Talk:Bristol slave trade

Comment
Great article on the slave trade, but I wonder if the scope should be wider to aid understanding of why Bristol merchants went for the Africa trade with such glee, and maybe to question the underlying attitudes to slavery that allowed this to happen. When the African trade opened up it was not a new venture that the Bristol merchants picked up and ran with, they were already masters of the art. According to Robinson "... by the time of the Norman Conquest, Bristol was the most important centre in England for collecting, selling and exporting slaves" (BristolPete (talk) 09:40, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

From - A Shocking History of Bristol by Derek Robinson - Abson Books 1973 - Chapter 1 para 2). He cites incidents of this trade for the next half a millennium until the time of the civil war when in 1648 "'the gentlemen of Bristol applied to have liberty to transport 500 of the prisoners to the plantations'. The request was granted, and 500 Scottish slaves were shipped from Bristol to live, work and die on the big estates in Jamaica or Virginia". (BristolPete (talk) 09:40, 27 August 2012 (UTC)ibid Chapter one - para 8)

He also cites a heated exchange when Judge Jefferies threatened the Lord Mayor of Bristol with death for kidnapping for slavery (BristolPete (talk) 09:40, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

ibid chapter one - para 25). All this before the Royal African Company lost it's monopoly of the African Trade and Bristol entered it. This is important, because this was not just a race issue - it isn't that they saw Africans as sub-human, they were happy to exploit anyone who was vulnerable, regardless of skin colour (real equal opportunity employers). The move to the African Trade was a change in scale, but not in policy. Again this is important because the inclusion of this information, broadens the story out and challenges us to all vulnerable people we can exploit. At the very lest it gives an important background to understanding not just the facts, but the thinking behind a part of Bristol's past, and allows us to see the traders like Colston, not as monsters but as creatures of their own age and culture. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BristolPete (talk • contribs) 10:40, 27 August 2012‎


 * Please feel free to develop and expand this this suitably sourced material. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:57, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Clarification of removal please
, please describe the problem you allude to in the edit summary of this removal of sourced content. -- DeFacto (talk). 20:40, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * The deleted Bristol Post article claiming 3.5 million slaves were sent to the New World from Bristol should not be restored. It claims this number represented one fifth of the number sent by England which would indicate England (alone) sent 17.5 million slaves across the Atlantic. I suspect the reason that this journalistic squib is no longer available at the paper's website but only via archive is because of this big mistake. I also note you seem to be following me around? --  SashiRolls 🌿 ·     🍥 20:43, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * do you have evidence that it was "removed" rather than simply expired? And I arrived here by clicking the 'see also' in Edward Colston. I was hoping for a more comprehensive article, to be honest. -- DeFacto (talk). 20:55, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * The source is wrong. I didn't write the article, only removed the already deleted poor source. -- SashiRolls 🌿 ·     🍥 20:58, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * that's not what I asked. Is the Bristol Post a generally unreliable source and do you have evidence that article was "removed" rather than had simply expired - I note that other articles from the Post on the same page as that also result in the "Sorry you can't find what you're looking for." message? -- DeFacto (talk). 21:05, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Here is a live article in the Post's current website, Bristol Live, giving the same 3.4M figure. -- DeFacto (talk). 21:31, 13 June 2020 (UTC)


 * That figure is given as being for all of England, not for Bristol (as it was in the deleted article). Someone just posted this to the Edward Colston page: https://www.slavevoyages.org/assessment/estimates . --  SashiRolls 🌿 ·     🍥 00:07, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
 * If you find a scholarly source that hasn't been deleted indicating different numbers than the University of Bristol source, feel free to add it. -- SashiRolls 🌿 ·     🍥 20:54, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Commercial legacy
I have added a new section under legacy, commercial, to allow space for the banks that have been amalgamated and absorbed into extant banking institutions. This is hard to reference as the booklet on banking I have linked relies on you knowing that the named founders were slave traders (as none of them have Wikipedia pages; their wikidata entries are specific and referenced to the slave trade, but I don't think the average reader is likely to look there). I have linked another source that specifically talks about Onesiphorus Tyndall as both banker and slave trader. I feel that we could do with a proper page on the history of banking in Bristol that could cover this more satisfactorily, or am open to other ideas.DrThneed (talk) 04:17, 23 June 2020 (UTC)


 * You added Several Bristol banks, such as the Bristol Old Bank, the Miles Bank, and the Bristol New Bank, were founded by prominent slave traders and merchants, but the only mention of the slave trade in the source you cited says Onesiphorus was born into the merchant class in 1689. Like many another Bristol merchant of the time, he waxed rich on the slave trade. It's unclear what "the booklet on banking" refers to and your "relies on you knowing the named founders were slave traders" sounds like your are veering towards WP:OR. SmartSE (talk) 09:09, 23 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks, fair points. The booklet I meant was ref 13, now 15. I did not realise the URL for the online text was not showing, so have fixed that. I've also added a couple more sources, one from National Archives and one from Architecture Bristol, that name Isaac Elton. "Quote from Sweet History 'The National Westminster Bank on Corn Street has a plaque on the wall that commemorates the Old Bank, that was originally set up in nearby Broad Street in 1750 (see site 9 of Sweet History? trail). This once was the site of one of the first banks outside London. This was one of the banks that eventually merged into the National Westminster Bank. All but one of the bank’s founders were traders to Africa, including Merchant Venturer Isaac Elton. This shows the connection between Bristol’s slave trade and the development of the banking system.'"


 * I hope that is more acceptable. DrThneed (talk) 09:49, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Introduction Review
Re. change reversal https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bristol_slave_trade&oldid=964499908 I think the summary is valid, the only new information would be the Transatlantic Slave trade stats that I would suggest are added to the lower section rather than this introduction being removed. I am interested in your thoughts Evertent (talk). 21:39, 25 June 2020 (UTC)
 * the lead is supposed to be a summary of the article. As the article is about Bristol's involvement in the trade, then the lead should summarise only that, and not the trade in general which is not discussed in the article. -- DeFacto (talk). 21:52, 25 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Ok, I will re-instate the change but then remove the wider trade statistics in favor of Bristol specific statistics. Are you in agreement? Evertent (talk) 22:02, 25 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I have made the revert and removal of the information that you flagged. Evertent (talk) 18:10, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Images
Is there any good justification for including the images added in these edits in this article? They are very appropriate for inclusion in general articles about the slave trade, but should they be included in this article, which is specifically about the Bristol slave trade? They do not seem to be particularly pertinent to Bristol. Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:05, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Lead image
As the article is about the Bristol slave trade, the lead image of a slave ship that sailed mainly out of Liverpool seemed an odd choice. I have replaced it with one of the leading Bristol slave trader (and moved the ship image down the page). --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 11:44, 7 January 2022 (UTC)