In 1831 a baby boy was born on the island of Antigua. The name he was given was Samuel & he was born a slave.

His owner was another Samuel.

Samuel Nelson lived in Belfast & was a ‘West India merchant’ & an alderman in Belfast Town Council.

[Thread] #BlackHistoryMonth

Samuel Nelson was 37 when he came to own Burkes estate in St Paul’s Parish, Antigua. How he came to own slaves, is unclear, but by 1824, Nelson had come to be the proprietor of this estate with 170 slaves in his ownership.

From an office located in the north side of the White Linen Hall on Donegall Place- on the site of what is now Belfast City Hall- he purchased & sold slaves, operating his estate sending slave produced goods from Antigua back to Belfast.

Following the Slavery Emancipation Act in 1833 he was compensated over £3,000- worth around £300,000 today- for 154 slaves.

The emancipation of his slaves was only to mark the close of one chapter and begin another of greater wealth and prominence in Belfast & Antigua.

Nelson continued to trade from Antigua, e.g. in 1843 with an ‘Auction of West India Produce including sugar, rum and coca ‘from Antigua’ sold directly from Samuel Nelson himself at Hyndman’s Auction Mart in Belfast.

Elected as early as 1841, Nelson became a prominent politician in the city for at least 12 years as an alderman for the Smithfield Ward of Belfast Town Council. Nelson held such prominence in the Belfast until his death in 1863 aged 76 at Burke’s in Antigua itself.

These images are the records of the Slave Register for 1832- the last register to keep a record of people Samuel Nelson ‘lawfully enslaved’ before emancipation- of which young Samuel was one of 38 children in this list of 120 people.

What was life like on Nelson’s estate? This barbaric indication of life on the Burke estate has been handed down through oral history in Agnes C Meeker’s book ‘Plantations of Antigua: the Sweet Success of Sugar’:

Samuel Nelson was perhaps never known as a slave owner in Belfast. He presented himself a respected ‘West India merchant’ & alderman.

The people he enslaved had names. And they mattered.
Samuel- the boy born a slave- mattered.

#BlackHistoryMonth

Correction: The register for 1832 which features Samuel below- previously provided the register for 1828.