You're Dead to Me - Black Georgian England

Episode Date: August 5, 2022

Host Greg Jenner is joined by Prof Gretchen Gerzina and special guest Kwame Asante in Georgian England as they meet some of the leading figures of Black History. With communities thriving in London and the port cities of England, we take a look at some of the amazing life stories of the time. From writers, musicians, sailors, heirs and heiresses, we examine how vital their work was in preserving the lived experience of Black people in Georgian England.You’re Dead To Me is a production by The Athletic for BBC Radio 4 Research by Genevieve Johnson-Smith Written by Emma Nagouse, Genevieve Johnson-Smith, Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow and Greg Jenner. Produced by Emma Nagouse and Greg Jenner Assistant Producer: Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow Project Management: Isla Matthews Audio Producer: Abi Paterson

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello and welcome to You're Dead to Me, the Radio 4 comedy podcast that takes history seriously. My name is Greg Jenner. I'm a public historian, author and broadcaster, and I was the chief nerd on the BBC comedy show Horrible Histories. And today we are journeying back a couple of centuries to learn all about England's black history in the 1700s and early 1800s. And to help me explore this fascinating story, I am joined by two very special guests. In History Corner, she's the Paul Murray Kendall

Chair in Biography and Professor of English at University of Massachusetts Amherst in the USA and is an expert on the history of black people in Britain. She presented the BBC Radio 4 series Britain's Black Past, has written and edited several important books including an absolute classic, Black England, which is very soon to be reissued as Black England, a Forgotten Georgian History. You'll of course know her from our Mary Seacole episode. It's Professor Gretchen Gerzino. Welcome, Gretchen. Hello, Greg. Nice to be here again. Delighted to have you back. And in Comedy Corner, he's a rising star in not one but two notoriously difficult jobs. He's an award-winning comedian who was also nominated for the prestigious

Best Newcomer Prize at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. You may have heard him on James Acaster's Perfect Sounds podcast or hosting BBC Sounds' funny medical advice show, The Placebo Effect. And why did he get that gig, you may ask? Because he's also a doctor. Yes, he works in an A&E department. He's proving that laughter is the best medicine. It's Kwame Asante, or rather, Dr. Kwame Asante. Welcome, Kwame. Hi, Greg. Thank you so much for having me. We've not had you on before before how did you end up in comedy if you're a doctor was it comedy first then you were like you know what i'll do a bit of medicine in the side or was it medicine first and then you just realized you're funny no so it was um

comedy first i was there to do comedy at a school talent show uh when i was 16 and i i i at that point i already listened to a lot of stand-up so i thought yeah i'll have a go in terms of getting into medicine my dad's a doctor. My mum was a midwife and is now a medical secretary. So I think there was always that background family push to consider taking up medicine as a profession. So becoming a doctor is the backup plan. Clearly, you are ridiculously brainy.

Do you like history? In terms of history, I think A&E doctors are sort of famous for their short attention span. So I think it's going to be, I think history was never my strong point, but I think surrounded by all the authorities today, I think I'm in safe hands. So I'll have a go. Fantastic. Well, let's crack on with the podcast. So what do you know? So, what do you know? This is the So What Do You Know? This is where I have a go at guessing what you, our lovely listener, might know about today's subject.

And my guess is that you probably don't know that much about the stories and lives of black Brits in the long 18th century. But I'm suspecting that if you're going to have any knowledge, it's probably through movies and telly. And the movie that perhaps comes to mind first of all is Belle from 2013, starred Gugu in Battle of the Roar. Recently, you've had Shonda Rhimes' smash hit Bridgerton. And ITV have had their Jane Austen unfinished novel Sanditon, all of them featuring black characters, all set in the Regency period. But when such TV dramas and movies are made, there's always a pushback from certain people. They're all saying, it's political correctness gone mad and Black British history only starts with Windrush generation after World War II, to which we say, no, absolutely not. And we've got some fascinating stories to explore. So let's crack on with a podcast. Professor Gretchen, first of all, why is the 18th and early 19th century a time where we do get a prominent black community in England?

They were black people in England as early as when the Romans were here. There's a wonderful book about black people in Tudor Britain. But in the 17th and 18th century, black people really began to come in large numbers owing to the growing triangular slave trade. owing to the growing triangular slave trade. As British colonialism in North America and the Caribbean boomed, planters returned home with enslaved people as their servants, and black people also were sent as students, and some came as musicians. In 1768, estimates put the black population of London at around 15,000, and it probably grew further into the early 1800s. Wow. So 15,000 people in London alone who are of African heritage. That's a pretty sizable number, Kwame. I don't know if you were expecting that figure.

No, I wasn't, to be honest with you. Back then, was it mainly concentrated around London or sort of moving up towards the Midlands and the North? Were there black communities there as well at that time? That's a great question because yes, London was often the concentration, but usually you would find black people in port cities. So Liverpool, Bristol, other places as well, concentrated in those areas because a lot of them came over on ships, sometimes as sailors. But they were scattered all about. You find them in country houses as servants as well. Yeah. And we're going to be looking at some interesting personalities. We'll start with Loro Equiano. He's quite a fascinating figure and still being discussed

by historians because his story is a little bit more complicated, but he was quite well known in the 18th century. Do you want to tell us about him, Gretchen? He was an incredible man. He was a world traveller who bought his own freedom. At an early age, he had learned to read and write. He then used his profits from trading in the Caribbean and in South America and in the American South to not only become free, but to move to London and become a musician. He studied hairdressing. And then he wrote this famous autobiography called The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. It went through nine editions in his lifetime. It's still in print, and it gained international attention.

And according to his narrative, Equiano was an Igbo African stolen from his homeland and sold into slavery as a child, taken to the Caribbean and sold to a Royal Navy officer. He was then sold twice again and renamed several times. One of his enslavers named him Gustavus Vasa, which was a Swedish character, a name by which Equiano sometimes still went later in his life. There's recently been some controversy over Equiano's description of his early life in his book, and whether this was his own memory or a backstory constructed from accounts by other people. But what matters most, really, is that he was a powerful abolitionist voice. He wrote letters to newspapers to oppose slavery. He toured England, Ireland, and possibly Wales to promote his book. And also he was baptized. And this was really important because black people in England,

in particular, mistakenly believed that to make a person equal under God and law, baptism would cover that and they would be essentially free. Laudato Equiano is how we know him. He was also known as Gustavus Vassa. So he had a Swedish name. And he's also quite renowned for a portrait that we're going to show you, Kwame. It's been the source of some recent controversy as well. This is the portrait. Do you want to describe it for us? So it's a portrait of an Afro-Caribbean gentleman in a red suit jacket a white fabric cravat i think his

hair's done up to look i'd imagine mostly like a little bit maybe the caucasians around that time i think it'd be i'd be quite curious as to how well unless he had access to some kind of styling products i'm not sure about 18th century hairstyle products that's a whole other subject but i'm not sure how would it i don't know how i'd achieve that haircut now basically is what i'm saying is that where the controversy stems i mean i enjoyed the fact that the the hair would be the main controversy now the controversy is that we don't think this is a laudato equiano right okay anytime his name comes up any search you do on the internet this image will come up. But it's not him. And it's now known by the Royal Albert Museum in Exeter, which owns the painting, to be someone that nobody can identify. I think people

just assumed if you saw a well-dressed, confident-looking, African-descended Black man in the 18th century, well, who else could it be? There was only one, right? And now if you go see it, it says, Portrait of an African by an Unknown Artist. But we do have an image of Olaudah Equiano Kwame from the front of his book. This is an engraving, so it's not painted. This is how he wanted people to understand him. I mean, look at those threads. The style has transcended 100%. He's a very well-dressed man, and he looks and I think he's got the book in his engraving as well. So, it strikes me as a very classy,

intelligent man, well-travelled. Yeah, I like it. I think it's really important that Kwame just noticed the book. It's the Bible, and it's open to Acts 4, and we don't know why. But he wants people to see him as a serious, literate man who is well-dressed and not afraid to look you in the eye. And if people want to know more about Aladou Equiano, his life is extraordinary.

There is a Radio 4 program called The Amazing Life of Aladou Equiano, which you can find on BBC Sounds. And yeah, give that a listen. Let's now talk about a woman who had an even more comfortable life, Dido Elizabeth Bell, who is an 18th century black British heiress who lived in this massive mansion. We're going to show you a picture now. As the kids would say, are you shooketh by the scale of this house? That is ridiculous. That's amazing. Whereabouts is it? This is Kenwood House in Hampstead. Wow. It's certainly not a two up, two whereabouts is it this is kenwood house in hamstead wow it's it's certainly not a two up two down is it no it's a three up well no hang on i'm miscalculating it's

a very it's a luxurious three-story a manor house beautiful brickwork i assume beautiful land as well i can see a couple trees and this was And so this was owned by Lady Bell herself. It's not owned by her. It's sort of her family. So Gretchen, firstly, do we call her Dido? Do we call her Bell? Secondly, I've read on the very reliable internet that she was born enslaved in the West Indies in 1761.

So what is her name? Where was she born? How has she ended up in this enormous house? We would call her Dido. It's a common misconception that she was born enslaved. And in fact, Dido's mother, Mariah Bell, was an African woman who possibly lived in Jamaica and later Florida, who may at some point have been enslaved. But Dido was born in 1761 in London. She was born free. And her mother presumably moved there, having been mistress to Dido's married father, Sir John Lindsay, who was a white man. Lindsay actually had five children of color, all from different mothers. He also had a wife and white children. And he acknowledged his paternity of Dido by

providing generously for her in his will. Dido spent much of her life in Kenwood House in Hampstead and also in a London house owned by her great uncle, Lord Mansfield, who was a famous judge. Dido was raised and educated alongside her white cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray, who also lived in the same house. Kwame, do you think they're getting equal treatment? My knee-jerk reaction would be, although she's coexisting in her house, she's having a very different living experience within it. I'm quietly hopeful i've heard some of the relationships we've seen the other people we've talked about and maybe she's having a better time than i'm imagining i like the hope in the voice can we give kwame his hope yeah i think we can and we can't

we know that she was in charge of the poultry, which is something her cousin would not have done. She also was involved in copying letters out and helping her great uncle with some of his legal work. She was literate. She'd been educated. But she also had very nice clothes and a very nice bedroom hung with chintz. And so she was in a sort of halfway position in the house, but very much seen as a part of the family. Oh, good. So she's in charge of chickens and photocopying. Is she on a par with her cousin, Lady Elizabeth?

People are still arguing that one. But a letter from a visitor, and I hesitate to say he was an American visitor, which gives you an idea of how he might have reacted to having a mixed race woman freely having the run of this house. He said she did not attend family dinners, but came in after dinner for coffee. He was rather shocked by that, actually. But we don't know if that was always the case or whether it was just when they had guests over or something. We do know that Lord Mansfield was very fond of Dido. He gave her a quarterly allowance and birthday and Christmas gifts. These are much less than the amount that her cousin received, but certainly more than a servant would ever have gotten. She likely enjoyed a close relationship with her cousin as demonstrated by this famous

painting of them that was done. Yeah, Kwame, we can show you a very iconic painting. It's done, we think it's 1778. You've got Dido Elizabeth Bell on the left and then her cousin, Lady Elizabeth, on the right. What do you make of the painting? Do you want to describe it for us? Both in very luxurious gowns, nice pearls, nice jewellery, hair nicely done, makeup nicely done.

So I'd say neither of them look like they're like they're struggling they both look very well off in this picture it's a nice painting yeah they're not in tracksuits are they no i was also going to say when you said that she was like it compared it to sort of photocopying in charge of the poultry i was imagining some kind of intern like figure sort of old lunch photocopying uh but then you then you mentioned that she did get a a small salary it must be a bit more than small in this outfit but hey oh she looks great yeah she's got a sort of silk turban on yeah she's holding a big bouquet of is it flowers fruit fruit okay she's also putting a delightful pose

i don't know how you describe that kwame it's sort of quite who me i don't know yeah it's sort of like a cheeky pensive i don't know maybe semi-beckoning no no it's nice it's warm it's welcoming isn't it there's a there's a twinkle in the eye elizabeth is holding dido quite affectionately or maybe pushing her away i can't tell oh maybe this is like the first ever photo bomb actually i like that it's like a painting bomb because yeah she's posing and then she's kind of walked past the bowl of fruit struck a pose lady at the front hasn't noticed long enough for her to be painted in her entirety in the back of the painting but hey he's very quiet and stealthy

some people think that with her finger up she's pointing to her darker skin and giving you quite a look to say ah look at look at me. And she was not given a salary. She was given an allowance. What happens when her great uncle, Lord Mansfield, dies, Gretchen? Does that put her into a financial situation of suddenly the money runs out or the opposite? Does she inherit? The money did not run out. And in fact, she received a 500-pound lump sum plus an annual pension of 100 pounds a year, which would have been an enormous amount of money at the time, as well as a solid declaration in his will that she was a free woman. Now, Mansfield wasn't freeing her. He was actually just confirming that she had never been enslaved in the first place.

He wanted it to be absolutely clear. And he actually also added a codicil to his will to increase her inheritance. His will didn't exactly make her wealthy, but she was a black British heiress of comfortable means and now with some good marriage prospects. There you go. In your face, Bridgerton skeptics. It's all legit. It's true history. So what happens? Does she get to carry on living in comfort for the rest of her life? She married a man named John DeVinia, who was a Frenchman, and they moved into a newly built house in Pimlico. It was probably bought with Dido's own money.

And so a black woman bought her own London townhouse. They had three sons, and two of them survived to become respectable men. I really like how reaffirming that she was indeed a free woman. Was it common for him to go out of his way to put that in the will? He was a judge. He didn't trust people to do the legal thing. But you know, it did open people up. There were some nasty speculations that maybe their relationship was a little less than legitimate, but that was quickly squashed. It was just people being bad-tempered about a mixed-race woman having money and position. We'll turn now to another notable figure

called Francis Barber. Francis Barber is quite an interesting character. He's born in Jamaica. Francis Barber is quite an interesting character. He's born in Jamaica. He was born in 1742 or 43. His birth name was Quashie. He was brought to England and schooled by his enslaver, Colonel Richard Barthurst, who was friends with one of the most famous men in England, Dr. Johnson's wife sadly died. And so Colonel Barthurst sent him his young servant. And so this boy turns up in Dr. Johnson's house and they strike up an unlikely, I'm not sure friendship's the word, relationship, Gretchen? Yeah, it's never quite clear what exactly the relationship was. Dr. Johnson was suffering this really intense grief and he was struggling to write his famous dictionary. And Francis arrived, and he was only about probably 10 years old. They stayed in touch, and then when Colonel Bathurst died, Barber ended up working in an apothecary, and then later coming to work for Dr. Johnson. But then Barber went off to voluntary enlist in the Royal Navy. Johnson got so upset and concerned for Francis's health, he said it's like being prisoned except on the ocean. And he begged a favor from a famous politician whom he hated. So it was very awkward to ask to get Francis back, whether Francis wanted to return or not. I can imagine that probably raised a lot of eyebrows as to why is all this fuss being made

to get this guy out of the Navy and especially calling in favors from people he doesn't really like to do this as well. I think it says a lot about their relationship. It's quite nice to hear a story like that. Yeah. Francis then became his lifelong servant and Dr. Johnson paid for him to be educated, which was a little odd as well, because he was about 26 when he was at this boarding school with 12-year-old boys. Wow. I think going to school as a 26-year-old in a boarding school with 12-year-old boys

now, I think obviously a bit devious in this day and age. Their relationship was part master and servant and part father-son. Johnson definitely felt very paternal toward him. Francis was able to have friends over to the Johnson house, including other Black people, and he married a white woman but stayed in Johnson's life. who had no children when he died in 1784, left Francis as his heir, which caused outrage from Johnson's friends who were quite angry and upset about this. One thing I find fascinating also hearing, I think the stories in this episode so far is you hear 18th century England, black people,

I mean, you seem all probably frosty, difficult times, but I think it's just like every generation really is people advocating and pushing for advancement as well and that's really nice to hear i mean that's an extraordinary thing gretchen to bequeath everything you've worked for and and own in your life and say well this is the person who gets it all well it wasn't just money he got you know he he was given a control of the estate meaning all all of Johnson's writings, books, basically he owned the copyright. And anyone who wanted to write about Johnson or use his letters, all of his friends who hated Francis and thought he was just a swindler, they had to go to Francis to get permission to write

a biography. Which means in some ways, Francis is responsible for Dr. Johnson's reputation, even after his death. That's extraordinary, isn't it? We have Francis Barber, who was a servant to Samuel Johnson. He married a white woman. And then we have Dido Elizabeth Bell, who is a mixed race black woman who marries a white man. So Gretchen, how common were these interracial relationships? Were they an exception or pretty normal? A little of each. First of all, there were more black men than black women in the 18th century because more black men and boys brought over to be servants. And that meant that most of these black men were marrying white women who often worked in the same household. So it was very common.

On the other hand, there were people who didn't like this idea at all. When Francis married his Elizabeth, some remarked that Othello was marrying his Desdemona. Some writers wrote shockingly racist things about mixed race children being prone to bad behavior. And racists like Edward Long, who was a colonial administrator and defender of slavery, worried that working class women were contaminating pure English blood by having children with black men. This was supposed to be horrible. But by and large, attitudes toward interracial relationships in this period were much more tolerant, certainly more than they were in America, where it was illegal. Kwame, what do you make of that? more than they were in America, where it was illegal. Kwame, what do you make of that? It's quite heartwarming to hear.

More tolerated sort of attitude of interracial relationships in the UK compared to the US, even back in those days. It's great to hear. What I really find fascinating is that there are white Brits today, alive, whose ancestors were black. They don't all know this, but all of Francis Barber's descendants now 200 years later, they're all white. And some are very proud and they live in the same village where he lived. And they all say, yes, that was my great, great, great, great, great grandfather. Yeah. The fact that this was quite common, Gretchen, tells us that this is part of

everyone's history. We're not just talking here about black history, we're talking about just history, aren't we? Yeah. I like the idea of black Britishness being in the DNA of unsuspecting people today. Kwame, thoughts? It's really heartwarming to hear about people really embracing it and being proud.

I think, yeah, I think it's definitely about latching onto the positives in these historical stories. Yeah, definitely. So far, we've had some fairly positive stories, Kwame. We're now going to turn to a story that's a lot sadder. So we're talking about Mary Prince here. She was born enslaved in Bermuda in 1783 and she was sold four times,

separated from her family, beaten, made to work exhausting long days, extracting sea salt. She only arrived in Britain as a middle-aged married woman in the late 1820s. And yet Gretchen, she still becomes famous despite having had this extremely difficult life. So how does she end up renowned? When she first arrived in Britain, she was an enslaved servant of the Wood family. Even though she had been married to a free man in Antigua, so her actual legal status is unclear, Prince fled to the anti-slavery society, where she was taken in by abolitionists named Thomas Pringle.

Pringle got her to dictate her life story, published in 1831, Pringle got her to dictate her life story, published in 1831, as the history of Mary Prince, a West Indian slave, related by herself. It gives us the only voice of a black enslaved woman in early 19th century Britain. It was really powerful testimony at a time when the full abolition of slavery in the wider British Empire was still being debated. abolition of slavery in the wider British Empire was still being debated. From this story, we know she suffered great brutality, but also gave examples of times she stood up to her enslavers. She was clearly a very spirited person. Yeah, so she can't read or write, so she's dictated it to Thomas Pringle. They published a book, it's reprinted three times in 1831, so it's a successful book but it sparks lawsuits kwame one of the lawsuits is brought by the wood family her enslavers who basically do her for libel

and they win which is disgusting and gross she was discredited too kwame i don't know if that's something that feels familiar with modern stories of people speaking out against what happens to them and they get attacked. You're quite right. It's like another sort of punching up, punching down kind of situation where she obviously has her experiences and she's free to talk about it. But like, obviously the Wood family have their reputations, properties, sort of assets and stuff they want to sort of protect as well. their reputations, properties, sort of assets and stuff they want to sort of protect as well. So they've got a lot of vested interest, even moving beyond the racial power dynamics to sort of be like, oh no, these things weren't said. It's nice that someone wanted to sort of hear a story and have it shared. I'm always curious. I think when people write these stories and whilst it's still

happening, I just wanted to ask Gretchen, like that kind of book would have still been very popular amongst people who are literate and could read it. Obviously, it still belonged to, I'm guessing, a more wealthy demographic. Was there still quite a big uptake for that kind of literature at the time? The middle class was becoming a bit more literate at the time. But the fact that it went into three editions in one year, three printings, means that it was being widely shared. You know, one of the reasons, Greg, that she is attacked is something we can't ignore, is that she's a woman.

And of course, being a woman, one of the ways to attack her was to accuse her of having a sexual relationship with Pringle or of being perhaps not such a pure woman after all. And they were trying to discredit her any way that they could. Pringle himself questioned some of the atrocities, and he commented that surely must be some exaggeration. The facts are too shocking to be credible. The true horrors of slavery were still just shocking to people. Even to those abolitionists who are familiar with the earlier accounts of people like Equiano would find it really difficult to hear. So even Pringle, the man helping her publish her story, still,

even he couldn't believe what had happened to her. And yet she remarkably was able to get away from that, tell her story. We don't know what happens to her though. To be honest with you, I probably just hope she just has a happy and a quiet one. And as you say, Gretchen, I think the only source we have of a woman's voice speaking about her enslavement at this period. So really important to us as historians. We've mentioned Mary's dictated autobiography. Another type of source we can rely on, Kwame, are letters written in the 18th and 19th century. One of the busiest letter scribblers was the brilliant and brilliantly named Ignatius Sancho. He's very cool.

He won me over at his name. I think it's premiership football worthy to others of you. Ignatius Sancho was born enslaved on a ship. When his mother dies, he was sent to be a servant to three sisters in London. And then he gets scooped up by a duke, Gretchen. What's happening here? How does the duke scooping work?

Duke scooping. Sancho was born on this slave ship. He arrived in London as a child and he lived with three sisters who were not very nice to him. They treated him first as a pet. They refused to let him read or write or to learn any of those things. I named him Sancho after Sancho Panza in Don Quixote. And he somehow encountered the Duke of Montague, who could see that he was very talented and very intelligent. He taught him how to read and kind of swept him up and let him come to his house and worked as a butler for the Duchess after the Duke had died. Sancho saw himself really as a Londoner. He moved in aristocratic and artistic circles.

He had famous friends and asked them to speak out against slavery. He ended up marrying a Black woman from the West Indies named Anne, and they had children. He called them the Sanchonettes. In 1774, Montague helped Sancho to open his own shop where he sold tobacco, sugar, and tea. He was now a property owner. He had this shop in Westminster and lived there, meaning he was probably the first ever black person to vote in a British election. Wow. That's an incredible story.

I think I like how he sort of, he keeps going. He's obviously very likable, rolling in good circles, ending up with his own shop, tobacco, tea and sugar. That's very British. If you're going to sell three things in Westminster, that's all you need he's very astute as well so he knows the market and naming his kids the sanchonettes is great i hope that was like he didn't just call them sanchonettes like one two and three i hope that was just like a nice nickname they had proper names he loved his children he adored them and yes they had very proper names his son billy

was the one who actually published his letters after he died oh cool so we know a lot about ignatius sancho from his letters uh and uh kwame i'm guessing you're not a letter writer but what will future historians make of you from your uh your social media posts your emails your whatsapps are they going to look at you and go he was a cuddly lovely fellow you know what i'd like to think so so at work i write a lot of letters if we're sending a patient from a and e back to the care of their gpr i love letters okay they tend to be quite i guess short and to the point so no one's going to think i'm very cute or cuddly if it's just like oh came in drunk was fine sent home kind of thing it's like oh this crime you seem very you know tired and irritable but maybe my social media presence is a bit more

um light-hearted and upbeat ignacio sanchez a fascinating guy and and really warm and cuddly and big he's quite a large chap and you can feel that kind of warmth and wit in his letters and if you want to know more about him um there was a play about him, which has now become a novel by the writer Patterson Joseph, who's also a very famous actor. I think that novel is coming up very soon. It's called The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho. So check that out. So we've had abolitionists like Aladdo Equiano, Mary Prince, of course, Ignatius Sancho asking his famous friends to speak out against slavery. So he's not just an abolitionist, he's also trying to drive a movement and get white people on board. We have this huge legal case, it's really important that we discuss here, in 1772. And it's known as Somerset versus Stuart. And do you want to walk

us through what this case is, Gretchen? James Somerset was an enslaved African bought by a customs officer named James Stuart in Boston in America. Stuart brought Somerset to England in 1769, but Somerset escaped. Stuart recaptured and imprisoned him on a ship that was bound for Jamaica, planning to sell him to a plantation. But Somerset's three godparents from his Christian baptism in England applied to the court of the king's bench to consider if this imprisonment was unlawful. The question was, could an enslaved person on English soil be forcibly removed to be sold into slavery? Somerset's lawyers, Francis Hargreave and William Davy, cited a case from 1569 which involved a man beating his Russian slave

during which it was declared that English was too pure an air for a slave to breathe in a quote which would be paraphrased for years to come wow English air is too pure for racism Kwame I think that'd be like a nice sort of evolution of the phrase and I think people should take that going forward definitely but the the fun thing about this case uh is the twistiest of plot twists can you guess who the judge on the trial is we've already met him he's a great uncle oh so many names I'm embarrassed now tell me tell me tell me it's dido bell's great uncle it's lord mansfield so the man who owns that huge house he's the guy adjudicating this case oh brilliant how does he rule it's very complicated it's actually very simple but

its aftermath becomes very complicated mans Mansfield ruled for Somerset deciding, and this is paraphrased, it is so odious that nothing can be suffered to support it but positive law. Whatever inconveniences therefore may follow from the decision, I cannot say this case is allowed or approved by the law of England, and therefore the Black must be discharged. Now this meant slavery had no basis in English common law. He didn't, however, comment on British overseas territories, and this ruling was often misunderstood to mean slavery was now abolished in English law. But this wasn't the case until the landmark Slavery Abolition Act of 1833. So although this ruling set an important precedent, it really

only applied to Somerset himself. And actually Mansfield got quite touchy when it was taken more broadly. People started saying he just abolished slavery, but that's not exactly what he did. No, he was just simply addressing this one single case and he was saying no you can't do that to this one guy and then everyone went ahaha fantastic great let's run with this it'd be so weird like everyone's trying to like praise oh you've just abolished slavery and i was like oh yeah he's the man and you're like no no no i was like why are you why are you trying to push against this like what a great thing everyone's trying to credit you for i guess different time but yeah just weirdly he's pushing back

but four years later on 1776 something pretty big happens across the atlantic do you know what it is kwame the u.s independence yeah it is the war of american independence we get the the declaration of independence gretchen i know you're an american so I don't know if I need to sing the Star Spangled Banner for you to get you in the mood. But we have got this really interesting intersection between the 1772 legal ruling of an English judge and what's happening over in America in 1776. What's that connection then? What's that connection then? Well, thank you for not singing. I already had to put up with several hours of fireworks going on outside my window the other night. Yes, the Declaration of Independence stated that we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal. Some enslaved black Americans were inspired by the Somerset decision and escaped.

So news had spread across the Atlantic. The British army took advantage and Lord Dunmore, who was the royal governor of Virginia, gave Black runaways a chance to avenge themselves on America who were enslaving them. And he announced that he would arm them and declare them free if they would join the British side. And within days, 500 black men in America had come to him. Some of them formed what was called Dunmore's Ethiopian Regiment and wearing the words liberty to slaves on their uniforms. How many men do you think joined this British policy, Kwame? Is it the Gretchen say 500? That was in the first week. Oh in total. Oh wow. Okay.

Well I think probably thousands maybe? Yeah it was 20,000. Wow. We also get 9,000 men join the American army which is slightly more confusing they're fighting against the British and Gretchen do all these men go to frontline combat? Do they go into a variety of roles? What are they doing in the army?

They had a variety of roles and they were also promised pensions. So it wasn't just freedom. They were told that they could come back with the British to England and they would have money. These black loyalists, as they were called, became soldiers, cavalry guides, laborers, carpenters, blacksmiths, miners, woodcutters. When Britain was defeated in 1783, many of them were at risk of being re-enslaved. So they fled to England and Canada. But life in England was not as it was promised to be. Oh, no. You're saying that life in England was a disappointment and a crushing blow to all their hopes and dreams? Surely not. Surely not. Not England. It's just a harsh reality

because there's real genuine poverty, Gretchen, isn't there? Most of them ended up unemployed in England without their pensions or with a very meagre one. and a lot of them ended up begging on the streets. They formed a large portion of what became known as London's Black Poor. This also included stranded Lasker sailors from India. As their numbers grew, a solution was needed. So in 1786, a benefactor called Jonas Hanway gathered several white philanthropists to a weekly coffeehouse meeting in London, and they formed what they called the Committee for the Relief of the Black Poor. They collected 800 pounds, distributed food at two public houses, and opened a basic hospital for them.

They also assisted ex-sailors in returning to the sea and helped people return to other countries. in returning to the sea and help people return to other countries. The committee then began distributing money, six pence per person, until eventually they had donated to 1,943 destitute black people in London. When the cash ran out, the government stepped in to help with things like hospital bills and coach hires for the unwell. These aren't all new people arriving in. This has already been a problem for a while, Gretchen, hasn't it? So is this sort of now in need of a radical plan? There were laws about who could help take care of people. You couldn't just move into another parish.

Right. You couldn't ask for relief if you weren't born and raised in that parish. So it was very complicated. The radical idea they came up with now was to simply ship them out of the country. And the government happily funded this project. I bet they did. A man named Henry Smeethman had lived in Sierra Leone in West Africa. He was a white man. And he came to the committee and told them that Sierra Leone is the perfect place to send the black poor.

I don't know if any of this sounds familiar in modern times, but he said they would be given clothes, supplies, material for housing, tools, and once settled, they would quickly be able to trade raw materials with Britain. And it sounded to the committee like a win-win. Kwame, you chuckled there. Give us a vibe check on this plan to send people to Sierra Leone. Do you think that's a win-win? We all chuckle because it's very reminiscent of our current plan

for asylum seekers being redirected to Rwanda and again another heavily marketed win-win, giving them the promise of a better life, education, employment, giving UK that sort of sense of controlling the borders and so forth. Yeah, this is another case of history repeating itself. It's almost like we're going back in time. So the Sierra Leone plan, this quickly turns into a disaster, right? It does.

They think they thought that within four months they would have built an entire town, planted crops, been able to harvest everything, and had good relations with all their neighbors. But in fact, that wasn't even practical in its conception. haste to accept Smithman's perfect solution, they'd failed to check that Smithman had recently testified that Sierra Leone's climate was so deadly that if convicts were sent there, 100 of them would die every month. Also, Smithman and his pals intended to establish a profit-making estate there using enslaved labor. They didn't seem to know any of this. It's a trap. Classic evil man trying to sell a plan. Yeah, a bit of small print,

a bit of the UK government being very like, oh yeah, the upsides of this plan look fantastic. But yeah, it's terrible. And Jonas Hanway, this chap who's trying to do good, he's not corrupt, but he quickly, sadly dies. And then Smithman dies as well. Right, so where does that leave this big plan? Well, this man named Joseph Irwin, who was rather corrupt, took over and started skimming money from the budget.

They bring in our old friend, Alauda Equiano, in 1786, and he was hired to organize supplies for the mission. But he soon realized that the Black Corps were in danger because of all of this corruption. He spoke out against mismanagement, but he was fired for whistleblowing, and they said some nasty things about him in the newspaper. As Equiano feared, the scheme proved to be a tragic disaster. Disease caused an immediate death toll within weeks. be a tragic disaster. Disease caused an immediate death toll within weeks. Of the over 400 who finally set sail, only 60 remained alive five years later. Equiano later wrote about his regrets, but this tragedy spurred him on to keep speaking up about abolition. Yeah, sorry Kwame. I mean, I know we invited you on a comedy show, but that's tragic. So let's

move on. Several of the figures we've talked about today had connections to the Navy, connections to sailing. Gretchen, it's also, I suppose, a fact that the Royal Navy, on the one hand, upholds slavery in some ways because it's the militarised arm of the British Empire. But on the other hand, it's a sort of equal opportunities employer, right? It hired black people and it paid them. Lots of black people went to sea and there was a sense of freedom. But it was a sense that you weren't on land, you weren't on the plantation, you weren't being necessarily whipped or beaten and you could travel. Equiano went as far as the Arctic and he went to South America on various ships. But some of these people had fought in the American War of Independence, such as John Moran, who published

his autobiography in 1785. Britain was the dominant naval superpower at this time, and Black people were often part of crews. Some were picked up and forced into servitude on ships during the triangular trade. The Caribbean was where tropical diseases often hit British crews hard. So recruiters replaced their men with American or Caribbean runaways who signed up voluntarily. Interestingly, the evidence shows that black and white sailors were paid the same by the Navy, and life on a ship offered regular meals, good drink, camaraderie, regular wages, and even pensions. However, Black sailors still lived in some fear there was always the risk that they'd be mistaken for or kidnapped as runaways and taken back into slavery. However, plenty of them survived and settled in England after serving, and I think a lot of the population of Liverpool, the mixed race population, are descended from black sailors of various kinds.

I've learned so much. I think I've really taken the 18th century sort of black history of Britain. It's definitely something I have to go away and read off about because there's so much going on. You can read Gretchen's book. It's out very soon. But then when people returned to land, that's where we see a new type of story emerging, which are the people who went from sailing to performing. Gretchen, we're talking about people who were sailors and then they would be injured. They'd be unable to sail or their pensions would run out. So here we have Billy Waters Kwame. Do you want to describe the image for us? What can you see? We can see a black male. He's wearing a suit, a waistcoat and trousers. Most notably, he's missing a leg. He's got a peg leg on his left hand side and he is playing a violin. He looks like he's enjoying himself, I would say. He's got a big eye-catching hat with a lot of feathers. I think that probably adds to his stage persona. Yeah, this is someone who's, well, clearly had some difficulty missing a leg,

but still trying to live life to the full or just trying to entertain and get some attention. Gretchen, he's pretty famous. He's Billy Waters' King of the Beggars. Yeah, not every beggar got to have a title. But one thing about his outfit is that you can see it's rags. It's all tattered. He's not making much money, but he has the most remarkable hat. I'm glad you noticed that.

Billy Waters performed outside the Adelphi Theater playing the fiddle and wearing a distinctive costume, which included a cocked hat covered in colorful feathers, a sailor's jacket, what they called a grin on his countenance, and a wooden leg, which he brandished in all directions. That sounds slightly threatening, but I'm guessing he sort of danced a bit, maybe. The hat's quite impressive. It's enormous, and it's got sort of feathery... Are they ostrich feathers? I'm guessing this hat is not your style, Kwame. No, not on stage. If I'm going to age like my dad, I may have to inherit something like this on stage.

I've got definite baldness in my future. And yeah, I could take the Billy Waters way out and get some ostrich feathers up there, definitely. He's quite famous. He's the king of the beggars. And it ends badly for him, Gretchen, because his fame works against him. Is that fair? Yeah, he got perhaps too famous. Characterizations of him appeared in several broadsides. He got featured as a character of the popular play Tom and Jerry or Life in London, which depicted the adventures of two young men in London interacting with various Londoners.

Sadly, Waters' celebrity hurt him. Despite being a legitimate busker, he was depicted on stage as a cadger or a scrounger, and his income dried up. He was reported to have entered St. Giles' workhouse before his death. We have another character. Joseph Johnson was his name, but his nickname was Black Joe. He'd been denied a seaman's pension because he'd been in the Merchant Navy. And again, he turns to singing and begging on the streets. And he has another hat, Kwame. Do you want to guess what his hat is before we show you a picture? I guess maybe like a mocking sort of naval hat, maybe modified in some way, colourful. Go as naval as you can go with naval well okay so i'm either thinking like high level captain or maybe a boat shaped hat he's got it

wow okay look at the hat on that do you want to describe the hat for us it's a hat with a sort of a full sailboat on top of it like a model sailboat it was very intricately made and yeah very eye-catching and impressive this is more than just a hat this is a full-on battleship on his head i love this picture he was so enterprising that he came up with this idea he built a model of the ship nelson which he wore in his cap. So when he moved his head as he walked past underneath the windows, it would give the impression of a boat bobbing along the sea, and people would throw money out and look for him. This was first documented by John Thomas Smith in

1815 in his study of London street figures called Vagabondiana. Johnson would draw audiences in with his large and fascinating hat and then entertain them with patriotic nautical songs. Like Billy Waters, Johnson's disability formed part of his persona. He had to use two crutches to walk, so one was longer than the other one, to allow him to move better while performing, and he often acted out nautical scenes in panto style. Wow, so he's doing song and dance, he's doing pantomime. He would bob in front of people's windows, so it looked like the ship was sailing. I don't know if that's a technique that can ever be applied in any other career.

Obviously, that effect only works depending on where you're sitting. So if you're in the expensive seats up top, you can see the boat sailing and if you're in the cheap seats you just see the dude hobbling along you're thinking is this we're getting two very different types of show here could you ever do comedy through someone's window i could put my head in a window and say the words i think trying to whether it would go down well i'm not entirely sure during the pandemic i think there were various it would go down well i'm not entirely sure during the pandemic i think there were various versions of that love sort of outdoor comedy people looking outside their windows drive through so we have we have had to do that that's true but it's time now for

the nuance window the nuance window this is where kwame and i chill for a couple of minutes and we build ourselves a lovely sailor's hat. And Professor Gretchen has two uninterrupted minutes to tell us something related to today's episode. And Gretchen, you're going to tell us about why this stuff matters and how you got into it, I think. So I'm going to get my stopwatch up. And without much further ado, can we have the nuance window, please? And without much further ado, can we have the nuance window, please? I never expected that I was going to have two thirds of my career built around the idea of black people in Britain in history. And it all began when I was actually a student, a postgraduate student. And I was reading books like Thackeray's Vanity Fair.

And I would see that they were black or mixed race people in these books. And they were all over the place. But I didn't pay any attention to them because I thought, well, surely they don't have any black people in Britain at this time. But then I kept thinking, well, how would I have fitted into this if I had been living in Britain at the time? So I started really reading about it. And there was this wonderful book that we all considered the Bible called Staying Power. And I went to a London bookshop to try to buy it because it was out in paperback. And the bookseller looked at me and said, Madam, there were no black people in Britain before 1945. And I said, Oh, yes, there were. And she said, Oh, no, there weren't.

We had a little throw down for a minute. And I just put everything aside. And I went home and wrote this book. And it's become an important topic. I didn't know that I was ahead of the curve when I wrote this book decades ago. But now with BLM and everything else, it's suddenly become very relevant, which is why they're bringing the book back into print. I'm very excited about that. And other people are on board. Zadie Smith wrote the foreword to it. I'm very pleased that this lifelong work has turned into something meaningful at last. Thank you so much. Not at last at all. I mean, I love your book as a student, so I'm delighted it's been reissued. So what do you know now?

Well, it's time now for our quiz. It's to see how much our comedian Kwame has learned and remembered. And we've fired a lot at you, Kwame. I mean, you are... You're smiling slightly in terror. How do you feel about your chances here? Has it gone in, do you think, or is it a bit of a blur? I think the spirit of the show has gone in. I think if you're going to ask me about specific names and dates, I gonna i will flail i will say things i don't like to leave blank spaces

uh yeah and i just forgive me if i if i do anything too ignorant i apologize in advance we are gonna ask you names and dates so let's see let's see where we get to and i look forward to some flailing um okay 10. We start with question one. In 1768, approximately, what was the black population of London in thousands? Do you remember? Oh, 15,000? It was 15,000.

Well done. Very good. Question two. Which famous writer and abolitionist also had a Swedish name of Gustavus Vasa? That was... Oh, i can't pronounce his

name i'm gonna have to pass i can sort of see it i can't say it laudo equiano question three before buying her own house which heiress grew up in the huge mansion of kenwood house in hampstead bell dido bell yeah question 4 In 1831 who dictated her life story which is the only narrative of enslavement we have from a 19th century woman

from the Caribbean Think Purple Rain Mary Prince Very good Question 5 What was the name of Dr Samuel Johnson's trusted servant

who he named as his heir and treated almost like a son Oh Samuel Barber. Francis Barber, yes. Francis Barber, okay. Question six.

What did Lord Mansfield decide in the famous court case of 1772 called Somerset v. Stuart? What was his decision? It didn't abolish slavery. It sort of made slavery a non-entity in British territories but not British overseas territories. That's right, yeah. James Somerset could not be deported or re-enslaved

because the air he breathed was free or something like that. It's all a bit vague. Question seven. Which northern port city had a black and Asian community mostly made up of sailors? Liverpool? It was Liverpool, yeah. Question eight.

Ex-merchant sailor Joseph Johnson, also known as Black Joe, was famous for wearing what type of hat? Oh, this was the hat that had sort of a model warship on top of it. That's right. The model of HMS Nelson. Question nine. Ex-sailor Billy Waters became famous for playing the fiddle outside of the Adelphi Theatre. What was his celebrity nickname? The King of the Beggars. It was King of the Beggars. It was King of the Beggars. Question 10. As a property owner, Ignatius Sancho was possibly

the first black Englishman to do what? To vote in Westminster. Yeah, vote in an election. That's right. I think you've got 8 out of 10 there. I think that's a very strong score. Well done. Very impressive. Are you pleased? I didn't feel like an 8 out of it, but I am pleased, yes. A lot of help, a lot of help, thank you. No, no, no, we fired a lot of names at you. There's many other names we could have fired at you.

This is a much bigger history. We just chose some stories today that we thought would be interesting. But if people want to know more, they can read Gretchen's new book, or old book, or reissued book, let's call it that. Revised. Revised. Newly revised and newly updated. Well, thank you so much, Kwame. And listener, if you want to hear more Gretchen, then you can check out our episode on Mary Seacole.

Or if you want to learn more about Black hearts and culture in early 20th century America, you can check out our episode on the Harlem Renaissance. You'll find them all on BBC Sounds, along with all our other episodes. And remember, if you've enjoyed the podcast, please leave us a review, share the show with your friends, subscribe to You're Dead to Me on BBC Sound

so you never miss an episode. But I'd just like to say a big thank you to our guests in History Corner. We had the peerless Professor Gretchen Gazina from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Thank you, Gretchen. Thank you. It was such fun to be with you again

and to help educate the medical profession. And in Comedy Corner, be with you again and to help educate the medical profession and in comedy corner we had the quick witted kwame asante rather dr kwame asante thank you kwame thank you everyone thank you very much for having me gretchen thank you so much for everything you've taught me today and greg thank you for facilitating really enjoyed it thank you and to you lovely listener join me next time when we traverse time with two more different temporal adventurers. But for now, I'm off to go and build a scale replica of my podcast studio to wear as a hat and then do awkward broadcasts through other people's windows.

Bye! Your Dead to Me was a production by The Athletic for BBC Radio 4. The research was by Genevieve Johnson-Smith. This episode was written by Emma Neguse, Genevieve Johnson-Smith, Emmy Rose Price-Goodfellow and me. This episode was written by Emma Neguse, Genevieve Johnson-Smith, Emmy Rose Price-Goodfellow and me. The episode was produced by Emma Neguse and me, assisted by Emmy Rose Price-Goodfellow.

The project manager was Isla Matthews and the audio producer was Abby Patterson. Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley and I want to tell you about Lady Killers. It's a new series from BBC Radio 4. It's a programme that from BBC Radio 4. It's a programme that mixes true crime with history, but with a twist. With our all-female team of experts, I am re-examining the crimes of Victorian murderesses through the eyes of 21st century feminists.

What can we learn from these women and would it be any different today? Listen to Ladykillers on BBC Sounds.