King Charles’s ancestors abetted the slave trade, and research aims to show what they knew

It is no secret that the succession of British kings enriched the former empire – and himself personally – from the evils of the transatlantic slave trade.

What is less clear – and interesting for today’s debate about the monarchy’s relationship with slavery – is what they knew about the practice, how they felt about participating and the level of enthusiasm for it.

Some 360 ​​years ago, did King Charles II consider human trafficking to be the same as elephant ivory? Did his younger brother, the future James II, have moral qualms about running the world’s most notorious slave trading company?

Preliminary answers to both questions, obtained by examining only one document, appear to be “yes” to the first and “no” to the second – and there are collections and libraries full of hundreds, even thousands, of documents still to be unearthed. by.

CBC News recently visited England’s National Archives, where University of Manchester PhD student Camilla de Koning painstakingly opened and examined the yellow pages of the Royal African Company’s charter.

“What I want is [the research] is about the royal family as individuals. It’s about personal thoughts, personal choices and ideas,” said de Koning, 28, who works under the supervision of Edmond Smith, an associate professor at the university.

Most impressively, King Charles himself has given his unequivocal support to her research.

Monarchy’s relationship with slavery under the microscope

England’s coronation week, which saw the coronation of King Charles III on Saturday, has focused attention not only on the future of the monarchy but on its past. The issue of the king and queen of England and their relationship with slavery has made for some uncomfortable moments.

There have been repeated calls from African and Caribbean countries for apologies and reparations, and groups of former British slave trading families are demanding that the British government atone for its historic role in transporting more than three million African slaves across the Atlantic.

King Charles is often vocal and emotional about his hatred of the slave trade, including during a visit to Ghana in 2018, when he spoke of the “horrible cruelty of slavery.”

He went further last month by openly supporting de Koning’s research work, offering access to the Royal Collection and the Royal Archives.

“I cannot describe the depth of my personal sorrow in the suffering of many, because I continue to deepen my understanding of the lasting impact of slavery,” said a statement from Buckingham Palace that quoted the King from a speech he gave in Rwanda last year.

“It was a bit shocking. I mean, all of a sudden, I was in the national news related to King Charles,” de Koning said.

The Royal African Company shipped nearly 200,000 slaves from Africa across the Atlantic to colonies in North, Central and South America over a 60-year period.

Written in elegant calligraphy with the name of the last King called Charles, King Charles II, de Koning said the charter left no doubt about the motivations and wishes of the king, who was King of England, Scotland and Ireland from 1660-85.

“Enslaved people are very important and in this regard [document] they are … listed in commodities. So they are not seen as people but as ‘good,'” he said.

Furthermore, the document shows that Charles II anointed his brother James, the Duke of York, as future king, with the power to run the Royal African Company and make important day-to-day decisions.

“The King … gave this great privilege to his brother … and that goal is the goal of the Royal Family,” de Koning said.

All of this suggests that not only kings were involved in the slave trade, but in some cases the royal family was also involved in making day-to-day decisions about how the trade was conducted, he said.

“This is very much James’s company. He gives his personal touch, his ideas and his company,” said de Koning.

Bristol was the seat of the slave trade

The Charter of the Royal African Company has been extensively studied in the past, but now with the support of the King, it is hoped that during the next three years of this project, there will be more revelations from new documents that are not usually available.

The evolution of Charles on the issue of slavery and the momentum it has gained lately can be traced in no small part to a chain of events that began in Bristol, a city in the southwest of England, in June 2020.

The city has a special connection with the slave trade.

The Bristol Historical Association estimates nearly half a million slaves moved through the city’s port in the 17th and 18th centuries – many of them under local businessman Edward Colston, who was secretary of the Royal African Company.

Seen by many as a philanthropist and benefactor to the city, Colston used the wealth generated by the slave trade to build schools, hospitals and public facilities. At the end of the 19th century, a bronze statue was erected in his honor on a plinth near the city’s waterfront, not far from where the slavers’ ships would dock.

But over the decades, as the origins of Colston’s wealth became better known, pressure to remove the statue grew. It culminated in mass demonstrations in June 2020, as protests related to Black Lives Matters took place around the world.

An angry mob tore up Colston’s tribute, dragged it to the water’s edge and threw it in the harbor.

“It was like the moment of the Berlin Wall,” recalls Edson Burton, an academic from Bristol who has studied the city’s ties to the transatlantic slave trade.

“It’s raising awareness in a very impactful way, and it’s had a ripple effect that I’ve never seen in my life.”

The debate over reparations for slavery

After the toppling statue, the issue of whether the British government should pay reparations for slavery was taken to the top of the nation’s political agenda.

The slave trade was officially outlawed at the beginning of the 19th century, and the British government offered compensation – but only to the companies that lost business, not to the enslaved people.

“Now we’re in 2023, and King Charles is looking at the queen’s involvement in the transatlantic slave trade, which I don’t think would have been possible without the Black Lives Matter campaign and the statue coming down,” Burton said.

“It feels like a responsible and progressive way to move this discussion forward,” he told CBC News.

Others, however, wanted Charles to go further by apologizing and compensating the descendants of slaves, both in England and overseas.

“I think it’s about leveling the playing field and equity,” said Cleo Lake, a reparations campaigner in Bristol who once attended a high school in the town that still has Colston’s name on the gate.

He said that Charles had taken some important steps, but that he had to work on the royal family’s wealth to justify it.

“Of course my ancestors died to make the same wealth [the Royal Family] and others are happy now. I think that should be disbanded,” Lake said.

A recent poll conducted for Yahoo shows public sentiment has shifted toward support for reparations, with 44 percent giving their support. The survey also found that there was a big difference between young people, who opted for compensation, and those over 65, who didn’t. Blacks are also more likely than whites to support reparations, underscoring the political sensitivity of the issue.

Edson Burton, the historian of Bristol, credits Charles with being able to proceed with the issue in a “progressive way” while avoiding some of the “polarities” that had existed.

He said he supports “the idea that the king should feel appropriate to the new nation, and not just the conservation of the old identity. So how do we get a consensus of identity going forward?”