Photo: ‘Diagram of a slave ship’ from Charles Crawford’s Observations, 1790
Room for improvement: Elaine Green on the ‘shameful mantle’ of Quakers and the slave trade
‘I hope I am not blinded by sentimentality when I am called to ask what Love requires of me.’
by Elaine Green
28th May 2021
It is an awkward question for Quakers in Britain to consider deeply and truthfully. The record of Quakers who enslaved people in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries feels like a shameful mantle to wear, and it is hard to know how it can be made good by the current generation of the faithful.
