MJR documentary  After the Flood was screened recently at Bristol Cathedral.

Visitor Experience and Events Officer Jess Cainey writes:
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"We expanded the event with a conversation with two members of our Clergy where we did a Q&A regarding the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the Church. The documentary was a moving conversation starter that emboldened the attendees to ask difficult questions and explore a variety of challenges the Cathedral need to confront on its journey to address its legacy of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.  
​It was beautifully shot and extremely well received. 
Thankyou again to MJR for its kindness in letting the Cathedral show After the Flood."

MJR documentary ‘After the Flood: the church, slavery and reconciliation' has been reviewed by Churches Together in England (CTE). "For reconciliation to take place there is much work to do to correct the societal disadvantages of black Britons. The film calls upon the churches to recognise their legacy, acknowledge wrongdoing and make reparations." Read the full review here.

Manchester City Council has announced a public consultation on who should be remembered in public spaces as part of a review of statues, monuments and memorials in the city. The council says it is not looking to ‘eradicate’ some of Manchester’s past but to instead understand its ‘history, heritage, and the context around it’. Mancunian's views will be sought on the appropriateness of existing pieces of art. This will also shape policy on artworks that will be commissioned and displayed in the future. 

​A review of every statue in Manchester was announced days after Black Lives Matter protestors marched through cities across the UK last year. Approval has already been given for a statue of Len Johnson, a black boxer from Clayton who was denied championship bouts because of the colour of his skin.

​The consultation is being supported by charity Manchester Histories. Read more here. See the consultation here.

The Interest: How the British Establishment Resisted the Abolition of Slavery is a new book by Michael Taylor. After the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, 800,000 enslaved people continued to work in the British colonies producing sugar and other commodities for the home market. Slavery remained central to Britain’s economic and strategic interests, and resistance to further reform meant a 26 year delay to the abolition of slavery in the colonies. This was led by “The West India Interest”, a pro-slavery elite involving wealthy planters, hundreds of MPs, civil servants, financiers, landowners, clergymen, judges and military chiefs, including publisher John Murray, The Spectator magazine, William Gladstone, the Duke of Wellington, Robert Peel and George Canning. Taylor explains that racism went hand-in-hand with the business, because people needed a way to rationalise slavery to themselves. They were helped by clergy who associated white and lighter skins with Christian concepts of “goodness” and purity and black skin with darkness and evil.

This review says: "Taylor’s magnificent book opens a window onto a most shameful commerce." Another reviewer comments: "In an era when black history is at last being given its rightful due, Taylor’s potent book shows why slavery took root as an essential part of British national life and why to remember it otherwise is 'misleading and self-serving'”.

Read more here.

MJR is about addressing legacy of both colonial enslavement and industrial exploitation. One of the most significant events in UK history affecting the latter was the Peterloo Massacre of  August 16, 1819 in Manchester when 60,000 peaceful pro-democracy demonstrators were charged by cavalry resulting in 18 deaths and over 700 severe injuries. Described as “the most important political event ever to take place in Manchester.” by the Guardian (founded as the Manchester Guardian as a direct outcome), the 200th anniversary of Peterloo will take place next year. Many events and activities are being planned to mark the anniversary (more information here) and MJR is helping plan one of these: a special commemorative service at Manchester Cathedral on July 7. More details to follow.

Also marking this anniversary is the Mike Leigh film 'Peterloo', now on general release in cinemas. The film tells the story of the context and build-up to the events of August 16, 1819, and of the day itself. It gives a telling insight into the conditions of the working classes and comparative ease and wealth of the factory owners and landed ruling classes that resorted to drastic measures to hold onto their power. Many reformers and commentators of the time compared the plight of the working classes to that of the enslaved, referring to 'white slavery', and a number of abolitionists were also involved in the struggle for worker's rights. The film leaves the viewer to draw their own parallels with modern-day Britain. Recommended for those who wish to learn about an important piece of our history, which, like the truth about enslavement and colonialism, has been conveniently neglected.

'Cotton Panic!' tells the story of the cotton workers of the North of England and their inspiring solidarity with the slaves of the American South during the US Civil War. When the supply of cotton to English mills was blockaded, the mills stopped and, with no welfare, the workers suffered horribly. But at an historic public meeting at Manchester's Free Trade Hall they identified with the slaves and their fight for freedom, sending a letter of support to Abraham Lincoln. Using a mixture of industrial music, folk-songs, imagery, dance, poetry and spoken word –including contemporary accounts and documents – Cotton Panic! is more of a gig than a piece of theatre. But, despite some of the words not always being clear, and with a mesmerising central performance by Jane Horrocks, the story is well-told and the links between the workers and slaves are clear. A final song is accompanied by a fast-moving collage of contemporary images of politicians, protesters, Black Lives Matter and significant events, which brings the issues bang up to date. Very effective.

In a post-show Q&A, the creators spoke about how the production came to be written. Jane Horrocks on 'Who Do You Think You Are?' discovered she was descended from mill-workers from this time and realised this was a largely untold story. The lack of education about the human aspects of slavery and the Industrial Revolution, and the lack of knowledge by Manchester people about their own history and culture became a theme of the Q&A. There is a job to be done!

​Paul Keeble

This day conference, set up with help from MJR, was held at the end of April at Gladstone's Library in Hawarden, North Wales. It was led by Dr Nick Draper, Director of the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slave Ownership, whose research lay behind the BBC programme 'Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners'. Nick took the 18 delegates through a history of Britain's role in the transatlantic slave trade. He focused on the £20m payment by the Government made as compensation to the slave owners in 1833 when slavery was abolished, and the large number of ordinary people who owned slaves. Given the venue and the fact that much of the Gladstone family wealth came from the plantations and slaves owned by John Gladstone, of particular interest was his Prime Minister son William's own position on slavery. Let's just say there was a difference between the received (and sanitised) version and views that he held as a man of his time. In a fascinating and thought-provoking day much was said about the legacy of enslavement, including how its remembrance has been eclipsed by that of abolition.

I Am Not Your Negro is a new documentary film by Raoul Peck based on an unfinished manuscript by James Balwin (author of recently republished 'The Fire Next Time') called Remember This House. In it he told the stories of three of his friends who died before they reached 40: Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and Medgar Evers. This review in The Independent comments: "Baldwin was writing more than 30 years ago. Not so much has changed since then", but the intention is to provoke rather than induce despair. More...

'Homegoing' is the best-selling debut novel by new author Yaa Gyasi. It tells the story of a family over several generations, exploring the impact of their being taken as slaves from late eighteenth century Gold Coast in Africa, through to Southern US slave plantations and up to modern-day Harlem. The Times review called it "an awe-inspiring debut that gives an insight into the toxic legacy of transatlantic slavery". Gyasi also confronts the involvement of Africans in the enslavement of their own people, not to provide an 'everyone was doing it' excuse but to get us to consider '"the tangled chains of moral responsibility that hang on our history". The Guardian review comments: "If there must be a purpose to the creation of yet another slave narrative other than to show how cruel, unfair, debased and horrific slavery was, it should be to convey the impact of it on modern life. ... [S]lavery is a source of our confusion and discomfort, regardless of which side of the colour divide we descend from. So here is a book to help us remember. It is well worth its weight."

"Scuttlers" is a new play that recently had a well-reviewed premiere at Manchester's Royal Exchange. ("...opening a soot-smeared window into the past, as well as holding up a cracked mirror to our present." The Times) The Scuttlers were Manchester's original street gangs that grew up in the gruesome conditions of the factories and mills of the Industrial Revolution. It is a striking piece of drama which highlights the lack of ambition and bravado-covered insecurity of young people with few options and at the mercy of employers maximising profit in what seemed to be a "zero-hours contract" situation. The parallels with modern young people in the inner-city were clear to anyone with any knowledge of that context, but just in case, a clever twist at the end gives a clear reminder that the legacy of those oppressive times lives on. Watch out for future productions of "Scuttlers" and be ready to be moved and challenged.

"It's 1885 and the streets of Manchester are crackling with energy, youth and violence. As workers pour into Ancoats to power the Industrial Revolution, 50.000 people are crammed into one square mile. The mills rumble thunderously day and night. The air is thick with smoke. Life is lived large and lived on the street. This is the world's very first industrial suburb and the young mill workers who are the living cogs in its machines form the very first urban gangs, fighting over their territory with belts, fists and knives. Invisible in history their lives, deaths, loves, lusts and defiant energy tell stories that will repeat and repeat over the decades that follow. Inspired by the Manchester riots of 2011 and the stories of all the Manchester gangs between the nineteenth century and today Rona Munro's new play smashes the nineteenth century against a twenty first century sensibility to bring the young Scuttlers back to vivid, potent life."  From the Royal Exchange publicity.

Paul Keeble