Slaves and Slavery

This work set out to describe, in broad outline, the history of slavery and the slave trade in the British colonies up to 1838. In that year all slaves in British possession were freed. Moreover, those slaves were black, imported from Africa or born to Africans and their descendants in the Americas. The book, therefore concentrates on black slavery. It does not seek to tell the story of slavery in the USA although it is concerned with slavery in the Northern American colonies before they broke away from British control in 1776. This work does not try to explain the course of slavery in the non-English speaking world, save only where it impinges on the course of British slavery. It is then a brief account of the British involvement with black slavery from the early days of European colonization through to the early 19th century. Some attempt is then made to trace the legacy of black slavery, a legacy which survives in a host of ways today.