Britain's Slave Traders: A Forgotten History

This ground-breaking history reveals for the first time the true significance of the trade in enslaved Africans in Britain’s development as a modern nation - based on a comprehensive, landmark investigation.

FROM THE LEAD INVESTIGATOR BEHIND THE REGISTER OF BRITISH SLAVE-TRADERS

'Essentially, a new history of Britain' The Times ‘Forensic analysis from a global authority’ Sathnam Sanghera'Deeply researched and revelatory' GuardianThey came from a wide range of backgrounds: plumbers as well as politicians, instrument-makers as well as monarchs, women and immigrants alongside aristocrats and merchants; playwrights, poets and artists, too. They were a tiny minority but their wealth, their power and their appetite for risk influenced not just Britain’s economy but its politics, science, arts and institutions – from the development of the Royal Navy and the restoration of the Stuart monarchy to the emergence of two-party politics, the free press and Parliament itself.

Drawing on a years-long project to unearth the identities of 13,000 individual investors, Britain's Slave Traders shows not only how they helped win wars, shape modern industry and make Britain the global and imperial force it eventually became, but how their drive to open up the trade contributed to Britain’s reputation as a freedom-loving nation and how slavery’s profits improved the lives of the neediest Britons through hospitals, alms-houses and schools.

Rewriting our national story in light of this new research, Britain’s Slave Traders corrects a profound distortion of our past, revealing a previously obscured but vital thread within Britain’s history.

‘Vital and necessary’ SUZANNAH LIPSCOMB ‘Ambitious, original and extensively researched’ AMANDA FOREMAN ‘No place to hide. William Pettigrew’s compelling narrative reveals how slave-trading shaped British society, economy and government, through and through’ CLARE JACKSON

AS FEATURED IN BBC DOCUMENTARY FINDING BRITAIN'S SLAVE-TRADERS

Author: William A. Pettigrew
Format: Hardback
Pages: 400
Publisher: Vintage Publishing
Published: 24 September 2026
ISBN: 9781847927903