Black and British: A Forgotten History, from the acclaimed historian and star of 'Celebrity Traitors'

by David Olusoga

The new movement was the London Society for Mitigating and Gradually Abolishing the State of Slavery.

The most English name for a society ever?

In part because it was written by an American and set in the United States, Uncle Tom’s Cabin is not usually thought of today as a Victorian novel, and its impact upon Britain and British culture has largely been forgotten, yet after the Bible it was the best-selling book in Britain during the entire nineteenth century. It went on to become the best-selling book of the century across the world.

BWIR troops reported being ostracized and segregated from white soldiers. When a pay rise was given to other imperial troops, it was denied to the West Indians on the grounds that they were ‘natives’.

In 1964, Peter Griffiths, the Conservative candidate in a by-election in Smethwick in the West Midlands, fought on the slogan ‘If you want a nigger neighbour vote Labour’.

Cities that had been enriched by the slave trade and the sugar business saw fires set and barricades erected by young people who were the distant descendants of human cargo.