Sins of the past and hidden histories

Categories: uncategorized

Date: 30 November 2007 06:53:44

Sometimes, just sometimes you get stopped in your tracks and made to think. Reading through this Baptist Times article made me do so. Reading through it explains the rational behind apologies for involvement in slavery being made and lists the places that grew as economic centres as a result of slavery. I knew about Bristol and Liverpool I didn't however know about Ipswich.

I grew up there, went to school there and learnt about my local history there yet this was something I didn't know about. Thinking back we learnt about the time up until Wolsey and reformation and from the Victorians onwards but practically nothing about the 1700's. We knew the town grew as a port but not what was traded. I also knew that a number of the streets were named after abolishionists but not why that may have had a significance.

I am wondering what else I don't know about the place of my birth and what other walls of silence the town has collectively engaged in.