In 1944 Eric William’s book Capitalism and Slavery was published. He points to capitalism as being the main driving force behind the trade in enslaved African people being forced to work on colonial plantations in the Americas and there may be no clearer symbol of capitalism than money. Great Britain dominated the European slave trade. Glasgow Museums’ collection of coins and trade tokens minted in … Continue reading Coins of Empire
Before Kelvingrove became a public park it was a desirable private country estate located among gently rolling hills, farm land and ancient woodland. From 1782-1790 the estate belonged to colonial merchant Patrick Colquhoun, who is thought to have built Kelvingrove House. By 1870 Colquhoun’s old mansion was refurbished into the city’s first municipal museum – the ancestor of today’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum. Colquhoun … Continue reading Patrick Colquhoun of Kelvingrove
Sugar was the sweetest product that came from the slave plantations of the Caribbean. It was the source of many of the fortunes made by Glasgow merchants and became a ubiquitous condiment on dining tables across Britain. It came from the sugar cane plant, which grew well in the hot and humid climates of the islands in the Caribbean. Growing and harvesting sugar was harsh … Continue reading The Medora – a Glasgow sugar ship
Robert Burns (1759–1796), the celebrated ploughman poet, is lauded for the humour and earthy realism of his poems that raised the status of the Scots dialect and showed new respect for the rural poor in Scotland. He is a Scottish cultural icon and a national obsession. Many public monuments were erected in his honour in the nineteenth century, often through public subscription, with vast crowds … Continue reading Robert Burns and Jamaica
This stool was taken from the Asante Royal Palace of Kumasi by Brigadier General Sir Archibald Alison, on 4 February 1874, when he led part of the British Army’s invading force against the Asante people. To the Asante, stools were sacred and symbolic, thought to contain the soul of its owner, and passed down through the generations. Asante stools are usually carved from asese wood … Continue reading A Looted Royal Stool
In 1873–74 James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) painted the portrait of Scottish historian and philosopher Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881). Like Carlyle, Whistler was a confrontational figure, known for his defiant and acerbic temperament, who took on the art establishment in his provocative declarations and radically pared-down compositional arrangements. Challenging the very nature of portraiture, he claimed that colour harmony and pictorial balance were more important that the identity … Continue reading Arrangement in Racism and Black Injustice: Whistler’s Colour Theory
Glasgow Museums has a number of portraits of the Scottish historian and philosopher Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881). Most famous is the painting by American artist James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903), in which the so-called ‘Sage of Chelsea’ is depicted as a pictorial arrangement of form and colour. There are also three sculptural portraits: an 1874 plaster bust by Austrian-born Joseph Edgar Boehm (1834–1890); an 1889 bronze by … Continue reading Thomas Carlyle, historian, writer, racist
Alexander Campbell of Hallyards (1768-1817) was one of Glasgow’s most illustrious West India merchants active during the city’s ‘golden age’ of sugar. Collectively described as the ‘sugar aristocracy’, these merchants came to prominence after the American War of Independence (1775-1783) had ended Glasgow’s monopoly of Chesapeake tobacco. Around 1787, Alexander Campbell joined with his cousin, John Campbell senior, to establish the firm John Campbell senior … Continue reading Alexander Campbell, Glasgow’s Sugar Aristocrat
In September 1945 Sir William Burrell purchased three stained-glass panels from the dealer William Drake. The first shows St Nicholas, the Bishop of Myra (c 270 -343AD), dressed in his bishop’s regalia, stopping an executioner from beheading three kneeling military officers who had been falsely accused and sentenced to death. The second is a roundel with decoration in a technique known as grisaille – where … Continue reading Sir William Burrell’s Stained Glass
Among the many paintings in Glasgow Museums’ collection is a portrait by Andrew Geddes, of his friend, Alexander Oswald. Oswald was an advocate, or barrister, and landowner, and born into the Oswald family dynasty of merchants, MPs and propertied gentlemen. The Oswalds had been established in Glasgow as colonial merchants and ship owners since the early 1700s and owned numerous estates including Scotstoun, Shieldhall, Moore … Continue reading Inheritance and Privilege – Alexander Oswald of Changue
I’m delighted and honoured to be joining Glasgow Museums as a curator focussing on the legacies of the British Empire and the trans-Atlantic trade in enslaved African people. This post, funded for two years by Museums Galleries Scotland, is a result of Glasgow Museums’ wider programme of activity addressing these issues. I certainly seem to be joining at an exciting time, with cultural institutions looking … Continue reading Addressing the legacies of empire and slavery
Suriname, on the north coast of South America, became a Dutch colony in 1667, with numerous plantations for the production of commodities such as sugar, cotton, and coffee. Around 300,000 enslaved people from the African continent were bought, sold, and forced to work in inhumane conditions in Suriname by the Dutch. In the Netherlands, the owners of these plantations often commissioned beautiful wine glasses engraved … Continue reading Legacies of the Dutch Slave Trade
The Burrell Collection includes a chair with a large decorative crest, carved with the coat of arms of the Cann family of Bristol, with the date ‘1699’ inscribed into the rails of the chair. The Cann family amassed their wealth from plantations they owned in the Caribbean. Sir Robert Cann, 1st Baronet of Compton Greenfield (1622-1685), was a prominent merchant in Bristol and served as … Continue reading A Seat of Power
In Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum hangs Sir Henry Raeburn’s enormous double portrait of Robert Nutter Campbell and his wife, Margaret Montgomery. Mr and Mrs Campbell tower over the other museum exhibits in the gallery – the sheer scale of Raeburn’s painting, the glow of the sunlight reflected in the couple’s elegant clothes and their intense gazes were meant to make you take notice. The … Continue reading Robert Nutter Campbell, country gent and slave owner
The artist and the sitter’s identities for this unique portrait of a woman working in a grocery shop c. 1790 to 1825 in Glasgow Museum’s collections are as yet unknown and remain to be discovered. However, not all is lost because this portrait has attracted more attention in recent years, such as Professor Eleanor Gordon’s assessment of it in 2014 when she interpreted it in … Continue reading Selling West Indian Sugar and Rum in Glasgow
This stunning tapestry in the Burrell Collection with its long-necked camels allows us to take a long view and look at the origins of the transatlantic slave trade. Woven in about 1500–30 probably in the workshop of Arnould Poissonnier in Tournai, Southern Netherlands, now Belgium, this tapestry is one of a group known collectively as the Voyage to Calicut. Each panel showed a scene from … Continue reading Voyages of Exploration and Exploitation
In 1776, John Foreman set sail from Greenock to buy cotton in Tobago to send back to Scotland. He was a merchant born in Scoonie, Fife, in 1740. Three letters written by him were donated to the Mitchell Library in 1934. These give an insight into Scottish trade with the West Indies at that time. On 28 November 1776, the day of his departure from … Continue reading Letters from Tobago
Glasgow Museums recently acquired the painting A Highland Chieftain: Portrait of Lord Mungo Murray (c.1683) by Scottish-trained artist John Michael Wright (1617–1694) with support from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Art Fund, Friends of Glasgow Museums and National Fund for Acquisitions. At face value it is an exuberant celebration of Highland dress and cosmopolitan Gaelic culture, but it also has links to the transatlantic slave trade. … Continue reading Mungo Murray, Darien and Slavery
By 1783 John Glassford (1715 -1783) had been married three times. The last marriage was in 1768 to Lady Margaret Mackenzie. It is Lady Mackenzie who is seated in the Glassford family portrait. What did she have to say about life with the Glassfords? Lady Margaret Mackenzie wrote to her Aunt, Lady Henrietta Dundas. She noted ‘I do not find any little jealousy’s in the … Continue reading Lady Margaret Mackenzie speaks – life with the Glassfords
As seen by his signature on this guinea bank note in Glasgow Museums’ collection John Robertson was the Cashier for the Glasgow Arms Banking Office in 1778. The Glasgow Arms Bank was originally established as Cochran Murdoch & Co. in 1750, changing to Speirs, Murdoch & Co in 1763. It later became Murdoch, Robertson & Co a few years after this bank note was issued … Continue reading John Robertson: Cash for a Cashier
