Eight Glasgow statues singled out for links to slave trade, report revealed

It noted there was also a muted response in Glasgow in contrast with other Atlantic ports in 2007 the bicentennial of the ‘Abolition of the Slave Trade Act’ was marked.

Council leader Susan Aitken said the city needs to respond adding: "we should apologise, fully and unreservedly, to the descendants of enslaved people."

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Commissioned by Glasgow City Council, the purpose of the Glasgow Slavery Audit was to determine the historic connections and modern legacies derived from the Atlantic slave trade.

The study, led by Dr Stephen Mullen, academic historian at the University of Glasgow, focused on individuals, who were residents of Glasgow and elsewhere, involved with Atlantic slavery between 1603 and 1838.

Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow which is the former mansion of Lord William Cunninghame of Lainshaw

Some of these individuals shaped today's city, whilst others are memorialised in civic space, including eight statues which were erected around the city.

Eight statues of Colin Campbell, William Gladstone, John Moore, David Livingstone, James Oswald, Robert Peel Jnr, James Watt and King William are all highlighted in the report.

Glasgow City Council leader Susan Aitken said the report provides an incontrovertible evidence base of the extent of Glasgow’s complicity in chattel slavery and the actions that supported it.

She added: "This issue now is how we respond as a city. A working group with a remit to propose and take forward recommendations from the report will reconvene following May’s local elections.
“This would include matters from street names, monuments and buildings with direct or associated connections to Atlantic slavery, Lord Provosts of Glasgow who were involved in the slave economy through to how Glasgow should permanently acknowledge the city’s historic role in slavery and memorialise its victims. All recommendations will be subjected to consultation, particularly with groups representing BAME citizens.
“And we should apologise, fully and unreservedly, to the descendants of enslaved people and to the nations they came from for the city’s significant role in Atlantic slavery.”

Among the key findings are that between 1636 and 1834, 79 individual Lord Provosts were nominated to Glasgow Town Council with 40 having some connection to Atlantic slavery, and some sat in office whilst owning enslaved people.

It found Glasgow Town Council invested £1,812, around £4m today) in the Company of Scotland in 1696. CoS ships later trafficked enslaved people from Madagascar in the Indian ocean.

A view of Glassford Street, one of Glasgow streets linked to slave owners in the city.

A minimum of 11 existing mansions and urban buildings in Glasgow have been found to be connected to individuals linked to slavery and funding for the City Chambers in the 1880s was derived from municipal incomes, whilst occasionally borrowing from banks with previous connections to the Atlantic slavery economy such as the British Linen Bank.

Delayed in its publication due to access to archives during the pandemic, Dr Mullen acknowledges that the audit of a city’s history of Atlantic commerce and slavery was undertaken in a challenging period for researchers in general and archive-led historians.

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The report states the named statues have direct connections to Africa trafficking. King William, whose monument is near Cathedral Square, was a shareholder in the Royal African Company while James Watt, inventor and steam engineer improver, was involved with colonial commerce in Glasgow in the 1750s and 1760s, including the trafficking of a Black child named only as Frederick. Others inherited slavery-derived wealth and promoted the interests of enslavers in the British Parliament. MPs William Ewart Gladstone and James Oswald inherited wealth from forebears with major connections to the Atlantic slavery economy.

In different ways, Gladstone and Oswald, as well as Robert Peel junior, supported the interests of enslavers in Parliament, although Oswald nominally supported the end of the Apprenticeship scheme, by signing a public petition in 1836.

John Moore and Colin Campbell, whose statues are both found in George Square, were in the British army, with identifiable roles in upholding the system of chattel slavery in colonies of the British West Indies.

Missionary and explorer David Livingstone was employed in Blantyre Mill, owned by Henry Monteith, who was in a partnership with two Glasgow-West India merchants in the 1810s. Blantyre Mill paid relatively high wages to its workforce; including Livingstone from 1823 and especially after 1832 when he was promoted to a cotton-spinner which funded his education.

Sir Robert Peel statue, the prime minister whose father had links to the slave trade.

Although outside the scope of this study, one street in Glasgow commemorates an abolitionist. Fox Street was named after Whig politician Charles James Fox (1749 – 1806), a parliamentary campaigner who supported abolition in the 1790s.Fox was a close ally of William Wilberforce and was widely recognised for his parliamentary efforts. At a meeting on 5 April 1792, the ‘London Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade’ thanked William Wilberforce, William Pitt and Charles James Fox for their parliamentary contributions - although abolition was not enacted until 1807.

The report also highlighted street names, and found that 62 Glasgow streets and locations have a ‘direct’ or ‘associational’ connections to Atlantic slavery.

These include Buchanan Street, named after Andrew Buchanan junior, Glassford Street, after tobacco lord John Glassford, and Monteith Row, named after Henry Monteith.

Buchanan Street is named after former Lord Provost and tobacco merchant Andrew Buchanan

The report refers to cities across the UK and beyond which have apologised for slave trade connections, it added: “The paradox is that whilst historical research focused on Glasgow and slavery related themes is now relatively well known - and its political leadership and citizenry are in an informed position - the city lags behind in civic recognition.”

It said of all Britain’s Atlantic outports, Glasgow has arguably the most well-developed body of historical writing that explains the implications of the colonial era from the city’s early 18th century sugar returnees; mid-18th century slaving voyages; the eras of the ‘tobacco lords’ 1740-1790 and ‘sugar aristocracy’ 1790-1838.

The report added: “Whilst historians have addressed key aspects of Liverpool and Bristol’s history, notably in the Africa trafficking, there are multiple perspectives of Glasgow and its citizens’ connections with Atlantic slavery.”

The report is due to be delievered to members of Glasgow City Council later this week.

Glasgow City Council was contacted for comment.