From the collections of the National Monuments Record of Wales: © Dave Davies Collection
O'r casgliadau o Gofnod Henebion Cenedlaethol Cymru : © Casglaid Dave Davies
Thank you for visiting this site which we have set up to share the research findings, we look forward to your comments - please use Feedback - we plan to continue to research the story of Welsh Plains and links with the Slave Trade, as well as exploring many of the other ways that Welsh people were drawn into one of the most awful crimes against humanity.
Also a special thank you to Dr Adam Coward at the Royal Commission, who made such an easy process of getting free permission to use the image above. We have filed the necessary permissions and licence.
You can get back to the original website for CRVs here www.welshplains.cymru and through that link to the Welsh site.
This website has been created to tell the story of Welsh Plains and to share our research findings, which then be transferred to the People's Collection.
NB at present, June 2020, this site is not translated into Welsh, we also put a hold on collecting more information as the Covid pandemic hit, but we are still consulting with the project volunteers and advisors to check the presentation of their research findings
- we are recognising that most of the information we found re the topic is included or links are provided - GREEN
- work in progress - ORANGE and information still being sorted and validated - RED
Project Team comments at in italics under PT:
Telling the story
First of all sincere thanks go to everyone who has taken an interest in this research and offered information, made constructive suggestions, given pointers and delved into archives and records. Also thanks to those who have been interested to understand this history and enabled us to tell the story and link it into their understanding and awareness.
The detailed 'thank you's' are at the end of this site, click HERE but we do have to say a special 'thank you' to the National Lottery Heritage Fund for their support which has enabled the funded research phase of the project to be so successful.
How did we judge the success of this project ?
We have had support from over 50 people willing to sign up as Community Research Volunteers in 3 phases who agreed to undertake a specific aspect of research and reading, and who usually ended up finding out about a whole lot more!
We have files and folders full of information about the links between Welsh Plains and the Slave Trade, as well as a great many excellent articles and links.
And we found that many more people have a much clearer understanding of the way that rural families were drawn into producing and being part of the supply chain that provided cloth for the enslaved workers in the Caribbean, as well as North and South America.
Not only did we meet the 'Approved Purposes' we set ourselves in the NLHF proposal, and as well as successfully achieving the 'Outcomes' we targeted, but the additional outcomes are amazing and so exciting - click HERE
The Learning Links International teaam are grateful to have had the support and interest over the years, of the well known historian and campaigner, Prof Sir Hilary Beckles, Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, who is based on the Mona Campus in Kingston, Jamaica. Also his colleague Prof Verene Shepherd, who sits on the UNESCO Committee that has been working for years to ensure that there is better understanding of the Slave Trade and the legacy left today of racism and poverty for many, but wealth for others. Prof Beckles led the call for reparation from the countries of the world at the Durban Conference in 2001.
On 10 December 2014, the U.N. General Assembly launched the International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024) in New York. Click HERE for the address made by Sir Hilary Beckles, Special Advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and click HERE for a link to the UNESCO site.
The summary findings of this project will be shared with this initiative, showing that in a small way that communities who were implcated in the slave trade can contribute to growing understanding of the shared history of the Slave Trade, while accepting shared responsibilities.
From the UNESCO site: 'The slave trade represents a dramatic encounter of history and geography. This four century long tragedy has been one of the greatest dehumanizing enterprises in human history. It constitutes one of the first forms of globalization.'