Heiresses: Marriage, Inheritance and Caribbean Slavery
Georgian heiresses are inescapable in British culture. They flutter through Jane Austen’s novels and countless period dramas. Their portraits – painted by Gainsborough, Zoffany, Reynolds – crowd our museums while their lavish estates pepper the countryside. However, a less genteel story lurks beneath the veneer – those glorious balls, dresses and dowries were funded by the exploitation of enslaved men, women and children.
Following the lives of nine heiresses and tracing their tainted money from its origins in the sugar plantations of the Caribbean to its legagies in Britain today, Miranda Kaufmann reveals a murky world of inheritance, fortune-hunting and human exploitation. From Jane Leigh Perrot, Jane Austen’s jailbird aunt, to Elizabeth Vassall Fox, Lady Holland, who faked her daughter’s death to maintain custody during a tumultuous divorce, Heiresses traces the often scandalous lives of the women who helped build Britain’s empire.
Kaufmann also pieces together the lives of the people these heiresses and their families enslaved, whose labour funded their lifestyles with whom their fates were intimately intertwined. There’s a Jamaican carpenter who collected caricatures of his enslavers; Dinah, an Antiguan heiress’s former nurse, who wrote to her former charge in India to demand her freedom; and Betsy Newton who travelled all the way from Barbados to London to confront her enslavers face-to-face.
Enlightening, provocative and masterfully researched, Heiresses offers a vital history of enslavement in Britain and the Caribbean.
Georgian heiresses are inescapable in British culture. They flutter through Jane Austen’s novels and countless period dramas. Their portraits – painted by Gainsborough, Zoffany, Reynolds – crowd our museums while their lavish estates pepper the countryside. However, a less genteel story lurks beneath the veneer – those glorious balls, dresses and dowries were funded by the exploitation of enslaved men, women and children.
Following the lives of nine heiresses and tracing their tainted money from its origins in the sugar plantations of the Caribbean to its legagies in Britain today, Miranda Kaufmann reveals a murky world of inheritance, fortune-hunting and human exploitation. From Jane Leigh Perrot, Jane Austen’s jailbird aunt, to Elizabeth Vassall Fox, Lady Holland, who faked her daughter’s death to maintain custody during a tumultuous divorce, Heiresses traces the often scandalous lives of the women who helped build Britain’s empire.
Kaufmann also pieces together the lives of the people these heiresses and their families enslaved, whose labour funded their lifestyles with whom their fates were intimately intertwined. There’s a Jamaican carpenter who collected caricatures of his enslavers; Dinah, an Antiguan heiress’s former nurse, who wrote to her former charge in India to demand her freedom; and Betsy Newton who travelled all the way from Barbados to London to confront her enslavers face-to-face.
Enlightening, provocative and masterfully researched, Heiresses offers a vital history of enslavement in Britain and the Caribbean.
REVIEWS
'Heiresses captures the many intimate stories behind the money laundering of enslavers' wealth. Kaufmann's writing style is neither judgy nor cold but a perfect balance of critical humour and searing historical insight. A must-read.' —Paterson Joseph, actor and author of The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho
'A startling insight into the lives of the real “Mrs Rochesters”. The role of women in plantation slavery, as perpetrators and victims is uncovered by a historian at the height of her powers.' —Anita Anand, author of The Patient Assassin and co-host of Empire
'A sobering and significant achievement, this is a book you need to read.' — Lucy Worsley
'Heiresses is a masterpiece, beautifully written, deeply researched, and very moving. Kaufmann writes with passion and compassion; she has real empathy for the characters she describes.' -- David Dabydeen, author of Hogarth's Blacks: Images of Blacks in 18th-Century English Art
'Heiresses takes us on a breath-taking tour of the eighteenth-century social world. It shows us, dramatically and undeniably, that women as well as men played a foundational part in the gruesome industry of transatlantic enslavement, and that the profits they garnered laced together almost every part of Georgian Britain and its empire. Powerfully written and scrupulously researched, Miranda Kaufmann's new book is a standing rebuke to those who would deny the facts of history, simply because they challenge an invented national self-image.' -- David Andress, author of The French Revolution
'An impeccably researched and penetrating new history of the transatlantic slavery system, revealing the role of heiresses in bringing slavery wealth to British society. Forensic, rigorous and deeply ethical, the book is written in flawless prose. Kaufmann's revelatory chapter on Jane Austen alone entirely redefines a favoured author's relationship with slavery and abolition.' —Corinne Fowler, author of Our Island Stories
'Heiresses is truly remarkable. This superb book will guide thousands into a world new to them… and make them think, reflect, think… and think again.' —Marika Sherwood
'This marvellously written tale of nine heiresses forging their thoroughly absorbing lives with money from slavery gives us an entirely fresh insight into Georgian and Victorian Britain, but more importantly it is also a triumph of reparative history.' —Alan Lester, Professor of Historical Geography at the University of Sussex
'Vivid, shocking and compulsively readable: these stories of greed, lust and betrayal, all driven by a ruling elite that was racist and misogynist to its core, are so important as we seek an honest reckoning with Britain's colonial history. Miranda Kaufmann is not just a fine investigative historian – she is a superb story-teller.' —Alex Renton, author of Blood Legacy
'Heiresses is incredibly well researched, providing a fascinating (and sometimes shocking) insight into the stories of nine heiresses and their connections to plantations and enslaved people. Highly recommend!' — Melanie Backe-Hansen, author of A House through Time
Kaufmann creates a vivid, complex picture of how deeply Caribbean slavery and its profits were enmeshed in British society, with cameos from figures like Jane Austen and Lord Byron. Heiresses consistently draws the reader’s attention back to the enslaved people as they resisted, rebelled, and endeavored to build better lives within a bitterly unjust system. Unflinching yet compassionate, this book will appeal to readers aiming to deepen their understanding of the British Empire and the history of slavery." Booklist
'In this fascinating study, Miranda Kaufmann explores the lives of nine women whose wealth derived from the slave trade. Scholarly and incredibly well researched, this will no doubt become essential recommended reading for those wishing to learn more about this shameful era.' --Historical Novel Society
'A fresh perspective on Britain’s involvement in slavery through the lives of nine 18th-century women who accrued large fortunes in the empire’s Caribbean colonies and, by virtue of their wealth, became sought-after wives by men of all classes. A meticulously researched history.' --Kirkus
'This robust chronicle excavates the lives of nine female British enslavers. These female enslavers were just as callous as their male counterparts, Kaufmann diligently shows. Her research is impressive; she frequently leaves her subjects behind in their mansions to dive into the history of slavery in the West Indies, and spends ample time delineating the stories of enslaved people and their relationships to these heiresses. Serious students of history will learn much.' Publishers Weekly
'Kaufmann provides a compelling account of the lives of nine heiresses. Kaufmann tracks not only the heiresses’ lives but also the lives of the enslaved people they owned, how their plantations traded hands, and their influences on Caribbean enslavement culture. She brings life to each story by crafting a linear narrative with rich background information. A comprehensive and gripping examination of the fortunes, lives, and influences of nine women within the Caribbean enslavement economy.' Library Journal
'The indefatigable historian Miranda Kaufmann... has written a new book digging deep into wealth, brought by women into Britain out of slavery, by marriage... A fascinating study, a great read and highly recommended.' Tina Baxter, for London Historians
'Kaufmann has done diligent research in copious archives in Britain and the West Indies to trace the fortunes of nine of these heiresses, and has produced an eye-opening account of their lives and inheritances... The stories she tells will stay in the memory, and perhaps also on the conscience, for a long time.' Stephen Bates, Literary Review
'Whereas other scholars have worked on female enslavers living in the Americas, the author’s originality is to study those who were mainly or wholly in Britain.... the reasons for choosing nine women are compelling: such breadth allows Kaufmann to touch on a huge range of ideas, and the collective portrait is a powerful one.... These nine women’s stories are remarkably new: apart from two old books and a few articles, none has been the subject of study before....Even for younger generations better informed about the consequences of Empire, this book will be revelatory....This book, in effect, takes imagined statues of elite female slavers from their plinths and, instead of merely attacking them, puts them on display, where the captions and adjacent displays can provide a more complete context. It is a heroic achievement.' Ophelia Field, Times Literary Supplement
'Heiresses captures the many intimate stories behind the money laundering of enslavers' wealth. Kaufmann's writing style is neither judgy nor cold but a perfect balance of critical humour and searing historical insight. A must-read.' —Paterson Joseph, actor and author of The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho
'A startling insight into the lives of the real “Mrs Rochesters”. The role of women in plantation slavery, as perpetrators and victims is uncovered by a historian at the height of her powers.' —Anita Anand, author of The Patient Assassin and co-host of Empire
'A sobering and significant achievement, this is a book you need to read.' — Lucy Worsley
'Heiresses is a masterpiece, beautifully written, deeply researched, and very moving. Kaufmann writes with passion and compassion; she has real empathy for the characters she describes.' -- David Dabydeen, author of Hogarth's Blacks: Images of Blacks in 18th-Century English Art
'Heiresses takes us on a breath-taking tour of the eighteenth-century social world. It shows us, dramatically and undeniably, that women as well as men played a foundational part in the gruesome industry of transatlantic enslavement, and that the profits they garnered laced together almost every part of Georgian Britain and its empire. Powerfully written and scrupulously researched, Miranda Kaufmann's new book is a standing rebuke to those who would deny the facts of history, simply because they challenge an invented national self-image.' -- David Andress, author of The French Revolution
'An impeccably researched and penetrating new history of the transatlantic slavery system, revealing the role of heiresses in bringing slavery wealth to British society. Forensic, rigorous and deeply ethical, the book is written in flawless prose. Kaufmann's revelatory chapter on Jane Austen alone entirely redefines a favoured author's relationship with slavery and abolition.' —Corinne Fowler, author of Our Island Stories
'Heiresses is truly remarkable. This superb book will guide thousands into a world new to them… and make them think, reflect, think… and think again.' —Marika Sherwood
'This marvellously written tale of nine heiresses forging their thoroughly absorbing lives with money from slavery gives us an entirely fresh insight into Georgian and Victorian Britain, but more importantly it is also a triumph of reparative history.' —Alan Lester, Professor of Historical Geography at the University of Sussex
'Vivid, shocking and compulsively readable: these stories of greed, lust and betrayal, all driven by a ruling elite that was racist and misogynist to its core, are so important as we seek an honest reckoning with Britain's colonial history. Miranda Kaufmann is not just a fine investigative historian – she is a superb story-teller.' —Alex Renton, author of Blood Legacy
'Heiresses is incredibly well researched, providing a fascinating (and sometimes shocking) insight into the stories of nine heiresses and their connections to plantations and enslaved people. Highly recommend!' — Melanie Backe-Hansen, author of A House through Time
Kaufmann creates a vivid, complex picture of how deeply Caribbean slavery and its profits were enmeshed in British society, with cameos from figures like Jane Austen and Lord Byron. Heiresses consistently draws the reader’s attention back to the enslaved people as they resisted, rebelled, and endeavored to build better lives within a bitterly unjust system. Unflinching yet compassionate, this book will appeal to readers aiming to deepen their understanding of the British Empire and the history of slavery." Booklist
'In this fascinating study, Miranda Kaufmann explores the lives of nine women whose wealth derived from the slave trade. Scholarly and incredibly well researched, this will no doubt become essential recommended reading for those wishing to learn more about this shameful era.' --Historical Novel Society
'A fresh perspective on Britain’s involvement in slavery through the lives of nine 18th-century women who accrued large fortunes in the empire’s Caribbean colonies and, by virtue of their wealth, became sought-after wives by men of all classes. A meticulously researched history.' --Kirkus
'This robust chronicle excavates the lives of nine female British enslavers. These female enslavers were just as callous as their male counterparts, Kaufmann diligently shows. Her research is impressive; she frequently leaves her subjects behind in their mansions to dive into the history of slavery in the West Indies, and spends ample time delineating the stories of enslaved people and their relationships to these heiresses. Serious students of history will learn much.' Publishers Weekly
'Kaufmann provides a compelling account of the lives of nine heiresses. Kaufmann tracks not only the heiresses’ lives but also the lives of the enslaved people they owned, how their plantations traded hands, and their influences on Caribbean enslavement culture. She brings life to each story by crafting a linear narrative with rich background information. A comprehensive and gripping examination of the fortunes, lives, and influences of nine women within the Caribbean enslavement economy.' Library Journal
'The indefatigable historian Miranda Kaufmann... has written a new book digging deep into wealth, brought by women into Britain out of slavery, by marriage... A fascinating study, a great read and highly recommended.' Tina Baxter, for London Historians
'Kaufmann has done diligent research in copious archives in Britain and the West Indies to trace the fortunes of nine of these heiresses, and has produced an eye-opening account of their lives and inheritances... The stories she tells will stay in the memory, and perhaps also on the conscience, for a long time.' Stephen Bates, Literary Review
'Whereas other scholars have worked on female enslavers living in the Americas, the author’s originality is to study those who were mainly or wholly in Britain.... the reasons for choosing nine women are compelling: such breadth allows Kaufmann to touch on a huge range of ideas, and the collective portrait is a powerful one.... These nine women’s stories are remarkably new: apart from two old books and a few articles, none has been the subject of study before....Even for younger generations better informed about the consequences of Empire, this book will be revelatory....This book, in effect, takes imagined statues of elite female slavers from their plinths and, instead of merely attacking them, puts them on display, where the captions and adjacent displays can provide a more complete context. It is a heroic achievement.' Ophelia Field, Times Literary Supplement
