Frederick Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 I listened to the woman responsible for the research on which families have done well out of a connection to the slave trade on the radio this morning ... Many families in the UK had connections via investment with companies who owned land or traded with the slave colonies . This Histiorian went on to say she felt it only right that such families should now consider financial reparation as their position today can be directly linked to what their families did 200 years ago and they are only where they are today because of their link with slavery I did not hear her mention Holland France Spain and Portugal in this desire to find cash to pay over and say sorry for what great great grandad got up to when investing his hard earned ... The link http://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/ This might lose out local MP a few votes ..............http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-dorset-21591814 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NormanH Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 I think the present Prime Minister might fall into the category of those whose wealth was ill-gotten... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybanana Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 Out of interest, how far back does this prat researcher consider we should go and how wide should we cast the net. What a silly piece of research.It happened, get over it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hoddy Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 I don't think the research is silly, but the conclusions she draws from it clearly are.The noble family connected to the village I am researching had an income of £34,000 per annum in 1834. Their direct descendants are still extremely wealthy and the latest generation have married into the royal family. I guess that many of us on this board are descended from a long line of agricultural labourers and although we may have travelled some way up the social scale have not reached the real heights of wealth. Are we to sue the aristocrats for the way our ancestors were exploited ? Where would one draw the line ? It doesn't make sense.Hoddy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rabbie Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 Hoddy, how nice for a breathe of common sense. If I do something wrong then I will apologise for it but I have no business apologising for something someone else did some considerable time ago. I suspect that many people descended from aristocrats are no wealthier than most of us which means they are not very wealthy at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hoddy Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 I agree about not apologising. The Irish potato famine is a good example of the way this works. I don't accept that the 'the English' were entirely responsible for it.Even if I did, of my thirty-two ancestors alive at the time, only one could read and had the vote. I'm not sure how much he would have known about what was going on in Ireland at the time given the scarcity of newspapers and lack of any other news. He was living in a very different world and it is completely stupid to apply modern ideas to historical times.Hoddy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Patf Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 I heard this too on the radio this morning.I wondered how many african/ americans and their descendants will be interested in following this up?The subject of the slavery of their ancestors is still important to many of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Ceour de Lion II Posted February 27, 2013 Share Posted February 27, 2013 Laissez faire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickP Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 Maybe the same historian (publicity seeker??) should do some research and suggest that the families of people who lost relatives in the cooking pot or who had their heads chopped off and shrunk could be due some compensation? After all there are lots of people in the African and south American continents who have benefited from the efforts of explorers and map makers. I believe that one of the biggest groups of people who benefited from slavery were the indigenous population who captured and sold the slaves on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan Zoff Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 It has been said before on this forum that it is dangerous to judge historical actions from a present-day perspective.Equally, I am not fond of excessively patriotic views based on a biased "official" version of history. I was taught in school that the Pope and Good King Richard were saving God's children from terrible Moslem atrocities, but the teacher conveniently left out the slaughter of thousands of innocent women and children, and the rape and pillage along the way, by the crusaders (or, for that matter, the personal excesses of the Pope.) Agincourt was a famous victory where the noble valiant English army defeated the larger French force for the honour of England; it was not of course the result of a greedy royal line not satisfied with ruling Britain but wanting France, too, and prepared to use dirty tactics (ignoring protocol, murdering civilians, destroying towns and villages, and raping and burning the countryside) by enlisting hangers-on and thuggish free-booters with promises of titles, land and any spoils they could steal from the defeated. Later dictators learnt a lot from the English.We might well say that some indigenous populations have in the long run benefitted from Victorian "progress" but it is disingenuos to claim that everything done in the name of England was something to be proud of. Were we worse than anyone else of those times? I don't know. But even if it should not give cause for present-day feelings of guilt, anyone who takes the trouble to read contemporary reports, preferably from more than one viewpoint, might come to the conclusion that there were fewer true heroes amongst our ancestors than they had been led to believe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybanana Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 Oi, a significant part of France was quite legally English but was eventually illegally taken by the French. The excesses around the Hundred Years War would, one suspects, not have occurred if the English had been able to have what was theirs. True, claims to the French crown were perhaps exaggerated, but then that was an English tradition. How many usurpers have we had? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan Zoff Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 Gascony was settled by the Normans, whose viking lust for conquest got them into Normandy and Sicily. It could well be argued that the French would feel justified in kicking the English out of what was clearly more naturally French territory after their treatment at the hands of the English during the 100 Years War.As ever, it depends from whose angle you want to see things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nomoss Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 [quote user="Patf"]I heard this too on the radio this morning.I wondered how many african/ americans and their descendants will be interested in following this up?The subject of the slavery of their ancestors is still important to many of them.[/quote]I think they should be all generously compensated and sent back to Africa[:D] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybanana Posted February 28, 2013 Share Posted February 28, 2013 Using money confiscated from arms sellers and drug barons! I reckon life in Detroit is preferable to life in upstate Mali. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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