18th century Black history

18th CENTURY SOURCES:

THE BEGINNINGS OF A NIGHTMARE

Contrary to popular belief, "race" and its constituent identities like "black" is a relatively new concept. While Black dramatic presence is readily acknowledged in the works of major playwrights such as William Shakespeare (for example Aaron, Othello and Caliban), we might consider Medieval depictions of Moorish characters in plays such as The Conversion of the Moor as the earliest of the Black presence in drama. These early plays depicted racial difference more in terms of religion rather than mere skin colour. Though "race" was still a changing concept in the mid-18th century, dramatic works began to consider the question of racial “blackness” in terms more in keeping with our current concept of race. Plays such as Isaac Bickerstaffe’s comic opera The Padlock (1789) as well as Matthew Monk Lewis The Castle Spectre (1797) depicted enslaved Africans in stories which inevitably reasserted white superiority even when they questioned chattel slavery. This section provides a range of texts which illustrate race as a shifting construct even amidst the mid-Atlantic Slave Trade.

Beckford, William. A Descriptive Account of the Island of Jamaica. London: Printed for T. and J. Egerton, 1790.

Also available via the Internet Archive.

Behn, Aphra. The Widow Ranter, or, The history of Bacon in Virginia: a tragi-comedy (1689)

Also available via UNL Digital Commons, University of Michigan Library and The Internet

Archive.

Bernier, François. "A New Division of the Earth" From Journal des Scavans, April 24, 1684. Translated by T Bendyshe in Memoirs Read Before the Anthropological Society of London, vol. 1, 1863-64, pp. 360-64.

Also available via Internet Archive and Web Archive.

Black Minister ordained 1765: Gentleman's Magazine, March 1765, p. 145.

Available via National Archives at Kew, “Black Presence”.

Details: This is a passenger list of the Belisarius, one of the ships that set sail from Britain in 1787, taking Black emigrants to found the colony of Sierra Leone. Here we find Black women married to White men, and White women married to Black men. A handful of White women were seeking marriage. This list gives an indication of how far Black people were integrated in British society at this date.

Extract from parish records reads: burial of Margaret, a Moor

Westminster City Archive ref: St Martin-in-the-Fields, vol.1 (27 Sept 1571)

Courtesy of Westminster City Archive and the Parochial Church Council of St Martin-in-the- Fields

Translation: I give and bequeath to my servante Mingoe a Negroe That now dwelleth with mee the somme of Tenne pounds to be paid within Twelve monethes next after my decease And I doe alsoe give unto him the said Mingoe the Custody and keeping of my Light houses Att Harwich, and the somme of Twenty pounds a yeare of lawfull money of England during the Terme of his naturall life for his paines therein Item I give and bequeath to my two maid servants Rachell Underhill and Martha Peake the somme of Tenne poundes a piece of like lawfull money be paid within the said space of Twelve monethes next after my decease Item

Entry reads: “On 24 March 1765, according to this press report, 'a Black was ordained' during the ordination of priests and deacons at the Chapel Royal at St James's. [….] He must have had a high profile to be ordained at the Chapel Royal.”

Non-Fiction

“Black Londoners Party:” British Library, Burney 5276b, London Chronicle, 16-18 February 1764.

Black Sailor in Nelson’s campaign (the Battle of Trafalgar Oct 1805): National Archives at Kew.

Blumenbach, Johann Friedrich and Hunter, John. The Anthropological Treatises Of Blumenbach and Hunter. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts & Green, 1865.

Also available via The Anthropological Society of London.

Blumenbach, Johann Friedrich. A Manual of Comparative Anatomy. Trans. Thomas Bendyshe. London: Printed for W. Simpkin and R. Marshall, 1865.

Boyle, Robert. “Of the Nature of Whiteness and Blackness”. In Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours. London: Printed for Henry Herringman, 1664.

Also available via University of Michigan.

Burial Record for Black Londoner 1571: National Archives at Kew.

Edwards, Bryan. The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in the West Indies. Volume 1. London: Printed for John Stockdale, 1793.

Also available via Early Caribbean Digital Archive and Internet Archive.

Equiano, Olaudah. The Interesting Narrative Of The Life Of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African. Written By Himself. London: 1789.

Also available via Google Books.

Evidence of Interracial Marriages 1787: National Archives at Kew [T 1/643, f. 139 (16 Feb 1787)].

Falconbridge, Alexander. An Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa. London: Printed by J. Phillips, 1788.

Also available via HathiTrust and Internet Archive.

Gamble, Samuel. A Slaving Voyage to Africa and Jamaica : The Log of the Sandown, 1793-1794. Ed. Bruce L. Mouser. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002.

Gronniosaw, James Albert Ukawsaw. A Narrative Of The Most Remarkable Particulars In The Life Of James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, An African Prince, As Related By Himself. Bath: Printed by W. GYE, 1772.

Also available via Internet Archive.

Ligon, Richard. A True and Exact History of Barbados. London: Printed for Humphrey Moseley, 1657.

Also available via Early Caribbean Digital Archive and Internet Archive.

Long, Edward. Candid reflections upon the judgement lately awarded by the Court of King's Bench in Westminster-Hall on what is commonly called the Negroe-cause / by a Planter. London: Printed for T. Lowndes, 1772.

Also available via Internet Archive.

Long, Edward. A History of Jamaica. London: Printed for T. Lowndes, 1774.

Also available via Early Caribbean Digital Archive and Internet Archive.

Mingo, a Black servant, made Lighthouse Keeper: National Archives at Kew [PROB 11/325, q. 144 (Dec 1667)].

Newton, John. Journal of a Slave Trader 1750-1754. Epworth Press, 1962.

Newton, John. Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade. London: Printed For J. Buckland, 1788.

Parsons, James. “An Account of the White Negro shewn before the Royal Society”. 1765.

Also available via The Royal Society.

Steadman, John Gabriel. Narrative, of a five years’ expedition, against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam. London: Printed by J. Johnson, 1996. c. 1806.

Steadman, John Gabriel. Stedman's Surinam: Life in an Eighteenth-Century Slave Society. Eds. Richard Price and Sally Price. London: John Hopkins University Press, 1992. c. 1790.

“The moment the signifier 'black' is torn from its historical, cultural, and political embedding and lodged in a biologically constituted racial category, we valorize by inversion, the very ground of the racism we are trying to deconstruct”

Stuart Hall

Fiction

Behn, Aphra. Oroonoko: or, The Royal Slave: A True History. London: printed for Will. Canning, 1688.

Behn, Aphra. The Widow Ranter, or, The history of Bacon in Virginia: a tragi-comedy (1689).

Also available via UNL Digital Commons, University of Michigan Library and The Internet Archive.

Bickerstaffe, Isaac. The Padlock: a comic opera: as it is perform'd by His Majesty's Servants, at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane (1789).

Read the anonymous poem written as a corrective epilogue to the play.

Lewis, Matthew Monk. The Castle Spectre. 1797.

Also available via Librivox audio recording, Internet Archive and Project Gutenberg.

Lewis, Matthew Monk. “The Isle of Devils: A historical tale, founded on an anecdote in the annals of Portugal”. ca. 1827.

Shakespeare, William. The Tragedie of Othello, the Moor of Venice. [1604] via Project Gutenberg.

Also available via the Folger Shakespeare Library.

Shakespeare, William. Titus Andronicus. ca.1588-1593.

Also available via The Folger Shakespeare Library.