A British corporation, Sandbach, Tinne and Company, reportedly continued to illegally traffic enslaved Africans to Guyana in South America in 1847, decades after the abolition of slavery in British territories. This evidence comes to light in a letter written to the company's Liverpool office.
The 1847 letter, from Peter Miller Watson, who managed the company's interests in Demerara, Guyana, refers to a ship named "the Parker" arriving with a "cargo of negroes," including dozens of young children. The letter details 115 adult males, 86 adult females, 82 under 14 years, and 41 under 4 years, with three casualties during the passage.
Author Malik Al Nasir, whose research is detailed in his book 'Searching for My Slave Roots,' states that Watson's specific reference to the people as "cargo" and his comments about their "wretched state" ashore indicate they were illegally trafficked from Africa. Sandbach, Tinne and Company, which was wound up in 1975, had already received compensation equivalent to millions of pounds today for the "loss" of enslaved people before abolition.
The findings have inspired a new research project, Overwriting-Underwriting, which aims to uncover the financial networks behind enslavement and is set to launch this month at the Museum of Liverpool.