The Company of Royal Adventurers Trading to Africa was created in 1663 to meet the colonists’ labour needs. In 1672 it was reorganised as the Royal African Company. It had a monopoly of all trade in exchange for protecting its new strongholds. Between 1673 and 1689 the Royal African Company exported 89,000 slaves. Following John Hawkins’ experience in the 1560s, English involvement in the slave trade developed after 1650. As the demand for sugar increased on the West Indian islands (Barbados, St Christopher, the Bermudas and Jamaica) England tried to end the foreign monopoly of the slave trade.
By 1713 the Royal African Company had built eight forts on the African coast, transported 120,000 slaves to the Americas, and imported 30,000 tons (3000,0000 kilos) of sugar from the West Indies. But it was also facing competition from other Englishmen as Bristol slavers began to trade illegally. As a result the Royal African Company began to sub-contract the provision of enslaved labour. The Company’s monopoly of the slave trade had been ended by Parliament in 1698. From then on, any Englishman willing to pay 10% duty on all goods, aside from gold, silver and slaves, imported into or exported from Africa, was allowed to take part in the trade.
Liverpool merchants had become involved in European trade and were getting involved in international trade by the 17th century. Contacts abroad were steadily built up as merchant funds allowed the city to expand as a trading centre. The ending of the monopoly of the slave trade allowed Liverpool merchants to get a foothold into a trade which they would dominate by the second half of the 18th century. |
