Information on Loughborough

story of slavery and its abolition

Posted on 07/07/2007
Loughborough Newsdesk

slaveryA travelling exhibition to mark the bicentenary of the Act to Abolish the Slave Trade reaches Donington le Heath Manor House on Wednesday 12th July.

The exhibition has been created by staff at the Record Office, where there is a significant collection of documents which reveal local connections with the slave trade, and with those who battled to abolish slavery itself. There are documents containing the names and ages of slaves on plantations in the Caribbean and on the north coast of South America " plantations owned by families in Leicestershire and Rutland. 

Leading Leicester abolitionists, Elizabeth Heyrick and Susanna Watts, orchestrated a vigorous anti-slavery campaign in Leicester, including a boycott on sugar.  Local landowner, Thomas Babington of Rothley Temple, was a friend of William Wilberforce, and hosted meetings of anti-slavery campaigners at his home.

A unique collection of mid-19th century papers let us hear the voices of slaves in a slave court in West Africa.  And the stories of two former slaves, Rasselas Morjan and Edward Juba, who came back to Leicestershire with their owners, are told in the exhibition. 

The Long Road to Freedom shows that the struggle to end slavery altogether was long and difficult " and still continues to this day in a variety of ways.  The exhibition opens on Wednesday 11th July and is open until Sunday 23rd September. Donington le Heath Manor House is open 7 days a week from 11.00am to 4pm. Admission is free.

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