The slavery connections of Bolsover Castle (1600- c.1830)

This report was commissioned by English Heritage in November 2008 and research was carried out from December 2008 to September 2009. The following six objectives were addressed in the research:

• to establish the slavery and colonial connections of the case study property and its owners, including their wider families;
• to assess the relative importance of slave-generated wealth to the owners and how this changed over time;
• to establish how slave-generated wealth was used in relation to the property and within the wider British economy and to establish if/how the wealth of property in Britain contributed in turn to the development of slavery-based investments in the colonial and slavery environment;
• to identify and evaluate any evidence of slavery-related designs at the property;
• to assess any evidence of a black presence within the household;
• to assess any responses to abolition from owners of the property, their families and any other figures associated with them.

Section 2 provides an overview of the owners of Bolsover Castle, their involvement with and uses of the property and their slavery connections which are explored in more detail in the remainder of the report. The following sections address each of the six objectives in turn. The report ends with a concluding section and raises issues for further research.