Skip to main content

Profound, and yet unsettling

I read a book called 'The Slave Trade' by Nigel Sadler and here are a collection of quotes from that book telling the story of the slave trade which I have posted on various people’s profiles on Facebook:

'...the first known British trader in Africans was John Hawkins. Between 1562 and 1567, Hawkins made four journeys between the Sierra Leone River and Hispaniola (modern day Haiti and the Dominican Republic), taking a total of 1,200 enslaved Africans to sell to the Spanish settlers.'

‎'prices had already been arranged with the quick for what quantity of each goods a female, male and child slave would raise'

‎'Bristol owes ALL her prosperity, nay, her existence to commerce with the West Indies.'

'I never before witnessed such a Christmas Day; the negroes have been beating their tambourines and dancing the whole day and now between eight and nine o'clock they are pursuing their sport as hotly as ever'.

‎'I feel great sorrow when I hear some people in this country say that the slaves do not need better usage, and do not want to be free.'

‎'The First Maroon War was led by Cudjoe and Nanny of the Maroons'

'In 1806 Lord Grenville formed a new government and argued that the slave trade was 'contrary to the principles of justice, humanity and sound policy'. In 1807 the Abolition of the Slave Trade bill was passed with clear majorities in both the House of Commons and House of Lords'.

'Harriet Jacobs recalled that 'the mistress, who ought to protect the helpless victim, has no other feelings towards her but those of jealousy and rage'.'

‎'Harriet Jacobs wrote in 1861, 'I now entered my fifteenth year... He tried his utmost to corrupt the pure principles my grandmother had instilled... He told me I was his property; that I must be subject to his will in all things.''

'1948 Universal Declaration of Human rights 'No one shall be held in slavery or servitutde; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms''


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Notes from Energy & Utility Forum 2017

1. Robert Symons, CEO of Western Power Distribution said: “Energy demand could rise by 100% by 2030. Smart grids will be needed to manage electric vehicle charging so that the usage does not exceed the supply capacity at any time during the day.” 2. Spoke to Harry Vickers, Business Development Manager of Camborne Energy Storage, Camborne Capital at the Energy and Utility Forum in London on October 23rd 2017. He told me his company is working with Elon Musk to bring Tesla battery grid storage solutions to the UK. 3. Spoke to Sally Barrett-Williams, Chairman of Energy and Utility Forum on October 23rd, who said subsidies for solar projects had ended and her company’s focus has shifted to energy storage schemes. 4. Spoke to Simon Dowland, PhD, at 13:00 on Sunday 29th October, Simon is now working up in Cambridge at the Cavendish Physics Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, he is working in industry for the company Eight19 Ltd a spin off from a research project to bring ne

Effective Altruism

It’s not quite Aldous Huxley or George Orwell. I think altruism is what the Dalai Lama perhaps aspires to; kindness, clarity and compassion. This is about humanity rather than about more abstract terms such as the value of money as a metric for happiness or altruism. When dealing with diagnostic labels in mental health, you have to decide whether money is in fact a factor is such a diagnosis or not, given your politics on what money is. Therefore, mental health should be more of a framework that enables those who chose to give up their freedom to live a healthy life, in safety and security within the system. People seek opportunity, therefore by providing such a framework and a decent introduction to a healthy life free of unhappiness is essential to providing a service that is altruistic. We can see this from the British government’s model of social care and welfare programmes, which have proven resilient to mass immigration, a changing demographic, leading to the disruption in

Thoughts of Grandma and Grandpa

Grandma and Grandpa at home in their 1 acre garden Grandpa was a scientist but no one paid him too much heed. He was a naval officer, Chief science officer, presumably naval lieutenant or, perhaps commander. I have never found out but I presume to have inherited the rank in British society. He had written about a voyage subsequent to WW2 where his ship promoted most ratings to officer rank, a 20 th century voyage of discovery where everyone made progress on their naval rank post war, so that most of the ships complement ended up as officers at the end of the voyage. This was led by a Rear-admiral so it must have all been legitimised by the mandarins at Whitehall. Grandpa never really approved of their pandering to communist sympathies. How many tweets make a twat again David Cameron? I think he was talking about Nick Clegg. #JokeOfTheDay my grandma thought I was an upper-class twit after I went to Eton. She thought it was more important to get a car and go on dates and make ou