A report from University College London’s Legacies of British Slave Ownership project has shown that between 10% to 20% of Britain’s wealthy can be identified as having had significant links to slavery. Tara Pilkington reports.
Although the slave trade was abolished in 1807 in the British Empire, it was not until 1833 that the ownership of other human beings was banned by the Slavery Abolition Act.
Despite this, 46,000 slave owners continued to benefit financially as the subsequent Slave Compensation Act provided a sum worth billions in 2020 terms back in payments. The former slaves, however, were not compensated.
Controversially, the amount of money borrowed to pay off slave owners was only repaid by the government fully in 2015.
Companies with links to slavery in their past include:
- Royal Bank of Scotland. A 2009 report funded by the bank found that directors of RBS predecessors had owned slaves, as well as giving loans and other support to plantation owners.
- Barclays Bank. Barclay’s history can be traced back to two goldsmith bankers in London in 1690. Two managers, a subscriber and three directors are named on the UCL database as having been involved in the slave trade or received slave compensation. More information can be found here.
- HSBC. Founded in 1865 to finance trade between Europe and Asia, its 1992 merger with the UK’s Midland Bank gives it earlier roots. Include the London Joint Stock Bank, whose first manager, George Pollard, shared £2,416 in compensation for giving up 134 enslaved people in Nevis.
- Lloyds Banking Group. Operating from one office in Birmingham for its first 100 years, in the 1860s it experiences rapid expansion John White Cater, a director of one of the rivals it acquired, received compensation for five estates that enslaved 80 people at the time of abolition. Eight former companies associated with Lloyds have links to claimants or beneficiaries in the UCL database.
