Good policing in Bristol

Callistemon

Liverpool also has a dark history concerning the slave trade, but on listening to an item on Jeremy Vine yesterday concerning Colston's statue, a caller stated that Liverpudlians don't turn away from it but accept that the past is the past and not something to be proud of, and have a museum set up to explain this. The memorabilia and relics of the slave trade were in this museum explaining the history, and Bristol should do the same with Colston.

And whilst changing the name of the Colston Hall, the schools, etc. the names of the roads Blackboy Hill and Whiteladies Road should also be changed.

No one can rewrite history. Slavery was not just white people exploiting black people but much more complex than that with Arab traders, and African tribes selling people from other tribes.

But now would be a good time to take steps to make amends with that wretched statue of Colston.

When Bristol Council considered attaching a plaque to the statue, explaining who Colston was and what he did, the Conservative Councillors voted against it.

I imagine whiteladies road refers to to an order of nuns - we have a whiteladies priory near here. Nothing to do with race.
And wasn't the Black Boy King Charles II? There is a Black Boy pub in Bewdley. (He had a Spanish mother).

I think Blackboy Hill was named possibly after Charles II or may be so called because there was a pub there called Blackboy Inn where criminals were tried.

Whiteladies Road was, I thought, named after the nuns at the Carmelite nunnery there who wore white.

X post MrsEggy

MrsEggy I believe that lots of pubs were called the Blackboy Inn built after The Restoration and I also read somewhere that the pub sign for the one in Bristol was a portrait of Charles II.

25Avalon. You are blaming the police for not coming to your aid promptly. Could this be because there are far fewer police now?

There may be only one or two police cars covering a large area and they can't be in two places at one time and we the public suffer.

I think I know who to blame for reducing police numbers.

I

The current Mayor is a thoroughly good thing imo.! Absolute rubbish.

On Sunday morning I remarked to my DH that I thought this might happen so if it crossed my mind it surely should have crossed Superintendent Bennet’s mind!.

Mob rules, disgusting.

Sparklefizz, Liverpool council are also planning the introduction of new plaques to be placed on roads with names that are linked to slavery - this was actually passed by the council last year.

Well done to Liverpool Dee1012.

MrsEggy and Callistemon You could well be right. I just assumed the names were related to Bristol's slave trade because those roads lead up to Clifton where the wealthy merchants built their houses away from the stink of the docks.

But I am not a Bristol person and was born and bred in Surrey, so although I live near Bath now, I only know what I've learnt since I've been here. Apologies if I've got it wrong.

We need to know history don’t we Callistemon ( and others) who say that Blackboy inn signs probably proliferated after Charles was restored to the throne. There are two pubs with this name that I know of fairly locally.
It’s always interesting to read posts about Bristol from those who actually know the city very well.?

It's ok Sparklefizz!
We have a lot of family/friends connections with Bristol over very many years.
I don't think any were connected with the slave trade.

I did mention Nathaniel Wells on another thread, who started life as a black slave on a plantation in St Kitts. His father was a plantation owner, his mother a slave. His father sent him to London to be educated and he was accepted into 'high society' here, inherited his father's estates and became a commissioned officer a JP and a High Sheriff.
He continued to employ slaves on his plantations in the Caribbean. Perhaps, as absentee landlord, he thought they were being treated as well as his father treated all of his.

That's very interesting Callistemon.

It reminds me of one of the episodes of the programme Who Do you think you Are? when they were tracing the family tree of a young mixed race popstar/presenter. I think his name was Marvin Humes.

Anyway, he knew he had ancestors from Jamaica and so was expecting slavery to feature, and was horrified to learn that when his great-grandfather was freed, he then immediately bought slaves for himself. He had never considered that black people could also be slave-masters.

I remember that episode. I think there was a woman too, who found out the same on WDYTYA.

I think Ainsley Harriott found out that one of his paternal ancestors was a slave owner.
It was Naomie Harris I think, who discovered her ancestors were a slave owner and an another an overseer.

It's not surprising really, as the women would have had no say in the matter.

Chocolate producers, of course, obtained the cocoa beans from slave plantations in the Caribbean.

Several producers started up in Bristol, among them the well-known Fry family.

I am going to do a DNA test to find out exactly my heritage I suspect that our family are a mixed race one. When tracing the family history my , I don't know how many, grandad was a merchant seaman in Bristol and brought a wife of colour back with him to Bristol. Often wonder if she was a slave or from a plantation or what, so I am hoping the test will help me.

As well as chocolate, Bristol is well known for tobacco . I'm sure old man Wills is to blame for more deaths than anything else with his cigarettes, and many buildings in Bristol are named after him.

www.davenapier.co.uk/wills/wdhowill.htm

It's now a centre for the arts.

We had an auntie who worked there; I sure she told us they got free cigarettes.
She did give up smoking eventually and was 97 when she died.

This history of Bristol is fascinating. I’ve only spent one night there and didn’t explore the city - I spent most of my time there tangled up in one-way systems and road works.

I do have ancestors who lived in the area until the 1800’s so I now feel I need to learn more.

If anyone has missed it, David Olusoga’s latest series of A House In Time focuses on a house in Guinea Street, Bristol. Slavery & Colston feature in it. It’s currently on BBC and precious episodes are on catch-up.

I missed it, will try to find it on catch-up.
Many of the old houses have been demolished, I think, to make way for new flats but I do like to hear tales of years ago from relatives who grew up there.
We really should write it all down.

Here it is, Callistemon. I find his programmes engrossing. And yes to writing down memories. All these stories will be lost, otherwise. My mum is 92 and still seems to remember almost everything from the day she was born!

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000jjn9

Thank you SueDonim

On 18th June you can listen to an online lecture about the lives of the Pinney family who lived in The Georgian House.

Pinney was the owner of many sugar plantations in the Caribbean and of hundreds of enslaved people. This free talk will reveal the lives of the house’s inhabitants – the Pinney family and the Bristol servants.

Each room in the Georgian House Museum explores the stories of the people who lived there in the 1790s. Through this talk, you’ll learn about Fanny Coker, a freed woman and Lady’s Maid of Jane Pinney.

We’ll also discuss Pero Jones, enslaved valet to John Pinney who lived alongside the family from the age of 12. A bridge that spans St Augustine’s Reach in the heart of Bristol Harbour now bears his name, in memory of just one of the many whose lives were devastated by slavery.

www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/bristol-museum-and-art-gallery/whats-on/late-lunch-talk-the-inhabitants-of-the-georgian-house/?fbclid=IwAR0pOQdVfgl1zIFjlQdWvfeS6EsqFyhCvVf4TwL86lujL9nVC87kqoeKBxE

Anyone that abuses the police in this country should be dealt with most strongly, protestors would have something to moan about if it were the USA