Enslavement Enabling Education

140 years after being granted college status the University of Liverpool’s connections to slavery have been interrogated by a group of community researchers, The Liverpool Black History Research Group.

The project entitled ‘Enslavement Enabling Education’ examines links to the slave economy in the business and family backgrounds of over 200 shareholders in Liverpool’s Royal Institution. The significance of the Institution being that it is widely accepted as the forerunner or ‘enabling institution’ for the University of Liverpool. The University acknowledged this link when it commemorated the bicentenary of the founding of the Royal Institution in November 2017.  The Royal Institution was established in 1817 for the promotion of Literature, Science and the Arts. The original building will be familiar to many, located at 24 Colquitt Street, within the World Heritage Site. 

The group emphasises that its research, which has taken some two years to complete, has been rigorous, adopting a high burden of proof and its findings are released now as ‘a least case scenario’. These findings show that some 68% of shareholders (see below) had business interests, or close family connections to the slave economy. In addition to persons having a direct interest such as plantation owners, former slave captains or investors in slave voyages (prior to 1808), it includes those merchants importing slave produced goods principally cotton, sugar and tobacco as well as manufacturers of goods used in the trade. 

Although the slave trade was abolished in 1807, pre-dating the Royal Institution, many of the merchants who were proprietors became wealthy captaining or investing in slave ships prior to abolition. This legislation merely prevented the trading of slaves in the British Empire, it did not abolish slavery in the colonies, which continued until 1834. Therefore, Liverpool merchants continued to profit from the slave economy after 1807 and specifically at the time the Royal Institution was established.

Perhaps surprisingly, the research reveals several shareholders shown to be importing slave produced goods and in some cases owning slaves, were at the same time advocating the abolition of slavery.

The research will be presented in a searchable database that can be constantly updated when new data becomes available. LBHRG welcomes contributions from other independent researchers, history groups, academics, genealogists and family historians.

It is not known whether the University of Liverpool, which is home to the Centre for the Study of International Slavery, has commissioned its own research. However, earlier research projects producing comparable findings have been undertaken by the Liverpool Bluecoat Arts Centre and the University of Glasgow.

Liverpool Black History Research Group is a collective of community researchers based at the Kuumba Imani Millennium Centre, 4 Princes Rd, Liverpool L8 1TH.

Project Update – March 2022

Following the release of our findings the group is now in dialogue with representatives of UoL.

The University of Liverpool (UoL) in recognising the value of this project has now agreed to fund its own research. This research on its links to the slave trade is being given priority status and is expected to last several years. It will build on our project, examining materials held in their special collections and archives.

Although outputs have not been identified, UoL will investigate its original sources of funding, the activities of key contributors through its history in addition to its estate and heritage collections. LBHRG has representatives on the Advisory Board which will progress this work and is pleased that this will be an ongoing working collaboration involving the local black community.

Following the lead taken by Glasgow University and UoL’s affiliation to the USS (Universities Studying Slavery) consortium, LBHRG will lobby for a policy of reparative justice, for further research to be widely shared beyond academia and for its originating research be made available via a searchable online database.