One of the stories we hope to tell in the upcoming
Ships, Clocks & Stars exhibition is the sheer importance to Georgian society of finding a solution to the Longitude problem . This story not only includes exploits across the globe (Cook’s voyages and Bligh’s famous Bounty mutiny) but also takes in the Georgian coffee houses where the Longitude Act and solutions were discussed by every branch of society, as well as the Board of Longitude meetings, and the network of clock and instrument makers across London.
Georgian London in all its forms is therefore an important theme in the exhibition and the season. On Friday 20 June, I attended ‘The Other Georgian Story’ at the V&A, which promised a ‘Glimpse into the parallel lives of black people living in Georgian Britain, ‘invisible’ to Kentian society’ to coincide with their
‘William Kent: Designing Georgian Britain’ exhibition (which is open until 13 July)
The evening began with a 30 minute illustrated introduction by curator Roisin Inglesby, followed by the opportunity to visit the exhibition. Kent’s ambition appears to have been to bring a bit of Italian glamour to a dreary, rain soaked London. After 10 years learning to paint in Italy, Kent found London’s cold incredibly depressing and hardly went outside except to go to the Italian Opera at Covent Garden. You might see Kent, therefore, as himself an example of ‘The other Georgians’ who lived life both connected to and against the mainstream, albeit one who created glamorous surroundings for the elite.
The 18
th century, also saw the beginnings of women’s rights movements and of a defined gay subculture. It also saw the rise of a number of Africans, who lived and worked in London in reputable trades alongside their white counterparts. Historian Steve Martin introduced these to the V&A audience, providing an alternative view of people of African origin in London from the stereotypical image of, often represented in paintings of this time as essentially live in pets (For example the young boy to the right of Hogarth’s
‘A Harlot’s Progress’).
Ignatius Sancho was a black Georgian Londoner who went from being a live-in pet for a group of elderly women who lived at the top of Greenwich Park to a property owner with voting rights. Sancho ran a grocers on Charles Street, minutes from Downing Street, which was frequented by key political and cultural figures of the time. Despite this, Sancho still considered himself ‘Only a lodger here’.
Sancho was not alone as a black property owner in Georgian London. Other black people owned property.
Bill Richmond was apprenticed at a Brass Foundry, but made his money as a bare knuckle boxer which allowed him to open a public house.
Many enslaved people ran away when they arrived in Britain ‘intoxicated with liberty’ but some were given their freedom. Having been brought back to Britain from Jamaica, having been given his freedom,
Francis Barber became manservant to Samuel Johnson and was the main beneficiary of his will.
These three stories don’t even take into account the large number of black sailors, spurred on by the Royal Navy’s insatiable need for manpower. A large number of black men volunteered, another large number were press ganged and some managed to move up the ranks, like
Captain John Perkins, the first black Captain in the British Royal Navy.
These are only some of the stories that can be told about black people in Georgian London, which is again only one of many different stories that can be told about Georgian London in general. We will be exploring Georgian London further as part of
The Virtue of Coffee at the National Maritime Museum on Thursday 23 October.