local black history

Local Black History

A beginning in Devon

byLucy MacKeith

Published by the Archives and Museum of Black Heritage

A partnership project between Black Cultural Archives and Middlesex University

Newest Lucy book 1/8/07 07:10

Basil Davidson, Sylvia Collicott and Marika Sherwoodhave inspired me by their work.

I would like to thank Zena Burland, John Ellis and‘Jane’ for their contributions to the text; Kathy Chaterand Mike Sampson for sharing their Devon data bases.

For other help I would like to thank: John Allan, SherryDoyal, Des Gander, Frank Gent, Todd Gray, Hazel Harvey,Ronald Impey, Vicky Jay, Julia Kumik, David Killingray, JoLoosemore, John McEwan, Stephen and Jo MacKeith,Sam Magne, Lynn Medlock, Jo and Harold Miller, ChrissieMorris, Louisa Parker, Den Perrin, Maggie Pipe, Len Pole,Liz Prince, Judith Proud, Joan Rendell, Mary-Rose Rogers,Brana Thorn, Alice Tomic, Janette Wallen, Angela Welchand staff at the Devon Record Office, North DevonRecord Office, Plymouth and West Devon Record Officeand the West Country Studies Library.

And my fellow communards where I live, who havecarried on with the work while I got lost in the past.

The author and publisher thank Devon County Council,the Devon and Cornwall Constabulary and the DevonCouncil of Churches for their sponsorship.

Every effort has been made to obtain permission forreproduction of pictures. The author and publisherthank those who have given their permission.

Designer Eva Searle; editor Bill MacKeith;photographer John Sealey; proof reader Sarah Bunker;researcher Mike Turnbull; word processing DawnBarraball.

© Lucy MacKeith, 2003; except ‘Black soldiers andDevon’, © John D. Ellis, 2003; ‘My father’, © ZenaBurland, 2003.

Published by Archives and Museum of Black Heritage,378 Coldharbour Lane, London SW9 8LF.

Printed by Brightsea Press, Exeter, Devon.

Front cover: Joe Green, Black Footman for Many Yearsto Mrs Quicke, late eighteenth century, painting formerlyascribed to Sir Joshua Reynolds. (See page 19.)

Acknowledgements

This booklet is dedicated to the memory of

Len Garrison 1943-20031

who worked to promote the recording of black history in Britain

It is time we let the world know we are proud of our heritage and we stand as living monuments For those who are afraid of who they must be are but slaves in a trance2


1

Foreword by Sam Walker, Director, AMBH 2Why black history in Devon? 3Black Romans in Devon? 3Saint Maurice 4Devon’s connection with the slave trade

and slavery 5Gravestones illustrating the links between

Devon and black history 13Black people and the sea; The London 16The Swete family in Modbury 17Joe Green 19Devon and the abolition of the slave trade 20Compensation for slavery? 21How to remember slavery and the slave

trade? 21Who is this man? 23Mapping the black presence in Devon 24

Olaudah Equiano 26Moretonhampstead 28Black soldiers and Devon by John D. Ellis 31My Father by Zena Burland 33Jane, a black Devonian 36How to take the study of black history

forward 37Conclusion – writing black history of the

past and today 39Resources for learning 41Notes for educators in schools, museums

and libraries 42Notes on the text 43Picture sources and acknowledgements 46Photo credits 46Index 47A call for further research 49

Note: An earlier version of the text of thisbooklet with more extensive notes is atwww.blackhistoryindevon.org.uk

Contents


2

Foreword

Until recently, few institutions have showninterest in the history, culture and heritage ofblack Britons. Indeed, during the 1980s whenblack people were campaigning for recognitionand awareness of the contribution they havemade to the development of Britain, they werevilified, ridiculed and marginalised.

Attempts to introduce multi-cultural educationwhich would reflect the multi-ethnic and multi-cultural nature of society failed through lack ofresources, rigorous research and access toinformation.

In the 1980s, Black Cultural Archives wasestablished and was among the leadingorganisations to collect, document anddisseminate the history and the role black peopleplayed in the development of Britain. The idea ofcollecting this information emanated from threebroad objectives namely:

• to challenge the stereotypical images onwhich racist notions are based;

• to be a source of pride for the blackcommunity whose history and heritage theyreflect; and

• to support the idea of a Black BritishHeritage.

Throughout Britain, the history of the Atlanticslave trade is generally known, but the history ofblack people before and after slavery isunknown. In some parts of the country, the ideathat slavery was part of the commerce in theirregion, and that the benefits of that trade arestill visible is not acknowledged.

This booklet will, I hope, begin to throw somelight on the presence of black people in areaswhich at one time were considered to be mono-ethnic.

I hope this booklet will provide useful hints andmethodologies for researching the black presencein all areas and thus provide further evidence ofthe multi-ethnic/multi-cultural nature of oursociety.

Sam WalkerProject Director

Archives and Museum of Black Heritage (AMBH)


3

This booklet about black1 history in Devonshire isshort because the work is only just beginning,not because there is no evidence to uncover.

The study of local history shifts the focus awayfrom the stories of kings, queens and GreatPeople to looking at the lives of ordinary people.Interest in finding out about the lives of blackpeople in history has grown in recent years andBlack History Month is celebrated each Octoberin Britain.

When we hear stories of the past it helps toknow who is telling the story. All stories,including ‘history’, are told from a particular pointof view. In today’s climate of equal opportunitiessome people say that race ‘makes no difference’.People can feel uncomfortable when the issue ofrace is raised.

But the ‘colour-blind’ approach hides theassumption that white is the norm, black theexception. To move towards a more accurate,inclusive view of history, we need to separate outthe different elements which have been ignoredpreviously. The evidence is available. The historywaits to be written.

Black history is not only for black people. It isnot only to be found in the history of big citiesand ports. Looking at black history in Devon, andsimilar parts of Britain, helps us to understandthe links between local, national and worldhistory.2

The study of a few exceptional individuals is notthe beginning and end of black history. There arestories about black people to be discovered in allwalks of life and in all areas.3

I hope to show that there is more to discover andthat we need this information to get a balancedview of our country, and our country’s past. Theuncovering of facts can alter our view of history.

This is the ‘missing part of our history’.4

Black Romans in Devon?

One local historian5 says that there is noevidence to show whether Africans were amongthe Romans who came to Devon. A Libya-bornemperor and other Africans were among theRoman soldiers, slaves and civilians in Britain.Some may have been in Devon.6

Why black history in Devon?


4

Saint Maurice

There is a carving of a black saint in the parishchurch in Uffculme in mid Devon. The carving isone of a number of old panels, which have beendescribed as medieval or sixteenth-century benchends or domestic panelling, which have beenmounted in a modern side altar.

Who is this saint? Why is his image here? Whatwas his part in our history?

The sixth Christian Crusade in the earlythirteenth century, led by the Holy RomanEmperor Frederick II, had as its sole allies NorthAfricans who were part of the Eastern OrthodoxChurch. Does this statue celebrate these AfricanChristian allies in the same way that, BasilDavidson believes, the statue of St Maurice inthe thirteenth-century cathedral in Magdeburgdoes?7

Whoever he is, the statue is of a black saint whowas worth making a carving of.

There is a church of St Maurice at Plympton StMaurice just outside Plymouth, which is alsoknown as St Thomas of Canterbury. It has noimage of St Maurice.

Relief carving of a black saint (Saint Maurice?) at Uffculme parish church.


5

Devon is a county with coastlines to the northand south. In the past the ports on Devon’scoastline played a more important part in travellocally and beyond. Their role today as holidayresorts hides their past importance as centres oftrade.

We can find evidence which shows Devon’sworld-wide influence and particularly richconnections with people of African origins.Devonians took their familiar names with themas they explored and settled the world. There areat least forty Plymouths in the world today.Sometimes black people were given the namesof places.8

The slave trade and slavery are not the onlyparts of Devon’s history where we can find blackpeople. But the contribution from black people inslavery, especially to the wealth of some peoplein Devon, is significant. The Atlantic slave systemhad many results. One is that people of Africandescent live all over the world today. Historyneeds to include slavery as a part of Devonhistory itself, not something quite separate.

Devon’s connection with the slave trade and slavery

Slave chains from West Africa, now in the Royal AlbertMemorial Museum, Exeter.


6

Well-known heroes in Devon history include seacaptains such as Sir John Hawkins, born inPlymouth, Sir Walter Raleigh, born nearSidmouth, and Sir Francis Drake, born nearTavistock.

William Hawkins, John Hawkins’s father,organised expeditions to West Africa in the1530s. He traded with Africans there in gold andivory. English traders brought Africans toEngland, sometimes by kidnapping them.9

But there was the possibility of making evenmore money. Many Europeans made the choiceto capture, later to buy, African people in WestAfrica. European ships took the capturedAfricans to the Americas on a journey oftendescribed as the ‘Middle Passage’. In theAmericas, Africans were forced to work asslaves on plantations. The Europeans then soldproducts like sugar, tobacco and rum, inEurope. There were enormous tradeopportunities for Devonians, and others, tosupply the basic needs of people living in theplantations.

For about three hundred years people in Britainwere directly involved in the slave trade and theplantation economies10 in the Americas.

John Hawkins is recognised as the first Englishslave trader, in 1562. He had learnt the skills ofsailing ships and trading from his father William.On his second slave-trading journey in 1564 hemade a profit of 60% on the outlay.

The coat of arms of Sir John Hawkins, who initiated theBritish slave trade, and recognised where his wealth camefrom by including a black figure.


7

People at all levels of societywere involved: sheepfarmers, spinners andweavers who created clothwhich was exported to Africaand the Americas, wooltraders in Exeter,bootmakers, food producers,metal workers who producedthe slave chains, shipbuilders,11 and bronzefounders who made themanillas (a kind of bracelet)which were used as money inthe slave trade. The list goeson. Probably most families inDevon benefited from whatbecame known as ‘TheTrade’.

A bronze manilla and a mould for making manillas from a bronze foundry in CowickStreet, Exeter, pre-1625. Manillas were used as currency in West Africa.


In The Forgotten Trade Nigel Tattersfieldexamines the involvement of minor ports in theslave trade, including Devonian ports.12 His bookis based on the logbook of a ship called Danieland Henry. The crew members came from coastaland inland towns and villages. He mentions‘George Yorke ... the sole black crew member’,who left the ship in Jamaica but was later press-ganged into the Navy. The crews of British shipswere multi-racial and multi-cultural in the past,as they are today. Black sailors were verycommon in the Navy.

In Devon there is a long-distance footpath, theMariners Way, which crosses both Dartmoor andExmoor (the present Two Moors Way followsroughly the same route). Sailors walked thispath, between the north and south coasts ofDevon, in search of work. This means that blacksailors, too, would have been seen far inland inDevon as well as on the coast.

Some Devonians became very rich through theslave trade, sometimes by direct involvement,more often by investing money and gettingenormous returns from their investments. OtherDevonians owned plantations in the Americas.Elias Ball of Stoke-in-Teignhead went to claim hisinheritance of one-half of a 740-acre farm inSouth Carolina in 1698 at the age of twenty-two.

A descendant, Edward Ball, in his book Slaves inthe Family, traces his ancestors in America, bothwhite and black.13 This book is a fine example ofdetailed historical research and is rich in Devonconnections. A slave is named ‘Plymouth’ in1721. A plantation is named ‘Halidon Hill’ in themid nineteenth century, perhaps a different formof ‘Haldon Hill’ outside Exeter?

8


9

Newspapers reported the ships which broughtthe products of the plantations back to Europe:

1670 … Barnstaple Jan 24. Yesterday arrived here the EXCHANGEbelonging to this port … laden with sugar.14

There were sugar-processing factories in Devon –at the Bishop’s Palace in Exeter,15 the Retreat16

in Topsham, and in Goldsmith Street, Exeter.Sugar was refined and made into sugar cones inclay pots. The Royal Albert Memorial Museum inExeter has modern reconstructions of these claypots. They are on display in the local historygallery, alongside fragments of the original claypots.

A sugar cone and syrup pot/jar dating from about 1700 fromexcavations in Exeter, with modern replicas showing theircomplete form and a sugar loaf as made in such pots.


10

Admiral Paul Ourry and his Servant or Slave, by JoshuaReynolds, painted for the Corporation of Plympton. Now inSaltram House, south Devon (National Trust).

There were also black people who lived in Devonwho were slaves or servants. Towards the end ofthe sixteenth century, Lady Raleigh, wife of SirWalter Raleigh of Devon, was one of the firstpeople in England to have a young Africanattendant. We can look at parish and otherrecords to find evidence. Some examples of thisare shown in the list in the centre pages of thisbooklet; the map there shows their widedistribution in the county. Also, we can findpaintings of rich people with their black slaves,statues in gardens, and archaeological remainswhich show Devon’s involvement.


11

Black people march from Brixham to London. From abroadsheet account of William of Orange arriving in Exeteron 17 October 1688.

200 Africans stay in Exeter in November1688

In 1688 William of Orange, from theNetherlands, landed in Brixham in south Devon.He marched all the way to London to claim theEnglish throne. An account was written at thetime about his passage through Exeter. We canimagine the procession crossing the River Exe,where thirteen arches of the old bridge remain,next to the modern roadways which cross theriver today. Then he went up Stepcote Hill andinto the city:

200 Blacks brought from the plantations ofthe Netherlands in America, Imbroyder’d Capslin’d with white Fur, and Plumes of whiteFeathers, to attend the Horfe.17


12

There were other African visitors to Devon whowere not slaves. John Naimbanna, the son of aruler in Sierra Leone, was sent to England in the1790s for his education and sailed for home fromPlymouth. He was not the only one.18

Vivian’s Visitations19 records details of Englishfamilies who were entitled to have a coat ofarms. It includes family trees showing whereindividuals lived. Thus we can read that JamesColleton, of Barbados, married Anne, daughter ofJames Kendall, the governor of Barbados. Theirson, John, married Elizabeth, the widow ofThomas Drax of Dorset and Drax Hall inBarbados. The centre pages of this bookletinclude records of the burial and baptism of blackservants of the Colletons.

Family histories will reveal similar stories. Oneexample is a study of the Prideaux family, onebranch of which lived in Barbados.20

Look at local street names. These are oftennamed after families who became wealthy fromthe fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries from theslave trade and black slave labour in plantations.Names such as Colleton, Codrington, Grenville,Drake, Hawkins and Raleigh in Devon. Otherplace names echo the past, such as Guinea21 orBlackboy Road.

Title page of The African Prince, an account ofthe life of John Henry Naimbanna (1767–93) byZachary Macauly, published in 1796.


13

Evidence of the link between Devon and theplantation slave economy of the West Indies isprovided by the gravestones of Devonians wholived there.

To the memory ofMary Ann widow of

Hugh Barnett EsquireFormerly of the Island of Jamaica

Who closed a life ofExemplary piety

And died at Newport, on the 7thDay of October 1846 in the 78th

Year of her ageBeloved and respected by all who knew her

Let me die the death of the righteous

Bishop’s Tauntonnorth Devon

These Devonian children drowned off Salcolmbein 1757:

Here lye the BodiesOf Rhodes-DanielMay and Joseph

Chambers. Sons andDaughters of EdwardChambers of Jamaica

Who were shipwreckedAt Cathole within this

Parish August 23rd 1757

Marlborough churchsouth Devon

Gravestones illustrating the links between Devon and black history


14

In Exeter Cathedral:

HSEGULIELMUS KELLITT HEWITT

De cashoo in – par – stae – elizabethaeAPUD – JAMAICAM INSULAM

ARMIGERNECON. PACIS. REGALIS. CURATOR

APVD. DURYARD. HVIC. CIVITATADJACENTIEM

CONIUGI. LIBERIS – SOCIIS. SERVIS.PROPINQUIS.

FLEBILIS. OCIDIT.III. ID IUN. A.D. MDCCCXII AET LV.

(Here liesWilliam Kellitt Hewitt

of Cashoo in the parish of St ElizabethIn the island of Jamaica

Knightand also Keeper of the King’s Peace

at Druryard adjacent to this cityHe died mourned by

His wife, children, friends, servants, relatives.11th June 1812 AD Aged 55)22

south choir aisle

Mrs Ann GriffithOf St Elizabeth’s in the island of Jamaica

d. 27.1.1824aged 78

south wall

Robert HarveyLate of the island of Grenada

D 10 July 1791 Aged 59

south-east corner, black stone

AnotherconnectionbetweenDevon and theplantationeconomy inBarbados, north aisle


15

Philip Scipio’s grave

There is a gravestone of an eighteenth-centuryblack person in Devon. It is the only one I knowof. It is now fixed to the north exterior wall ofWerrington Church:

Deposited HereAre the Remains of Philip ScipioServant to the Duke of Wharton

Afterwards to Sir William MoriceAn African

Whose Quality might have done HonourTo any Nation or Climate

And Give Us to SeeThat Virtue is Confined

To no Country or Complexion

Here WeepUncorrupted FidelityAnd Plain Honesty

In a pious regard to which virtue’s approv’dBy a brother and husband...23

Philip Scipio was brought to England from St Helena by the Duke of Wharton. He was apersonal servant to Lady Lucy Morice, whocaused the memorial stone to be erected. He wasburied on 10th September 1784 and wasdescribed in the church register as ‘A blackservant to Lady Lucy Morice’. He is believed tohave been eighteen years old when he died.


16

There was more smuggling in Devon and Cornwallthan anywhere else in England and black peoplewere involved. In a booklet about smuggling thereare three illustrations which include blacksmugglers.24 A black man is recorded as livingwith two smugglers on Looe Island just across thecounty border in Cornwall.25

In a book about women in the Navy in theeighteenth and nineteenth centuries, three out ofeleven illustrations show black figures.26

On 9 October 1796 a ship, The London, on itsway from St Lucia in the West Indies, waswrecked off Ilfracombe in north Devon.

There is a contemporary account of the captain ofthe ship, named Robertson, refusing to bring itinto the safety of the harbour to avoid the storm.There are reports of the bodies of Africans beingwashed ashore the following day, along with theshackles which had imprisoned them in the holdof the ship, and valuable coins. Were they slaves?

Or were they French prisoners ofwar? If they were Africans, theywere only in the Americas becauseof the slave trade.

There has been considerablecontroversy about the finds on thebeach of Rapparee Cove atIlfracombe.27 The localarchaeologist, Pat Barrow, hasgiven his own account of eventsfollowing his excavations up to1998.28

The London just outside Rapparee Cove(right in painting), Ilfracombe on 9 October1796, by John Walters, a painting inIlfracombe Museum.

Black people and the sea The London


17

The Swete family in Modbury

In 1699 the Swete family of Modbury, in southDevon, took over the lease of a property on theisland of Antigua in the West Indies. Letters andaccounts from the family’s agent, Roland Oliver,show that people living in the West Indies had toimport food, clothing, tools and equipment.Payments are made for doctors’ bills,29 loadingsugar on to ships, herring, cod fish, cloth,hoes,30 boots, candles, beans, oatmeal, ‘for beefat Christmas’, for nails, repairs to property andfor a grindstone.31

One year’s accounts includes payment to peoplefor catching runaway slaves32 and for buyingpadlocks, chains and collars to restrain Colla, ‘anotorious runaway’.33 People were paid to punishAfricans who resisted being slaves.34 In the1740s the agent wrote:

if you were to order six young negroes to bepurchased every year it would be of greatservice to the estate. At present we canscarcely make 40 able negroes, the rest areeither children or so old they are incapable ofworking. Old George died a few days ago, heis no loss to the estate.35

An interim report on fragments of the bonesfound in the cove states that it is unlikely thatthe bones were of black people from St Lucia.

Whatever the outcome of future findings, thestory of the wreck of The London is an exampleof the complicated nature of history, withlocal/national/world links.

There are arguments about whether the bonesshould be given a dignified burial in north Devon,St Lucia or Africa, or retained in a universityresearch department or in Ilfracombe Museum orby the local district council.

A local group, the Friends of Rapparee, want tobury the bones locally on the grounds that ‘thosewho died are part of our history too.’

When such a claim is based on studying Devon’sinvolvement in slavery and the slave trade, thiswill help Devonians understand their place in thehistory of black people.


18

Meanwhile, in London, Adrian Swete wrote to hisaunt on October 15 1744:

Mrs Phil Swete at Train by way of Ivybridge,Devonshire.

Dearest Aunt… My mama took this opportunity of sendingyou a pound of green tea and two pounds ofchocolates which she hopes you’ll accept ofand likewise the enclosed [papers] which shethought proper to send you to keep with therest of the Antigua accounts, and therefore,as I generally do, I supply the place ofsecretary to her.I am Dear Aunt,Your most dutiful nephewAdrian John SweteAged 1336

Like many other absentee Devonshirelandowners, the Swetes grew rich from the blacklabour in Antigua. They used some of the profitsthey made to pay for a water supply to bebrought into Modbury.

Old Traine, the house owned by the Swete family in Modbury,south Devon, photographed in the 1990s.

A memorial stonecommemorating Adrian Swetepaying for the supply of waterinto Modbury, south Devon. Atranslation of the Latin is:‘Given as a gift by AdrianSwete, knight (esquire) ofTrain in the year of our Lord1708. Transferred to this sitefrom the middle of the road1874.’


19

Joe Green

Thomas Coster was a merchant in Bristol whohad interests in the slave trade. He was amember of parliament (1734–9) and mayor ofthe city. When he died in 1739 he left £40,000 tohis daughter Jane.37

In 1759 Jane married her second husband, SirJohn Quicke of Newton St Cyres in Devon. Shebrought her inherited wealth when she marriedinto the Devon landed gentry. This wealth isreflected in the rich art works from that period inthe family.38

There is a portrait (see front cover) in the familyof a black man which is labelled Joe Green, BlackFootman for many years to Mrs Quicke. Thefamily think it likely that Joe Green was footmanto Mrs Quicke after she was widowed. JaneQuicke lived in fashionable Bath as an old ladyand there is a portrait of her at that time withtwo friends.

Mrs Quicke and two friends in Bath, by Sir Thomas Laurence.Just as Jane brought her slave-funded wealth with her whenshe married into the Devon landed gentry, so she took it onto her fashionable retirement in Bath.


20

Devonians also played their part in the abolitionof the slave trade and slavery. William Davy,from Exeter, was the one of the two counsels forJames Somerset, the recaptured slave whofought to be free in the famous Somerset case of1772.39 It was an Exeter painter, BenjaminRobert Haydon, who did a painting of the WorldAnti-Slavery Convention of 12 June 1840.40

There were sermons in churches and numerousmeetings were held in cities, towns and villagesthroughout Devon to call for the abolition of theslave trade and to collect signatures for petitionsto Parliament.

The Exeter paper, The Flying Post, reported asermon in Ashburton on Sunday 5 February 1792,when the Rev. Trefuis Love preached ‘againstirreligious, inhuman and inpolitic slavery.’41

There were reports of meetings to petitionParliament for the abolition of the slave trade, inCrediton,42 Exeter,43 Moretonhampstead,44

Plymouth,45 and Topsham.46

On 8 September 1830 there was a meeting inIlfracombe calling for the abolition of slavery inall British colonies, and a Devon and Exeter

Society for the Abolition of Slavery was reportedon 10 May 1832.

On 10 August 1837 there were reports ofmeetings in Crediton, Ashburton, Plymouth,Tavistock, Tiverton and Topsham to celebrate theanniversary of the abolition of slavery.

People had different opinions then, as they donow. Devonians are to be found on all sides ofany debate, as they were in the argument aboutabolishing slavery and the slave trade.

A report in theExeter FlyingPost of ameeting callingfor the abolitionof the slavetrade on 18March 1792, inthe White Hartat Moreton-hampstead. Theitem belowgives details ofa ship preparingto leavePlymouth forthe West Indies.

Devon and the abolition of the slave trade


21

The Abolition of Slavery Act of 1833 provided for£20 million to be paid to West Indian plantationslave owners in compensation for the loss oftheir ‘property’. One beneficiary was the Bishopof Exeter:

The Bishop, the Right Rev Henry Philpotts,together with three partners received:

£4,836 4sh 7d for 236 slaves in the parish ofVere, Middlesex County, Jamaica.£5,480 13sh 11d for 304 slaves in the parishof Clarendon, Mdx, Jamaica.£2, 412 6sh 8d for slaves also in the parish ofClarendon.Total of £12,729 4sh 4d for 665 slaves.47

It was worth waiting for the money.

As throughout British territories, it was the‘owners’ of slaves who were compensated. Nomoney was paid to black people for the yearsthey had been slaves or for the work they haddone to contribute to the wealth of far-awayplaces like Devon.

Compensation for slavery? How to remember slavery and theslave trade?

Death is sad for us humans. Even if we are notpersonally involved, most of us can share thesad feelings of bereavement. Britaincommemorates the Nazi Holocaust with aHolocaust Memorial Day each January. Should wemark the deaths which occurred because ofslavery and the slave trade in the same way?

In 2001 the Dagara Peace Commission, frompresent-day Ghana, visited ports in Britain tocommemorate Britain’s connection with theTransatlantic slave trade. On 26 April Exeter’smayor, Councillor Mary Evans, welcomed them tothe city at a reception in the Guildhall. Peoplegathered to add images of their hands and feetto a commemorative cloth which acknowledgedthe connection between Devon and theTransatlantic slave trade and there was aceremony down on Exeter Quay.


22

The Dagara Peace Commission visits Exeter, Thursday26 April 2001. Clockwise from top left: KhanyisaAmoo, ambassador for the Dagara Peace Commission;members of the Dagara Peace Commission begin theceremony; the mayor of Exeter adds her handmarksto the commemorative cloth outside the Guildhall;Devon residents join the Commission in the ritual atExeter Quay to acknowledge Devon’s involvement inthe slave trade; the mayor welcomes the Commissionto a reception at the Guildhall.


23

Who is this man?48

This oil painting is in the Royal Albert MemorialMuseum in Exeter.49 Many books say that it is ofOlaudah Equiano – but see if you think it is thesame person as the picture on page 26.

If it is not Equiano – then who is it?50

Maybe we have the story of another African inDevon to uncover …

Unknown African, portrait in the Royal Albert MemorialMuseum, Exeter (see Notes for discussion about his identity).


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Location of record listed on theaccompanying chart

� 16th century � 17th century� 18th century � 19th century� 20th century � Towns/cities

Devon border – coast Devon border – land Two Moors Way: roughlyfollows the Mariners Way, whichsailors, including black sailors,followed in search of work on thenorth and south Devon coasts.

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Sites of records ofblack people


25

The table on the tracing-paper shows some ofthe records which have been found of blackpeople in Devon.

In order to read it: either detach the table and enlarge it on aphotocopier; ordownload a copy fromwww.blackhistoryindevon.org.uk

The information in the table has been generouslyshared by researchers. The Friends of DevonArchives (FDA) invited all researchers working inthe Devon Record Office to let the FDA have anote about any evidence of black history theyfound.

This is a good practice to introduce in otherrecord offices.

This table is a starting point for further research!

If you find information about black history inDevon and elsewhere, please email it to theaddresses inside the back cover.

Thank you!

Chart key

(Not all entries are sourced)BASA = Black and Asian Studies Association

newsletterDRO = Devon Record OfficePRO = Public Records OfficePR = parish registerTDA = Transactions of the Devonshire

Association

Some items have been found in more than oneplace so show more than one source and/ordescriptive word e.g.:both ‘black’ and ‘negroe’.

Records of some black people in Devon


26

For many people, Olaudah Equiano (c.1745–97)is the only significant black person they knowabout in British history. For others he is aninspirational first contact.51 He acts as an icon forhistorical black figures.

Equiano, a former slave born in what is nowNigeria, published his autobiography52 in 1789.There were nine editions in his lifetime, includingtranslations into Dutch, German and Russian. Inthis powerful story of his life Equiano speaks forthe many Africans whose voices we cannot hear.It is well worth reading.

He first landed in England at Falmouth as aslave. When he returned more than twenty yearslater, as a freeman, on 7 January 1777, helanded at Plymouth. He writes about friends inPlymouth and Exeter, ‘pious friends, whom I washappy to see’.53

The black population in Britain, including Devon,had been increased by blacks who had fought onthe British side in the American War ofIndependence (1775–83) and in the Anglo-French wars in the West Indies.

Olaudah Equiano: the frontispiece from hisNarrative, first published in 1789.

Olaudah Equiano


27

In 1786 and 1787 theLondon Committee for theRelief of the Black Poorplanned a settlement forfreed slaves in Sierra Leone.The story of the settlementis too long to detail here.54

The Navy employed Equianoas Commissary for Storesfor the expedition to SierraLeone. He exposed thecorruption and inefficiencyat Plymouth and was sackedfrom his job. The NavyBoard later paid him £50 ‘infull expenses and wages’ forthe work he had done. Theywrote that Equiano had‘acted with great proprietyin all his transactions.’

It is likely that thisexperience in Plymouthencouraged Equiano to writehis personal story – theexperiences of a black manin Devon and throughout theworld.55

The Emancipadoes at Plymouth, by J. Johnston, 1790s. These are probably the black peopleabout to be shipped out to settle in Sierra Leone referred to in the text.


28

One result of the eighteenth-century Anglo-French wars in the West Indies and the AmericanWar of Independence was the arrival of blackprisoners in Devon. Prisoners were first kept inlarge ships off Plymouth. Later, Dartmoor Prisonwas established. Officers were often ‘paroled’.This meant that they were allowed to live inEnglish towns, with restrictions on theirmovements and activities.

From a Moretonhampstead diary56 we learn thaton 18 July 1807:

General Rochambeau, a French Officer with ablack servant, came here on parole fromWincanton, Somerset.

Then on 17 October 1808:

Married with licence Peter the Black, servantto General Rochambeau, to Susanna Parker.The bells rang merrily all day. From thenovelty of this wedding being the first negroever married in Moreton, a great numberassembled in the churchyard, and paradeddown the street with them.

The parish register records Peter’s surname asCourpon. Interestingly, it does not record the factthat he was black. The number of black people inDevon, or anywhere in Britain, is not limited tothose who were recorded in parish registers.57

That same year, the disaster of fire hitMoretonhampstead.

4th February 1808

About noon a fire broke out at the Dolphinpublic house, kept by Mr Wm. Tozer, whichraged with alarming violence over severalhouses, threatening the destruction of a greatpart of the town…its progress was happilystopped, by the energetic exertions of theinhabitants, the Moreton volunteers… .

It was pleasing to see about 1,500 people ofdifferent languages and colours uniting withgreat cheerfulness in making breaches to stopthe progress of the flames, in removingfurniture and goods to places of security, andin carrying water to supply a powerful engine,which was kept constantly at work at differentpoints for several hours.

Moretonhampstead


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And in the evening, the thanks of a meetingof gentlemen at the White Hart was orderedto be communicated through Captn Ponsfordto the volunteers and the foreigners whoassisted.

Danish, Dutch and French prisoners were amongthe officers on parole. It would be good to knowmore about the ‘people of different languagesand colours’ in a Dartmoor town nearly twohundred years ago.

There is a possibility that Peter Courpon stayedat Ockery Cottage in Princetown with GeneralRochambeau and General Boyer on the night of 2May 1811, as they made their way to Plymouthto return to France.58

Peter Courpon probably returned toMoretonhampstead, since a third child wasbaptised in 1815 there. His wife Susanna isburied in St Andrews churchyard atMoretonhampstead, where the inscription on hergravestone reads:

In loving memory of Susannah Courponwho died Decr. 29th 1852 aged 70 years

The eldest son, John Peter, bought a house inMoretonhampstead in 1870.59

A Moretonhampstead man fought the famousblack boxer, Tom Molineaux, in Exeter towardsthe end of his life.

Molineaux is also a good wrestler anddisplayed great activities and powers in thelast Exeter meeting July 27th 1812, where heentered himself for the public prize of tenguineas, but received a dreadful fall fromJohn Snow of Moreton.60

Peter Courpon probably stayed at this house in Ockery, nearDartmoor Prison at Princeton, together with his master theFrench general Rochambeau, on the night of May 2/3 1811.Only a ruined building remains on this site, near the bridge.


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We have a picture of Tom Molineauxand his black trainer, Bill Richmond,in a famous fight against Tom Crib,but not of when he fought JohnSnow of Moretonhampstead.

A century and a half later, in 1942during the Second World War, blackAmerican servicemen camped onMardon Down outsideMoretonhampstead, where they hadto survive the cold winter nights intents. The American troops weresegregated when they visited pubsin the town. There are nonewspaper accounts of the peoplewho entertained the troops,because of the tight security of wartime, but black musicians and theHeavyweight Champion of theWorld, Joe Louis, came toDartmoor.61

The next two pages are an exampleof detailed research on a particulartopic which builds up our picture ofthe past in Devon. It has beenspecially written up for this booklet.

Tom Molineaux fights Tom Crib, 28th September 1811 (print). On 27 July 1812 inExeter Molineux lost in a wrestling match against John Snow ofMoretonhampstead.


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by John D. Ellis

On a bitterly cold January morning in Plymouth in1816, John Freeman, a former Royal Marine offifteen years’ service, took the ‘king’s shilling’with his friend William Davis. William was aprivate of the 43rd (Monmouthshire) Foot and aveteran of the Duke of Wellington‘s legendaryPeninsula campaign.

In Devon, a county with a long tradition ofmilitary service, such incidents have always beencommonplace. However, in this case JohnFreeman was Afro-Caribbean (a labourer fromBarbados), and William Davis Afro-American (alabourer from Boston). They were but two ofmany black soldiers whose service and historicalpresence in Devon has passed unnoticed untilnow.62

Devon has acted, and indeed still acts, as hometo many serving and former servicemen andwomen. From the earliest times of the Britisharmy’s recorded history many of these peoplehave been black.

During the early nineteenth century Devon’sblack community was the focus of attention for

army recruiters. JosephDegenne63 (a twenty-seven-year-old labourerborn in Guadeloupe)and Francis Augustine64

(a twenty-four-year-oldcook born in St.Domingo) were two ofPlymouth’s blackcommunity to meetBritain’s call. Degenneenlisted in the 81st(North Lancashire) Footin 1804, and Augustineenlisted in the 32nd(Duke of Cornwall’s)Foot in 1806.

Many Black soldiersfound that their militarywork brought them toDevon to protect hershores against invasion.The black drummers of the 29th (Worcestershire)Foot, high-profile and respected enlisted soldiers,accompanied their regiment to Devon on manyoccasions during their long service from 1759 to1843. Between 1797 and 1798 they were

A black musician in the 46th(South Devonshire) Regimentof Foot, 1812. The regimenthad just returned from fiveyears’ active service in theWest Indies.

Black soldiers and Devon


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stationed in Plymouth, Barnstaple and Bideford.They were popular figures wherever they served.By 1815, when the 29th was next in the county,many of the men who had strolled the streetsand lanes of Devon in the 1790s had died forBritain in the Peninsula and North Americancampaigns. Their surviving comrades receivedthe same recognition and medals as their whitepeers, and several were highly decorated.

Black soldiers also served in Devonshire-raisedarmy units: A Jamaican named George Devon65

served with the South Devon Militia in the early1790s before transferring to the 3rd Buffs andserving with distinction, being wounded in theassault on Granada in 1796. Black soldiers servedin the 11th Devonshire, and at least one waskilled in action at Salamanca in 1811; another,Joseph Hill66 of Martinique, was discharged in1812 after serving in the same campaign. At thesame time, in the 39th (Dorsetshire) Foot, theregiment that would later amalgamate with theDevonshire Regiment, one Estiphania Pappin67 (‘aman of colour’ and a labourer from St. Domingo)was also serving in the Peninsula. He laterbecame one of a very select number of blackBritish army non-commissioned officers, and wasdischarged from his regiment in 1832.

Other black soldiers came to Devon not asguardians of her shores, but as inmates of hermilitary prisons. The French, like the British,employed black servicemen and many spent timein Devon after being captured [like Peter Courponin Moretonhampstead – see page 28]. Blackveterans of campaigns in the West Indies andPeninsula were held in prison ships in Plymouthbefore being sent to prisons throughout theSouth West. A number of these men, includingone Pascal Le Mole,68 a soldier and ‘a Black’captured at St. Domingo, who was held atPlymouth between 1805 and 1806, latertransferred to HM service.

The historical black presence in the British armyis only now starting to be fully understood andrecognised. The presence of black soldiers inDevon, and Devonshire regiments, is animportant part of the history of not just the blackpeople in the county, but of all the people wholive in the county. Perhaps now Devon canacknowledge the historical debt it owes to itsown black soldiers.

The following pages provide stories from two oftoday’s black Devonians.


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by Zena Burland

In 1948 my father was one of the many youngBlack West Indians who arrived on the EmpireWindrush that docked at Tilbury Docks.

He, with many others, came over to England tohelp with rebuilding Britain after the war. Manywomen and children came as well. My father hadjoined the RAF in Jamaica, so he already had arole to play.

It was very difficult for my father, as WhiteBritish people did not really understand and dueto ignorance treated my father and others likehim shamefully – name calling, slamming doorsin his face, not allowing him in bars – eventhough he was wearing the Queen’s uniform.

Many West Indians found comfort in living neareach other and relying on each other for security.

My father met and married my White Englishmother. He loved the sport of boxing and boxedwhilst in the RAF. His other love was cricket andhe later played for the RAF and for a team inBarnstaple.

Zena’s father, Laurieston Davis, as a young man inthe RAF.

My Father


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My father loved to listen to the radio especially toRound the Horn and The Navy Lark. He loved theDaily Mirror for the cartoon Andy Capp, whichalways made him laugh.

I was born 1950 and due to my father being inthe RAF we were posted to Egypt. I waschristened with the water from the River Nile.

Not long after that my sisters were born and thentwo brothers. There were difficulties as I grew upin a world where I constantly heard ‘What is thatwoman doing with that nigger?’ ‘Who the Helldoes he think he is marrying a white woman?’

Then it was my turn: ‘What a pretty little thing.Pity she’s a half caste.’ ‘You can’t play with me.My mum says you’re dirty.’ ‘How do you combher hair?’ And the horrid insults went on and on.

Later Dad was posted to north Devon to the RAFbase at Chivenor. It was here that things startedto change and life seemed to be a lot easier, frommy point anyway. The kids at school were nicerand we had some super teachers: Miss Chapple,Miss Rundle and Miss Clapton. We lived off campin rented accommodation. First in Braunton andthen in Bear Street, Barnstaple. It was here thatchurch played a very big part in our lives.

We lived right opposite the Thorne Memorial Churchand it was easier on mum if we were sent to churchso she could have a few hours peace and quiet.

The people in the church were nice and Sundayschool was OK, excepting for the fact that wewere always asked to read, perhaps becausemother would dress us so pretty that theywanted their church to look good.

The Davis girls in Barnstaple. 1950s.


35

Dad was a stickler for making sure we were keptbusy. He would give us essays to write or sumsto do – and this was in our summer breaks! Itfelt like this was cruel and unnecessary but now Irealise it was his way of keeping us safe, awayfrom those who would accuse us of doingsomething just because they would rememberthe black face in a crowd. That was easy inDevon.

Christmas was a great time. He would alwaysmake a punch and invite all the neighbours in.The music of Harry Belafonte and Cy Grant wouldbe on the record player and many West Indiancalypsos, with dad singing all morning.

Mind you, this would happen some Sundays aswell; not the punch but the singing. Mygrandmother in Jamaica would send a cake thatwas soaked in rum and by the time the postmanbrought it to the door the brown paper wassoaked in rum too. The postman’s mouth wasdrooling over the parcel – we had to wrench itout of his hand!

Dad continued to serve in the RAF and aftertwenty-two years he came out. He was awardedthe BEM [British Empire Medal] for his services tothe RAF.

His main aim then was to get his family back toJamaica. So we all went back to Jamaica on abanana boat. Dad was happy he was going homebut this did not last very long and, after ninemonths in the sun, we were back in Devon. Mumhad promised him that if we went back then itwould be to Devon.

Dad then got a job with the Ministry of OverseasAid and Development in London and commutedback and forward each week. Later he foundcivilian work back at Chivenor with the RAF.Later still he worked with the housingdepartment of the North Devon District Counciland helped with the administration of theBarnstaple Sea Cadets.

It was well known that Mr Davis could be seencrossing Barnstaple Bridge tipping his hat to theladies. He could be relied on to give the exacttime of day by his movements. He was alwayssmart and he told us that ‘Clothes maketh man.’Like so many who arrived on the Windrush, hewas smart from the very day he arrived inBritain. He died at the early age of forty-five.Only one week later his appointment as amagistrate came through the post; this wouldhave made him the first Black magistrate inDevon.


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(Jane is a pseudonym).

I was born in Devon, went to school in Devon,was brought up in Devon and have lived for thebetter part of my life in Devon.

When people ask me, ‘Where do you come from?’I always reply, ‘I come from Devon.’

‘Yes, but where do you really come from?’

I was born in a small village about eight milesfrom Exeter. My parents met in 1945. My Motherhad lived all of her life in the village. From what Ihave been told, my father was a Black Americanwho had been serving in Britain with theAmerican Navy, to fight against fascism with theallies in the Second World War. As I understand,he was a military policeman during the night andworked in a naval supply store during the day.

When my Grandmother found out that mymother was pregnant, she went to the naval baseintent on informing my father. The navalauthority told her that he had gone home toAmerica – and that she should go away. MyFather never saw me, his daughter; perhaps henever even knew my mother was pregnant.

My two young parents, just like other youngcouples of the time, didn’t have the opportunityto make an informed choice about their childconceived outside marriage. Racism against Afro-Americans was added to the prejudices of thetime.

There was an uncle (my mother’s brother) wholeft the family once I was born. That split in thefamily has lasted to this day.

I was raised as my grandmother’s ‘daughter’, mymother was my ‘sister’. No one ever talked aboutmy father. They denied knowing him. There wasone photograph of him but my aunt destroyed it.She ‘felt it was best.’ She was doing her best tohide the image of my father because he wasblack.

So I never even had a photograph of my father.

I met my husband when I was still at school, wemarried when I was twenty-one and have livedhappily together ever since. We have two grownup children and grandchildren.

As a parent myself, I know that my children haveexperienced racism, both at school and later

Jane, a black Devonian


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when refused a college place, even though theirqualifications were as good as other applicantswho got places. No reasonable explanation wasgiven at the time for the refusal. It later becameapparent that racism was indeed an issue but noaction was taken. That was part of us notacknowledging our black history in the family.

It feels to me like there was a ‘death’ before mybirth. It was a death of the knowledge of myparentage. It was a contrived and purposefuldeath, a denial of love and of the memory of anintimacy which should have been cherished.It has made it difficult for me to acknowledgethat I am a Black Devonian.

What I know about my father.

How to take the study of blackhistory forward …

People miss their history. Black history isfractured worldwide, in different ways fordifferent people. We need to rebuild thatfractured history.

Most information about black people in historycomes in small snippets such as these:

• In the 1765 Summer Circuit Court in Exeterthe judge decided:

to be hanged Henry Oroonoko (for assaultingJoseph Bray on the King’s Highway, andtheft).

In the Winter Circuit of 1766 the courtchanged the sentence:

Oroonoko to be transported for 14 years.69

• In 1780 there was a riot at Plymouth Dock. Alarge crowd took sides in a quarrel betweentwo black bandsmen from the Somerset Militiaand some white soldiers from the BrecknockMilitia. The military police fired on the rioters.One person died and ten were wounded.70


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• On March 22 1792 The Flying Post in Exetercarried this advertisement describing a personof African appearance:

Ran away on Sunday last, the 18th instant,Nicholas Herbert, an apprentice to Mr JamesHolman, Boot and Shoe Maker, opposite theLondon Inn. He is about 5 feet 6 inches high,wore his own black bushy hair, browncomplexion, pitted with the smallpox, and hasthick lips … Whoever harbours or employs thesaid apprentice after this public notice, theywill be prosecuted according to the law.

• In April 1835 Richard Ford, the author, and afriend of Beethoven, lived in Heavitree House.He invited Henry Unwin Addington to visit andwrote:

‘[You will] have nothing to do but give menotice, when my nigger shall stand at theShip [a pub] in Heavitree to conduct you tomy house.’71

• In the 1850s an African woman from Senegalworked as a servant in Exeter. She was livingin a workhouse in Exeter at the age of ninety-three.72

• In 1883 at a meeting of the Bible ChristianChapel in Tiverton, Lewis Charlton, a man ofcolour, gave a talk on slavery andintemperance.

He had been a slave for fifty-five years. Hewas collecting funds to build a place ofworship for coloured people in Maryland, inthe United States.73

• In 1885 the missionary, Mary Slessor, rented48, The Strand, Topsham for her mother, hersister and herself. Mary came to Britain for athree-year stay with two-year-old Janie, fromCalabar, West Africa. Janie returned toPlymouth with Mary Slessor at the age of tenand they lived at a house called ‘Majorfield’ inTopsham.74

• There are records of black people living in theport city of Plymouth through the centuries.The city had, and has a black city councillor.William Miller was born in Stonehouse,Plymouth, the grandson of a freed black slavefrom Sierra Leone. In 1925 he was firstelected a Labour councillor. His work for thecity included chairing the housing committeeduring the post-war reconstruction period. Heretired from council work in 1970. Plymouth’sMiller Way is named after him. His son Claude


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has been a Devon county councillor and is aPlymouth city councillor.75

• Retired black servicemen have lived inDawlish76 and one black forestry worker whoretired to Totnes wrote his own story.77

• A recent book includes several images of blackpeople in Exeter in the ninetenth century.78

However, there is much work to be done beforefull biographies of black people in Devon can bewritten.

The writing up of black history can be donethrough family histories.79 There is plenty ofinformation on how to trace family histories andthere are some specific articles on tracing blackancestors.80

There are sources in Devon which have not beenused for this booklet. The Cathedral Library andthe Devon and Exeter Institution may wellprovide examples of black history. Towns in thiscounty – as in other similar areas in Britain – willhave similar institutions with rich records whichhave not yet been explored.

Conclusion – writing black history ofthe past and today

This booklet has provided some evidence forcreating a local black history in Devon. The samework can be done in all areas of Britain.

It is difficult to make an estimate of the numberof black people in Britain at different times in thepast. In 1764 the Gentleman’s Magazine saidthere were 20,000 in London alone. In 1772 LordMansfield accepted estimates of 14,000 to15,000 black people in England.81 In 1977 FolarinShyllon estimated that ‘At the end of theeighteenth century there were still about 10,000black people in Britain.’82

How many black people were in Devon at the endof the eighteenth century? How many remainedin the county after that time? How many of theirdescendants are here today? Research methods,including the use of DNA, may reveal blackancestors we do not know about.

Shyllon’s 10,000 is probably an underestimate:he wrote before much work had been done onlocal records. As research progresses, our pictureof the past can change.


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Today in Devon, black people contribute in everywalk of life. They are caterers, academicresearchers, financial administrators, students,newscasters, performing artists and holiday-makers, shop assistants, lawyers, health workers,musicians, care workers, hoteliers, members ofthe fire, police and ambulance services,educators, youth leaders, social workers,comedians, publicans, photographers and filmmakers, fashion designers, cleaners, carpenters,lorry drivers, trainers, refugees – the list goeson.

The lives of black people today are the historiesof tomorrow. We need to be recording memoriestoday to leave a legacy of history for the nextgenerations. How can we do this?

Arts projects today reflect people’s lives. TheVisibly Proud photography project in Plymouthcelebrated the lives of different women in thecity. Their work was put on display at PlymouthMuseum and a book provides a record of theirlives for the future.83

Oral history is a powerful way of learning aboutthe (recent) past. The time span covered can belengthened by recording people’s memories ofthe stories they were told of times before theywere born.

Local archives are the places we use to collectinformation about the past. If we give ourpapers, of family, business and other activities, tothe local archives, those materials will be readyfor the historians of the future to use.

All history is stories.

‘It is easy to forget how mysterious andmighty stories are. They do their work insilence, invisibly. They work with all theinternal materials of the mind and self. Theybecome part of you while changing you.Beware of the stories you read or tell: subtlyat night, beneath the waters ofconsciousness, they are altering your world.’84


41

The more we learn about the past, the more we seehow it marks our landscape. In tracing black history,we can learn to see our county differently.

When we know about the history of Dartmoor, we nolonger see a ‘natural’ landscape, we see the prehistoricreeves (ancient boundaries) across the land, the tracesof tin mining, and old field boundaries where morepeople once lived and worked on the land than today.When we look at our houses and street names,statues, paintings and written records, they can tell usabout the past.

The notes in this booklet will show you places wherewe can find information.

Here are a few other suggestions to learn about blackhistory in Britain:

Video: Out of the Shadows, a video of the blackpresence in Britain 1500-1950. Produced by theCatholic Association for Racial Justice in 1988. Thiscovers the history of Asians as well as Africans inBritain. It is dated but remains an excellent generalstarting point for black history in Britain. £15 plus£1.50 p&p from www.carj.co.uk

Websites: These are more useful for researchers andteachers than for school students’ use.http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/B/blackhistorymap/index.html This is a general site – the onlyentries for the South West are in Bristol.http://www.blacknet.co.uk/history/links.html is beingdeveloped. Pictures of black soldiers in the Britishforces. Emphasis on slavery.

The Archives and Museum of Black Heritage378 Coldharbour Lane, London SW9 8LF. Telephone:0207 326 4154 Email: [email protected] the history and culture of the African diasporain Britain.

The Black and Asian Studies Association exists tofoster research into black and Asian history in Britain.Annual membership (includes subscription to thenewsletter, issued three times a year) is £5 for theretired, low-waged, students and unemployed, £8 forother individuals, schools, community groups; £10 forother institutions. Cheques payable to ‘BASA’ to Blackand Asian Studies Association c/o Institute ofCommonwealth Studies, 28 Russell Square, LondonWC1B 5DS Membership email:[email protected]

The Black Environmental Network exists to putethnic community environmental participation on theagenda of the environmental movement. It offerstraining and consultancy. The UK office is at 9 LlainwenUchaf, Llanberis, Wales LL55 4LL. Tel/fax: 01286 870715. Email: www.ben-network.org.uk

Roots is a partnership between BBC regional radio andArts Councils. It aims to raise the profile of African,Asian, Chinese and Caribbean art and culture. Itmakes programmes for radio, TV and online, organisescultural events and supports artists and arts venues.There are Roots co-ordinators in eleven centres in theEnglish regions. Contact Nicky Allison on 0207 9736497. Email: [email protected] Devon contact Fiona Evans on 01752 260323 oremail [email protected]

Resources for learning


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Ultimately the history of black people in Britainshould be integrated into the school curriculumrather than being an ‘add-on’. More work needsto be done to provide adequate evidence toachieve this.

In the meantime, I hope that this booklet willprovide examples to be included in the subjectsyou already cover. This can be for particularperiods, such as the Victorians or Tudors, and forlocal history topics.

Museums, libraries and record offices have a roleto play in raising awareness of local black historywith their collections. Black History Month (inOctober in Britain) can be a starting point – but itis not the finishing line!

It is good to consider HOW information ispresented and museums have been addressingthese issues.85

Finally, the Race Relations Amendment Act 2000(RRAA) places a specific duty on every publicinstitution to:

• prevent discrimination• encourage good race relations• consider race in all its functions

Including the history and arts of black people inyour work will help you to fulfil your duties underthe RRAA.

Applying for funding available for arts projectsunder a ‘Diversity’ heading may be useful.

For further primary school teaching ideas fromSylvia Collicott see:

‘Pulling Strings: History with Pegs and a WashingLine’. Times Educational Supplement, 14December 1990, p. 30.‘A Way of Looking at History:Local–National–World Links’, Teaching History,July 1993, pp. 18-23.‘Changing Lives’, Junior Focus, VictorianInventions, November 1994.

For a critique of the British education system fordelivering an ethnocentric history curriculum see:Marika Sherwood: ‘Sins of Omission andCommission: History in English Schools andStruggles for Change’, in Multicultural Teaching,Trentham Books, 1998.

Notes for educators in schools, museums and libraries


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An earlier version of the text of this booklet with moreextensive notes is at www.blackhistoryindevon.org.uk

Dedication page1 Len Garrison: ‘The Black Historical Past in BritishEducation’, in The Excluded Past, edited by P. Stone andR. MacKenzie, Unwin Hyman, 1990, pp. 231-44.2 From Len Garrison’s poem ‘Where Are OurMonuments?’, in The Black Presence in Nottingham: ACatalogue Exploring the Contribution of African-Caribbean People to Nottingham from the 17th Centuryto the Present Day, Castle Museum and Afro CaribbeanFamilies and Friends Nottingham, 1993.Page 3 onwards1 This booklet focuses on the history of Africans andtheir descendants in Devon.2 Sylvia Collicott: Connections: Haringey. Local-National-World Links, Haringey Community InformationService in Association with the Multi-Cultural SupportGroup, 1986. Copies £7 [email protected] ‘I’ve noticed … that practically all the parishes on theSouth coast from Kent to Cornwall, seem to have hadat least one black inhabitant in the eighteenth century.’– Kathy Chater, letter to author, April 2003.4 Peter Fryer: Staying Power: The History of BlackPeople in Britain, Pluto Press, 1984. This excellent bookis the standard introduction to the subject.5 John Allan, Curator of Antiquities at the Royal AlbertMemorial Museum, Exeter, personal communication. 6 Peter Fryer has a different opinion in Staying Power,Pluto Press, 1984, p. 2.7 Basil Davidson: In Search of Africa, TimesBooks/Random House, 1994, pp. 329-33 (Basil

Davidson has also found a thirteenth-century stainedglass window in Herefordshire which he believes is of StMaurice.)8 There is a field hand named ‘Devonshire’ in EdwardBall: Slaves in the Family, Viking, 1998, p. 138.9 Peter Fryer: Staying Power, Pluto Press, 1984, p. 12.10 I use this term in the sense of economies which arebased on large-scale production of staple crops orcommodities for an external market.11 See the memorial stones to ship builders inTopsham parish church.12 Nigel Tattersfield: The Forgotten Trade, Pimlico,1998.13 Edward Ball: Slaves in the Family, Viking, 1998.14 Devon Extracts 1665-1850 (from the LondonGazette), vol. 1, pt 1, A-K, Devon Family HistorySociety, 1987, p. 5. I am grateful to the late LenGarrison for drawing my attention to this publication.15 Hele School, Exeter, Historical Society, Exeter –Then and Now, A. Wheaton and Co, 1947 (2ndimpression).16 Aileen Fox: ‘The Retreat, Topsham’, DevonArchaeological Society Proceedings, no. 49, 1991, pp.131-41. This article gives details of trade contacts withsugar plantations in Grenada.17 Document held by the West Country Studies Libraryin Exeter.18 Folarin Shyllon: Black People in Britain 1555–1833,Oxford University Press, 1977, pp. 47-8.19 Lt-Col. J.L. Vivian: The Visitations of the County ofDevon Comprising the Herald’s Visitations of 1531,1564 and 1620. With Additions, Exeter: Henry F. Eland(preface dated 1895). A copy is in the West CountryStudies Library in Exeter.

Notes on the text


20 R.M. Prideaux: Prideaux: A West Country Clan,Phillimore, 1989.21 From the new measure of wealth introduced in1663, named after a gold-rich part of West Africa;Peter Fryer: Staying Power, Pluto Press, 1984, p. 21.22 Translation kindly provided by Ronald Impey.23 I am grateful to Joan Rendell for drawing myattention to this gravestone in 1990. She explainedthat the church was demolished to create a bowlinggreen and the stone was found at Ham Mill Farm in thenineteenth century. The final lines of the epitaph aremissing, perhaps because it had been cut to fit thespace as a paving stone. See also R.M. Prideaux: AWest Country Clan, Phillimore, 1989, p. 217.Werrington was in Devon until 1964, when boundarychanges meant it was transferred to Cornwall.24 J.A. Atkinson: Smuggling in Cornwall, Jarrold ColourPublication, 1989.25 Ibid. No reference is given for the source of thisstory.26 Susanne J. Stark: Female Tars, Constable, 1996.27 ‘Undignified bickering over bones of slaves’, WesternMorning News, Tuesday 30 January 2001.28 Pat Barrow: Slaves of Rapparee, Edward Gaskill,1998.29 DRO (Devon Records Office) 388 M/E 1.30 DRO 388 M/E 5.31 DRO 388 M/E 1-1.15.32 DRO 388 M/E 1.33 DRO 388 M/E 4.34 DRO 388 M/E 4.35 DRO 388 M/E 11.36 Copies of documents kindly supplied by Mary-RoseRogers from the Modbury Local History Society.37 Madge Dresser: Slavery Obscured, The SocialHistory of the Slave Trade in an English Provincial Port,Continuum, 2001, pp. 29, 30.

38 I am grateful to the present Sir John Quicke forallowing me to visit his home and to photograph two ofthe portraits for this booklet.39 For a detailed account of the trial see FolarinShyllon: Black Slaves in Britain, Oxford UniversityPress, 1974, pp. 82–124.40 In the collection of the National Portrait Gallery,London.41 Flying Post (FP) 16 February 1792.42 FP 1 March 1792.43 FP 15 March 1792.44 FP 22 March 1792.45 FP 9 February 1792.46 FP 8 March 1792.47 British Parliamentary Papers 1836 (597) vol. 49.The total actually comes to £12,729 5sh 2d!48 Christopher Fyfe raised the question of whether theoil painting in Exeter is of Equiano at the conference incelebration of the life of Paul Edwards, editor of the1967 Heinemann edition of Equiano’s Narrative, inEdinburgh on 21-23 March 1994.49 Catalogue of Oil Paintings, Watercolours, Drawingsand Sculpture at the Royal Albert Memorial MuseumExeter: ‘14/1943 Eng. Sch. (18thc) (previouslyattributed to Reynolds). Portrait of a Negro Man –Olaudah Equiano (costume d from c.1780s). Oil oncanvas. 618 x 515. 735 x 636. Presented by PercyMoore Turner, Esq. Compare this portrait with theengraved portrait of Olaudah Equiano (GustavusVassa), which forms the frontispiece of hisautobiography published 1792 [sic – in fact 1st edition1789]. This frontispiece portrait inscribed as engravedby D. Orme and painted by W. Denton.’ 50 More notes on this portrait in the BASA [Black andAsian Studies Association] Newsletter 25, p. 20: ‘thesitter’s dress indicates that the portrait was probablypainted before 1765, a period when Equiano was

44


45

usually outside England’ (Vincent Caretta). Sometimesdress in the provinces was some years behind the latestfashions in London. ‘The man in [the portrait] and in my[family?] picture are wearing almost identical jacketsand shirts ( – Mrs Jasmine Masson of Barnet), p. 14.51 Olu Taiwo, survivor of the Deptford Fire in eastLondon in January 1981, and an actor and musicianwho later lived in Exeter, explained his delight inreading Equiano’s Narrative and realising that he hadgrown up in an area Equiano knew. Personalcommunication to the author.52 Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative andOther Writings, edited by Vincent Carretta, Penguin,1995. See also: James Walvin: An African’s Life, TheLife and Times of Olaudah Equiano 1745–1797, London,Cassell, 1998, which sets Equiano’s life in the contextof the times; A South African cartoon version ofEquiano’s life: Joyce Ozynski and Harriet Perlman:Equiano: The Slave Who Fought to Be Free, RavenPress, 1988; Lucy MacKeith: Equiano: A Rough Road toFreedom, from the Royal Albert Memorial Museum,Exeter, £2.50 plus p&p 75p; card payment over thetelephone or cheques to Exeter City Council.53 Quoted in James Walvin (as above), p. 120.54 See Folarin Shyllon’s book Black Slaves in Britain,and Our Children Free and Happy, Letters from BlackSettlers in Africa in the 1790’s, edited by ChristopherFyfe, Edinburgh University Press, 1991.55 Folarin Shyllon, p. 234.56 Treleaven, S.: A Moretonhampstead Diary. The textof this can be seen on the website ofMoretonhampstead Local History Society,http://www.moretonhampstead.org.uk57 For an explanation see Kathy Chater: ‘Hidden fromHistory: Black People in Parish Records’, Genealogists’Magazine, June 2000, vol. 26, no. 10.58 Elisabeth Stanbrook: ‘A Dartmoor Legend: Two

French Generals at the Ockery, Princetown’, in DevonHistorian 42, 1991, pp. 3-8.59 Go to http://www.moretonhampstead.org.uk forfurther information.60 Egan, Boxiana, pp. 369-71. quoted in Paul Edwardsand James Walvin: Black Personalities in the Era of theSlave Trade, 1983.61 Information from Gary Cox in the feature filmDrumming up a Storm, made by Propertelly. Emailthem at [email protected] The film tells thestory of the contribution of the Ebony Steel Band fromNotting Hill, west London, to MoretonhampsteadCarnival, which takes place on the last Thursday ofeach August. I am grateful to Maggie Pipe for giving medetails of this film.62 For William Davis and John Freeman see PRO (PublicRecords Office) WO 25/386.63 PRO WO 25/481.64 PRO WO 25/366.65 PRO WO 25/322.66 PRO WO 121/122.67 PRO WO 97/557.68 PRO ADM 104/416.69 PRO. ASSI 23/7. I am grateful to David Killingray forthis reference.70 Peter Fryer: Staying Power, p. 88.71 Thanks to Den Perrin of Heavitree Local HistorySociety for this information.72 For further details see: The Victorian Underclass ofExeter, edited by Todd Gray, Mint Press, 2001, a reprintof a series of reports to the local newspaper in 1854.73 I am grateful to Mike Sampson for this information.74 Carol Christian and Gladys Plummer: God and OneRedhead: Mary Slessor of Calabar, Hodder andStoughton, 1970.75 Jonathan Wood: ‘The Labour Party and theReconstruction of Plymouth’, Labour Heritage Bulletin


46

Picture sources & acknowledgements

Front cover and page 19 reproduced by kindpermission of Sir John Quicke. Page 4 reproduced bykind permission of the Reverend Alan Dodds. Pages 5,7, 9, 23 Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter. Page 6North Devon Record Office. Page 10 National Trust,Saltram House, south Devon. Pages 11, 20 WestCountry Studies Library. Page 12 from Paul Edwardsand James Walvin: Black Personalities in the Era of theSlave Trade, Macmillan, 1983. Page 14 by kindpermission of the Dean and Chapter of ExeterCathedral. Page 16 Ilfracombe Museum. Page 27Plymouth Record Office. Page 29 reproduced by kindpermission of Elizabeth Stanbrook. Page 30 FamousSporting Prints VI: Boxing, London, The StudioLimited, 1930. Page 31 reproduced by kind permissionof the Duke of Cornwall’s Military Museum. Pages 33and 34 reproduced by kind permission of ZenaBurland. Inside back cover Ordnance Survey reprintsof 1890 edition, sheet 83: Tiverton, David andCharles, 1980.

Photo credits

Cover, pages 4, 14, 19 by John Sealey. Pages 13, 18,by the author. Pages 22 middle left and right by PatBarker, all others by Frances Fraser.

Autumn 2002.76 Author’s personal observation.77 Amos A. Ford: Telling the Truth: The Life and Timesof the British Honduran Forestry Unit in Scotland(1941–44), Karia, 1985.78 Todd Gray: Exeter Unveiled: 270 Unknown Imagesof the City’s Past, Mint Press, 2003.79 Susan Pearl: ‘Britain’s Black African Ancestors’, inFamily Tree Magazine, October 1995, pp. 11-12; ChrisBirch: ‘Slave Owners in My Family’, in Genealogists’Magazine, vol. 26, no 8, December 1999.80 Guy Grannum: ‘Tracing Your West Indian Ancestors’,PRO; Guy Grannum: ‘Tracing Slave and Slave OwningAncestors in British Caribbean Counties’, in Journal forOne-Name Studies, April–June 2003 – I am grateful toDes Gander for this reference; Kathy Chater: ‘WhereThere’s a Will: Genealogy and Black Britons in the 18thCentury’, from History Today, 12 November 2000;Jeffrey Green: ‘Before the Windrush’, History Today, 12November 2000.81 Quoted in Peter Fryer: Staying Power, p. 68.82 Folarin Shyllon: Black People in Britain 1555–1833,1977.83 Visibly Proud – Celebrating the Diversity ofWomen’s Lives Today, Plymouth City Museum and ArtGallery.84 Ben Okri: A Way of Being Free, Phoenix House,1997, p. 120.85 See: Developing Museum Exhibitions for LifelongLearning, edited by Gail Durbin, Stationary Office,1996, especially Helen Coxall: ‘Writing for DifferentAudiences’, pp. 196–9, and ‘Issues of Museum Text’,pp. 204–12; also Sam Walker: ‘Black Cultural Museumsin Britain’, in Cultural Diversity, Developing MuseumAudiences in Britain, edited by Eileen Hooper-Greenhill,Leicester University Press, 1997.


47

Index

The Index does not cover the Notes.References in italics (e.g. 22) are tocaptions.

Amoo, Khanyisa, Dagara PeaceCommission 22

archives 40, 41; see also recordsArchives and Museum of Black

heritage 41, back coverAshburton 20Ball, Edward (Slaves in the Family) 8Ball, Elias, inherited plantation 8Barbados 12, 14, 31Barnstaple 9, 32, 33, 34, 35Barrow, Pat, archaeologist 16Bideford 32Bishop’s Taunton 13Black and Asian Studies Association

25, 41Black Boy (now Black Dog) village

inside back coverBlack Cultural Archives 2Black Environmental Network 41Black History Month 3, 42books 8, 12, 16, 26, 26; 39;

see also NotesBrixham 11buildings 18, 28, 29, 29; see also

churcheschains, slave 5, 7, 16, 17Charlton, Lewis, preacher 38Chivenor RAF base 34-5 churches 4, 4, 13, 13, 14, 14, 15, 29 coats of arms 6, 6, 12Codrington family 12Colla, runaway slave 17Colleton family 12

Courpon, Peter, servant of GeneralRochambeau 28-9

court records 37; see alsoTable between pages 24 and 25

Crediton 20Crusade, sixth 4Dagara Peace Commission, visit to

Exeter 21Daniel and Henry, logbook of 8Dartmoor and D. Prison 28, 30, 41Davidson, Basil, historian 4Davis, Laurieston, memoir of 33-5, 33Davis, William, soldier 31Dawlish 39Degennes, Joseph, soldier 31Devon and Exeter Institution 39Devon Record Office 25Devon, George, soldier 32diaries 28-9Drake, Sir Francis 6Empire Windrush 33Equiano, Olaudah 23, 26-7, 26excavations at Rapparee Cove,

Ilfracombe 16Exeter

Bishop Philpotts of 21cathedral, gravestones 14 library 39 Equiano’s friends 26Tom Molineux fight 29 parade of William of Orange 11, 11workhouse 38and slave trade, plantations 7, 7, 9visit of Dagara Peace

Commission 21, 22 Falmouth 26family histories 39;

see oral history; coats of armsfire, at the Dolphin,

Moretonhampstead 28-9forestry workers 39Frederick II of Prussia 4Freeman, John, soldier 31Friends of Devon Archives 25Friends of Rapparee 17Garrison, Len, black historian

inside front coverGhana 21gravestone inscriptions

13-15, 13-15, 29Green, Joe, black footman

front cover, 19Grenville family 12Guadeloupe 31Hawkins, Sir John 6, 6Heavitree, Exeter 38Hill, Joseph, soldier 32history 2, 3, 37, 39Ilfracombe 16-17, 16, 20Jamaica 8, 13, 14, 32, 33, 35 Janie, adopted girl from Calabar 38Joe Louis, visit of to Dartmoor 30Laurence, Sir Thomas, painter 19Le Mole, Pascal, soldier 32letters 18, 38libraries 39, 42magistrate, first black m. appointed

in Devon 35manillas 7, 7Mariners Way 8, 24Marlborough, south Devon 13Martinique 32Maurice, Saint 4, 4‘Middle Passage’ 6


48

Miller, Claude, city and countycouncillor 38

Miller, William, councillor in Plymouth 38

Molineaux, Tom, boxer 29-30, 30Moretonhampstead 20, 28-30Morice family 15museums 5, 7, 9, 16, 23, 40, 42musicians 30, 31, 31Naimbanna, John, prince 12, 12newspaper reports 9, 11, 11, 20,

20, 38, 39; see Table between pages 24 and 25

Newton St Cyres 19Nigeria 26Ockery Bridge, near Princeton 29Old George, slave 17oral history 40Oroonoko, Henry, sentenced to hang

37Ourry, Admiral Paul and servant or

slave (painting) 10paintings and engravings front cover,

6, 10, 16, 19, 23, 27, 30Pappin, Estiphania, soldier 32parish registers 10, 25, 28place names 12plantation system in West Indies

6, 8, 11, 12Plymouth

anti-slavery meetings 20birthplace of John Hawkins 6emancipadoes 27Equiano in 27port 12, 26, 28, 29, 32, 37riot in 1780 37Visibly Proud project 40

Plympton 4, 10population, black, numbers 26, 39

ports 5, 8 see Bideford, Brixham, Falmouth, Ilfracombe, Plymouth,

SidmouthPrideaux family 12Princetown 29prisoners 16, 17, 28, 29, 32Public Records Office 25Quicke family 19, 19racism 33-4, 36-7Raleigh, Lady, 10Raleigh, Sir Walter 6Rapparee Cove, Ilfracombe 16-17, 16records of black history 24-25

and Table between those pagesresearch 2, 39-40, 41, 42,

inside back cover; see also historyresources 41; see also researchReynolds, Sir Joshua 10Richmond, Bill, boxing trainer 30Riot, in Plymouth 37Roots partnership,

BBC radio/Arts Councils 41Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter

5, 5, 9, 23, 23Royal Navy 8, 16, 27runaway slaves 17, 38sailors 8, 24, 16 Salcombe 13schools, ideas for teaching local black

history in 42Scipio, Philip, grave of 15Senegal 38servants 10, 12, 15, 19, 38ships 9

Daniel and Henry 8 The London 16-17, 16

shipwreck of The London 16-17Shyllon, Folarin 39Sidmouth 6

Sierra Leone 12, 27slave trade, Atlantic 2, 5-11

abolition of 20-21 beginning of 6commemoration of 21-2, 22compensation for abolition 21 Devon’s connection 5-12, 16-18

slaves 8, 10, 16-17, 26, 27, 38; see also slave trade;

Table between pages 24 and 25smuggling 16soldiers 3, 26, 28-9, 30, 31-2,

33-5, 36, 37, 39; see Royal Navy; sailors

Somerset, James, recaptured slave 20St Domingo 31, 32St Helena 15St Lucia 16, 17St Maurice, carving in Uffculme church

4, 4Stoke-in-Teignhead 8sugar trade 6, 9, 9Swete family, Modbury 17-18Tattersfiled, Nigel (The Forgotten

Trade) 8Tavistock 6, 20Tiverton 20, 38Topsham 9, 20Totnes 39Uffculme church 4, 4US troops in Devon 30, 36video 41Vivian’s Visitations 12websites 1, 25, 41Werrington church 15William of Orange, progress through

Exeter 11, 11women, in the Navy 16Yorke, George, sailor 8


The writing of the history of black people inDevon is at an early stage. The same is true forthe writing of the history of black peoplethroughout Britain.

In the past, such evidence has been viewed as‘curiosities’, not as part of the black presencethroughout British history.

It will take work to identify that black thread andthen to see its rightful place in the fabric of local,national and world history. A researcher canspend hours reading a document in a particularcounty record office and find interestingreferences to other counties – and none for theirown!

I invite readers to follow up some of the piecesof evidence in this booklet and make the pictureclearer.

Please share your findings with others. Recordsof ‘local history’ are not all neatly waiting to bediscovered in the county they refer to. Pleasesend any findings to these email addresses tohelp us all to build up a fuller picture:

[email protected]@sas.ac.uk for BASA

Please email any Devon findings to:[email protected]

A call for further research … !

A mid Devon village called Black Boy, shown here in the1890 Ordnance Survey map. It is now known as Black Dog.Is there a story behind this?


Local black history: a beginning in Devonintroduces the story of black people in the county, andat the same time gives useful hints and methodologiesfor researching the black presence in all parts ofBritain, providing evidence of the multi-ethnic/multi-cultural nature of our society.

This booklet demonstrates the presence of blackpeople in areas that have been considered to bemono-ethnic. The slave trade brought the first blackpeople to Devon for which we have records. JohnHawkins, the first English slaver, was from Plymouth.Lady Raleigh was one of the first people in England tohave a black attendant, and slave and plantation trademade many Devonians rich. Sailors, servants andsoldiers have been among the black people living andworking in Devon over the centuries, right up to thepresent, and their stories are told here.

The booklet is copiously illustrated with contemporaryimages and specially commissioned photographs. Theauthor draws on diverse sources such as gravestones,parish registers, paintings, public records, oldnewspapers, diaries and autobiographies.

Included is a table of over a hundred detailed historicalreferences to black people in Devon and a map of theirlocations. There are specially contributed chapters onblack soldiers in Devon, and two recent family histories.

Notes for educators in schools, museums and libraries,on resources for learning, extensive notes on the text,and an index provide access to many avenues forfurther inquiry and sharing of information about theblack heritage of Devon.

About the publisherThe Archives and Museum of Black Heritage has beena partnership project of the Black Cultural Archivesand Middlesex University to advance the education ofthe public in the United Kingdom and overseas in allmatters relating to the history and culture of theAfrican diaspora in Britain. AMBH can be found at:378 Coldharbour Lane, London SW9 8LF. Telephone: 0207 326 4154 Email: [email protected]

About the authorLucy MacKeith organised a conference in 1989 inExeter to celebrate the bicentenary of the publicationof Olaudah Equiano’s Narrative. Since then she hasbeen collecting evidence and lecturing on black historyin Devon and organised a Black History in Devonexhibition for Devon County Council for Black HistoryMonth 2002.

ISBN 0-9545864-0-9

Price £3


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