Schools Learning Zone
TEACHER NOTES
page 1 of 3
Diversity Through Time, Bristol (Multiethnic)
Slave Trade
Black citizens in a slave-trading port:
the black community in 17th and 18th
century Bristol
Trade Connections with the Americas and the Caribbean
Bristol ships had started to trade along the West African coast in the
1500s. ‘Brize-yo’ (literally ‘children of Bristol’) was reportedly the name first
given to the English by the Neyo people of (what is now) the Ivory Coast.
Bristol citizens were also involved in the early colonisation of the
Caribbean and North America, and the setting up of slave plantations
there from the 17th century - at first using white bonded labour from
Bristol, the West Country and Ireland. Bonded labour is made up of people
who sign a contract to work for an employer for a fixed number of years,
usually for low or no pay. Sometimes 17th century courts would sentence
someone to be a bonded labourer or prisoners (including prisoners of war)
would be transported as a labour force.
These white workers were not available in large numbers and generally
were not tough enough for the conditions in the colonies - and struggled to
survive the harsh conditions. A better workforce was found, and Africans
were forcibly kidnapped and enslaved before being brought to the West
Indies and American colonies as forced labour. Bristol merchants’
enthusiasm for profit quickly made Bristol a key slaving port.
Map of Britain and the Atlantic slave-based economy 1660s -1807.
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TEACHER NOTES
page 2 of 3
Diversity Through Time, Bristol (Multiethnic)
Slave Trade
Bristol’s involvement with the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Historians estimate that Bristol ships carried more than a half a million
enslaved Africans to America between 1698 and 1807, and believe that
about one in six (or 90,000) died during the sea journey. Despite these
large numbers, very few Africans were brought to Bristol. However,
popular, but untrue, myths have developed about street names and places
claimed to be associated with the slave trade.
Very few enslaved Africans were brought to Bristol. The Bristol street
names Blackboy Hill and Whiteladies Road are NOT related to the slave
trade. Enslaved peoples were NOT kept chained up in the Redcliffe caves.
However, there was a very small and dispersed ‘free’ black community in
17th and 18th century Bristol - mostly working in shipping and the port, as
well as some servants and others.
Enslaved Africans largely bypassed the city, being shipped directly from
Africa to the Americas. Bristol’s slave trade was a relatively minor part of
the port’s export, although Bristol was a hugely dependent on the trade in
slave-produced goods such as sugar, and thereby an integral part of the
emerging Atlantic slave economy.
What impact did the slave trade have on the Bristol economy and
life?
By the 1700s, sugar refining was the city’s largest industry, alongside a
range of other trades largely connected with the trade to Africa and the
West Indies.
What do we know about black Bristolians in a slaving port?
There is limited evidence about Bristol’s black citizens during the 17th and
18th centuries, but it is known that there was a small community involved
in a range of different trades.
While some historians claim that London had a black Georgian population
of about 15,000 people, Bristol records only help identify a hundred black
Bristolians. However, it is clear that the Bristol black community was larger
than this.
What was it like to be a black Georgian?
The black community in Georgian Bristol was quite widely dispersed. Most
employed black people were probably the only person of colour in the
household, and may have felt somewhat isolated. Although members of
the community may have felt some links with other people of colour, it
cannot be assumed that this was so. First-generation black people in
Georgian Bristol, who had not been born in the city, were less likely to
have access to a family support structure than the minority groups with
larger populations.
Most of the community had not been given access to formal education, so
cultural and language issues (as well as racism) probably made aspects of
their day-to-day lives difficult or uncomfortable. Although some of Bristol’s
minority Christian communities did excellent outreach (such as the
Baptists, Moravians and Methodists), the more powerful Church of
England was far less warm.
Textiles, glass, brass, and gun manufacturing all made products related to
supplying slavers and plantations. Many of the port’s sailors and
dockworkers were also kept busy by the slave trade.
Profits were reinvested in a wide range of other businesses in the city and
inland by the ‘African’, ‘West Indian’, ‘Virginian’ and ‘Carolina’ merchants.
Bristol people gained considerably from the ‘triangular trade’ and it is not
surprising that some of the most powerful and wealthy merchants opposed
the moves to end the slave trade.
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TEACHER NOTES
Diversity Through Time, Bristol (Multiethnic)
page 3 of 3
Slave Trade
Most of the ruling elite were involved in, or implicated in, slavery and
therefore held views which did not include seeing the black community as
their equals. While the rich appreciated the novelty value of having a
domestic servant with a black face, they were also happy to perpetuate
stereotypes of black people and often uncritically accepted the commonly
held myth that black people were less hard working or intelligent than the
white community. Certainly there is plenty of evidence from the art of the
period, especially in caricatures, of deep seated racism and stereotypical
views of minorities.
Inter-racial liaisons, whilst they did occur, happened mainly amongst free
seamen and local women, and seem to have been limited in number. They
were certainly not acceptable in polite society. Thus, when the immigration
of Black servants from America ceased after Emancipation, Bristol’s small
black population appears to have dwindled into insignificance.
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