Year 8 CE Learning about the Slave Trade

Year 8s have been studying the abolition movement and identifying the journey to the legal abolition of slavery in the UK.

The range of deeply emotive and morally abhorrent information about the historic slave trade has been sensitively taught, and much reflection has been had upon the dehumanising and immoral behaviours which were tolerated in the past, and the power of money, which fuelled and legitimised these acts.

We have examined slave-produced products which became boom items in the 17^th, 18^th and 19^th centuries, thus fuelling the slave trade itself. One important product was tobacco, and we had a close look at original period pipes, which used to be sold at the time packed with slave trade produced tobacco. The pipes were disposable and many have ended up in rubbish heaps and river banks across the country. These were found in the River Thames and are typical examples of the time.

We also discussed the ways that abolitionists encouraged support through the sale of items that carried slogans with anti-slave trade messages, much like ‘Help for Heroes’ bracelets or political slogan T-shirts today. They designed items for daily use which could carry an abolitionist message, and Laika made a pipe of the same style as the period pipes of the time.

Miss P. Gillow

Head of History