Research by Keele PhD student plays key role in local slavery exhibition

The research of a Keele University postgraduate student has formed a central part of a new exhibition exploring Staffordshire’s link to slavery.

Hannah Smith, who recently submitted her PhD thesis entitled Staffordshire and Enslavement: a county's connections to a colonial past, contributed her work to Staffordshire History Centre in Stafford, where previously unseen letters, petitions and legal documents to highlight the impact of slavery on the county have gone on display to the public.

After completing her MRes (Master of Research) degree at Keele, which explored the social consequences of misremembering the slave trade in Liverpool, Hannah embarked on discovering the variety of ways in which Staffordshire was connected to enslavement and how its residents gained benefit from enslavement, the slave trade, and colonialism through the 18th and 19th centuries.

"There has been a lot of great research that has looked at how port regions and cities such as Liverpool, Bristol, and London were connected to enslavement, however research into inland regions is still lacking," said Hannah.

"A primary aim of my research has been to dispel the narrative that Britain’s most notable role in enslavement was the country's involvement in both the abolition of the slave trade in 1807 and slavery’s abolition in 1834. As with national narratives regarding Britain and enslavement, Staffordshire's relationship with slavery is much more complex than simply that of abolition."

Hannah, who grew up in Kent, conducted research drawing on collections from the Staffordshire History Centre, the V&A Wedgwood Archive, and various repositories across North America and the Caribbean. A central focus of her work examined the apprenticeship system - a form of coerced labour that succeeded the legal abolition of slavery in the British Caribbean in 1834, and how women participated in enslavement.

She said: "One of the most notable ways in which Staffordshire is associated with the slave trade and slavery is through Josiah Wedgwood, and his children, and their involvement in the abolition of both the slave trade and slavery. While my research recognises that they played a tangible part in abolition, it also displays the multiple ways in which they benefited from the slave trade and enslavement.

"Recently, literature has started to explore how white women and free women of African descent participated in enslavement, and my research explores how two women, Sarah Smith and Mary Ricketts, both from Staffordshire, actively engaged in slavery.

"The history centre also holds the papers of John Rhodes Hulme, who was a Staffordshire property owner, and also acted as a Stipendiary Magistrate during the apprenticeship era in Jamaica, which lasted from 1834 to 1838.

"He was in charge of implementing a system that was seen as slavery by another name. Hulme's collection also offers an opportunity to understand the lives and experiences of apprentices, and how they viewed this new system."

The exhibition, which has been funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, also features research by fellow Keele PhD student Gabriella Gay, which explores how the voices of both enslaved people, and free people of African descent living in Staffordshire, can be reimagined from archives.

The exhibition runs until December 6th.