Bristol Post book review: "Brecon Town Council honoured a slave ship captain with a memorial plaque in 2010! Rosemary L. Caldicott's book Voyage of Despair looks both at Phillips journal and other sources to reveal the absolute horrors of the trade in general and the Hannibal's journey in particular. It also examines the campaign and arguments around the plagues removal. It's an issue that Caldicott makes clear... the business of enslaving people, and the profits made on the back of it, reach […]
Not A BRHG Event
Sarah Lundberg Summer School - Seán O'Casey Theatre, St Mary's Road, East Wall, Dublin 3, Ireland The 10th annual Sarah Lundberg Summer School is an exploration of the concept of commemoration, remembrance and celebration. Who decides what is remembered and how do we remember it ? Are all commemorations of equal importance, can remembrance be 'neutral' or is there always an agenda ? Does history dictate how we commemorate the past, or do commemorations shape how we view the past ? Presentations […]
Co-chair of the memorialisation task group for the Bristol Legacy Foundation, Cleo Lake has been exploring potential sites for a new memorial dedicated to African ancestors and their contribution to Bristol. Queen Square presented itself as a tranquil and historical option that is near but away from the bustle of the harbourside in the city centre. Dominated however by the statue of William III at its centre, Cleo decided to research further into who he was and discovered an intriguing reference […]
Not A BRHG Event
People’s University of Fishponds – Sunday 30 June 2024 – 7:00pm – The Nissen Hut, Eastville Park, Bristol. In 1693, Captain Thomas Phillips embarked on a voyage from London to Guinea in the Hannibal, where he purchased enslaved Africans on behalf of the Royal African Company. The subsequent journey across the Atlantic witnessed a tragic toll, with hundreds of the enslaved captives, and many of the crew, losing their lives before the ship reached the shores of Barbados.Fast forward to […]
On 7th June 2020, hundreds of Black Lives Matter demonstrators pulled down the 125-year-old statue of slave trader Edward Colston, who had been put in a place of prominence in Bristol City Centre; sending shockwaves around the world. Commentators at the time thought that the act had happened in a vacuum, but the truth was that many knew that the statue was inappropriate, and that the authorities had failed them for the preceding century. The first to uncover the slavers true story was the […]
In 1804, the former Caribbean slave colony of Haiti became the first free black republic in the world, having emancipated itself by force of arms by defeating the armies of France, Britain and Spain on the battlefield. This new nation sought international allies to help safeguard its hard-worn freedom in a world of imperial slavery. In this talk, we uncover the lost story of Thomas Goodall, a Bristolian who served as Haiti's first Admiral and tangled with the Royal Navy in the fight to defend […]
Book tickets for the showing here. BRHG are very pleased to welcome Arlen Harris (co-director) and Luke Daniels to Bristol to discuss this new documentary profiling the Guyanese revolutionary Walter Rodney. ‘Walter Rodney: What they don’t Want you to Know’ is an original 72-minute documentary featuring a murder, Cold War conspiracies, Black Power, the end of Empire, and how that connects to the policing, surveillance practices and social movements of today. This is the first film where Walter’s […]
Mike Baker, Plaque Maker – Living Easton Legend Erstwhile friend, collaborator and BRHG colleague Mark Steeds, presents a snapshot of the legacy of Easton legend Mike Baker, who sadly died in 2020 aged just 58. A doyen of the Living Easton History Group, among many others, his talent seemed to know no bounds. Rebel archeologist, Baker researched topics to the nth degree and then drew and sculpted them into veritable works of art. From his makeshift studio in the former Great Western Cotton Works […]
Bristol Post book review: "Brecon Town Council honoured a slave ship captain with a memorial plaque in 2010! Rosemary L. Caldicott's book Voyage of Despair looks both at Phillips journal and other sources to reveal the absolute horrors of the trade in general and the Hannibal's journey in particular. It also examines the campaign and arguments around the plagues removal. It's an issue that Caldicott makes clear... he business of enslaving people, and the profits made on the back of it, reach […]
We are very pleased to have Ian Bild a founding member of the influential Bristol Broadsides and the cast, researchers and organisers of the recent Haunting Ashton Court project speaking and performing at M Shed. Bristol Broadsides was a non-profit making publishing co-operative founded in 1977. Its aims were best summed up by the Hut Writers from the Southmead council estate in their book Corrugated Ironworks: For too long we’ve been sitting back, complacently accepting everything that has been […]
