1 post tagged “kenwood house”

Kenwood House, in Hampstead Heath, was home to two people who were influential in the demise of the slave trade in England. There is an free exhibition there about it which I went to see yesterday. Lord Mansfield lived there and was Lord Chief Justice in his day, and made some important anti-slavery decisions. Dido Belle, his mixed race niece, lived there also and was thought to have probably influenced Lord Mansfield's view of slavery. See this link for more details.

In those days (up to the late 1700s), any black person living in England could be kidnapped and sold into the slave trade, even if they were ordinary free people with good jobs and families. This was quite common practice and was considered perfectly legal. So, unsurprisingly, black people lived in fear of kidnap. One of the decisions of Lord Mansfield was to make this illegal and free black people who were thus enslaved.