Museums and Slavery in Britain

The year 2007 saw the bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act which formally ended Britain's participation in the transatlantic slave trade. ¹ Gestures to mark the occasion included the predictable issue of commemorative postage stamps, the minting of a special £2 coin, a wave of slavery-related programming on radio and television, ² and a succession of commemorative events involving senior dignitaries of church and state in the days immediately surrounding the anniversary date (March 25). Special services of “penitence” or of “remembrance and reconciliation” were held in cathedrals in Bristol and Liverpool, and a National Service of Commemoration in Westminster Abbey, presided over by the Archbishop of Canterbury, was attended by the Queen and by Prime Minister Tony Blair. In official rhetoric, the bicentenary was framed as a national event, engaging the pinnacles of state and church in affirmations of public attitude and national purpose. ³ Equally remarkable, however, was the extensive calendar of activities relating to slavery and abolition and their contemporary legacies, which unfolded across the country as a whole. Throughout 2007, local authorities, community organizations, voluntary groups, and cultural and religious institutions competed and collaborated with each other in organizing lectures, conferences, debates, exhibitions, workshops, film showings, dramatic performances, commemorative ceremonies and other cultural events. Commemorative activities were varied and sometimes ingenious: bell-ringers in Bristol arranged “a mass ding-a-ling,” timed to mark the precise instant at which the royal signature had been appended to the Act two hundred years before; ⁴ and two breweries marked the occasion of the bicentenary with special commemorative ales. ⁵ The movement to mark the bicentenary bore witness not just to the extensive financial support made available for local initiatives, chiefly through the agency of the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), but also to an impressive commitment of time and effort by numerous individuals and organizations.