamentary advocate of abolition, died at Chiswick House in 1806.While the comfortable position of Lord Mansfield’s black niece, Dido Elizabeth Belle, at Kenwood may have been highly unusual, other black people, such as James Chappell, a servant at Kirby Hall in the 1670s, lived in English Heritage properties within the household establishment.
These are some of the more prominent examples. Not all the links uncovered were this strong, but viewed together they create a tangled web of connections to the slavery-dependent Atlantic economy. The survey has shown that research into such traditionally neglected aspects of historic houses is likely to be fruitful, besides being fascinating and long overdue. It also serves as a reminder that while investigating the role of slavery in these high-status establishments reveals tales of exploitation, it also uncovers stories of affection and human sympathy.
- ‘Audio guide to “Historic Hibsworth Hall”’ audio-guide parody, That Mitchell and Webb Sound, (broadcast on BBC Radio 4 21/7/07, 18.30).
Inspired by the bicentenary of the Parliamentary abolition of the British slave trade, English Heritage recently commissioned a survey to identify links between 33 of its properties which were been built or occupied in the main era of English slave trading (c 1640–1840) and slavery or abolition. The intention was to establish what form any such links took and to add this to the bank of historical research on which future site interpretation can be based. Of the 33 properties surveyed, 26 were found to have some sort of link to the history of slavery and abolition. The kinds of connections uncovered were much more diverse than the stereotype of a wealthy slave trader or colonial plantation owner building himself a country house on the profits of exploitation. In fact none of the properties were directly built from the proceeds of slavery in this way. Peter Thellusson (1737–97) who bought the South Yorkshire estate of Brodsworth in 1790 is an interesting case in point. Though he did not build a new house with his riches, his career encapsulates three ways in which a property could financially benefit from slavery: trade with the West Indies, serving the banking needs of planters and ownership of colonial properties. Estates could also benefit from slavery-derived wealth through their masters’ marriages to an heiress or their holding official colonial posts. Thus, Godfrey Webster of Battle Abbey in Sussex married the Jamaican sugar plantation heiress Elizabeth Vassall in 1786, and Richard Aldworth Nevile, who inherited Audley End in Essex in 1797, had been appointed Provost-Marshal of Jamaica in 1762 – a lucrative post which is thought to have yielded £120,000.
As the exhibition ‘Slavery and Justice: the Legacies of Dido Belle and Lord Mansfield’ last year at Kenwood showed, places can be linked to the history of slavery in more positive and perhaps surprising ways. Lord Mansfield, who built much of Kenwood House, presided over the Somersett legal case of 1772, and the Zong case of 1783 – both important milestones on the road to abolition. Robert Henley, Lord Northington of Northington Grange in Hampshire, declared in the 1762 case of Shanley v. Harvey that ‘as soon as a man sets foot on English ground he is free . . . a negro may maintain an action against his master for ill-usage, and may have a Habeus Corpus if restrained of his liberty.’ Charles James Fox, a key parliamentary advocate of abolition, died at Chiswick House in 1806.While the comfortable position of Lord Mansfield’s black niece, Dido Elizabeth Belle, at Kenwood may have been highly unusual, other black people, such as James Chappell, a servant at Kirby Hall in the 1670s, lived in English Heritage properties within the household establishment.
These are some of the more prominent examples. Not all the links uncovered were this strong, but viewed together they create a tangled web of connections to the slavery-dependent Atlantic economy. The survey has shown that research into such traditionally neglected aspects of historic houses is likely to be fruitful, besides being fascinating and long overdue. It also serves as a reminder that while investigating the role of slavery in these high-status establishments reveals tales of exploitation, it also uncovers stories of affection and human sympathy.
Read more about English Heritage's project to research its properties' slavery connections, and more in-depth reports on Bolsover Castle, Brodsworth Hall, Marble Hill House and Northington Grange.
Read my TLS review of Madge Dresser and Andrew Hann (eds.) Slavery and the British Country House (2013).
Read my TLS review of Madge Dresser and Andrew Hann (eds.) Slavery and the British Country House (2013).
