1704 |
A 'small insurrection of negroes' reported in Jamaica
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1706 |
England: judgement of Lord Chief Justice Sir John Holt in the case of Smith v. Brown and Cooper said that 'as soon as a negro comes into England, he becomes free' - but this judgement is ignored |
1711-1713 |
Bristol Corporation and Society of Merchant Venturers campaign to stop the Royal African Company regaining monopoly status, arguing the importance of the slave trade to Bristol's economy |
1713 |
Treaty of Utrecht ends the Spanish War of Succession: Britain takes over the Asiento, the contract to supply Spanish America with slaves |
1729 |
Britain's Attorney General Sir Philip Yorke asserts that a slave in England was not automatically free, nor did baptism 'bestow freedom on him'
Slave revolt in Cuba
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1730 |
Britain becomes the biggest slave trading country: from 1690 to 1807 British ships transport about 2.8 million enslaved Africans |
1730-1740 |
First Maroon war in Jamaica |
1736 |
Slave revolt in Antigua: plans to massacre whites fail, and the plotters, including skilled millwrights, coppersmith, sugar boiler, masons, butchers, carpenters etc. are executed 5 broken on the wheel, six gibbeted, 77 burned alive |
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1742 |
Short-lived alliance between some slaves and disaffected maroons resulting in a localised uprising in Jamaica
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1743 |
The General Rules of the Methodist Church forbid the buying and selling of slaves |
1744 |
During the War of the Austrian Succession, Bristol Corporation forwarded a petition to the King praying for the protection of the African slave trade and characterising it as the most valuable branch of local commerce. Among the privateers raised to protect Bristol's commerce was the Southwell |
1746 |
Slave revolt in Jamaica |
1747 |
Liverpool overtakes Bristol as Britain's premier slaving port, with about 49 voyages a year against Bristol's average of 20 |
1750 |
The Company of Merchants Trading to Africa takes over the Royal African Company's role in slave trading, with membership of 237 Bristol merchants, 157 London merchants and 89 Liverpool merchants
Major slave revolt aboard the Bristol ship, the King David
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1752 |
Slave revolt in Martinique |
1760 |
Tacky's slave rebellion in Jamaica 400 rebels were executed
The Quakers ban slave-trading amongst their followers
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1761 |
Slave revolt in Nevis
Dutch forced to conclude treaty with 'Bush Negroes' (i.e. escaped slaves) in Surinam
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1763 |
Treaty of Paris ends the Seven Years War: Grenada, Dominica, St Vincent and Tobago given to Britain |
1765 |
Fanti Prince visits Bristol
Slave uprising on 17 estates in Jamaica
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1767 |
Jonathan Strong case begins: a slave in England was agreed to be free from transportation if they were not guilty of any crime |
1770 |
French writer Abbé Raynal publishes a work calling for a 'Black Spartacus' to arise and avenge slavery which the author calls a crime against nature |
1772 |
Lord Mansfield's Judgement in the case of James Somerset declares that masters cannot force slaves resident in England to return to the plantations. Wrongly thought to be a judgement which freed slaves in England, the Mansfield Judgement did signal the beginning of the end of slavery in Great Britain itself but a slave's legal status in Britain was still unclear and even after 1772 there are cases of slaves being forcibly deported by their owners |
1774 |
John Wesley publishes anti-slavery tract Thoughts Upon Slavery |
1776 |
American War of Independence seriously disrupts all transatlantic trade in Bristol |
1777 |
Short-lived uprising in the parishes of Hanover and Westmoreland in Jamaica |
1778 |
House of Commons appoints a Committee to investigate the British slave trade |
1783 |
Public outrage in England when the case of the Zong becomes known: the captain threw sick Africans overboard because of a claimed shortage of water - the owners could claim insurance if the deaths were necessary to save the ship, but not if they died of 'natural causes' |
1786 |
Thomas Clarkson's Essay on Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species is published |
1787 |
Committee for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade founded in London
Thomas Clarkson visits Bristol on a fact-finding mission about the slave trade
Society of the Friends of the Blacks founded in France and liaises with English and American anti-slavery groups
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Committee of the British Privy Council examines the slave trade
Dolben Act passed, to regulate the number of slaves carried on British ships
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1789 |
French Revolution encourages an insurrection of slaves in Haiti |
1791 |
House of Common rejects motion of William Wilberforce to introduce abolition bill. Celebrations in Bristol on Brandon Hill |
1792 |
Sierra Leone established as a private company, under the British Crown, of free Africans (many of whom are former American slaves) |
1794 |
French Revolutionary Government outlaws slavery |
1794-1796 |
Second Maroon war in Jamaica
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1798 |
Toussaint L'Ouverture, leader of African slaves, wins full control of Haiti Kofi's rebellion a small uprising in Jamaica |
1800 |
Napoleon sends in troops to re-establish slavery in the French Caribbean
Gabriel Prosser leads a slave rebellion in Virginia
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