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Season 1, Episode 10 18:10 running time

Eighteenth Century Black London

Three percent of London's population in the eighteenth century was black. This episode tells you more about three of them.

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Hosted by

Stephen Fry

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Sound Editing

Viel Richardson

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  • 17 Gough Square, Holborn, London

An Enslaved Child and His Two Inheritances

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Written by

Milo Harries

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Performed by

Cassius Konneh

About this story

Previously enslaved, Jamaican Francis Barber arrives in the UK in 1752 and works for writer Samuel Johnson, who compiled the first authoritative English dictionary.

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A contemporary picture, “probably of Francis Barber,” is owned by the Tate Gallery, London, but is not always on display. Dr Johnson’s house in Gough Square is now a museum. Samueljohnson.com has a copy of his will in which Barber was a legatee.

  • The Tower of London, London

A Genius in Bondage

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Written by

Sarah Fleming

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Performed by

Jasmine Elcock

About this story

Enslaved teenager Phillis Wheatley, comes to the UK to get her collection of poems published - becoming the first published African-American poet.

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Wikipedia has a copy of the frontispiece of Wheatley’s Poetry Book picturing her at a desk, quill in hand. Project Gutenberg has a free copy of the book. The Public Domain Review has an essay about the poet, including another portrait of Wheatley in evening dress.  Note that while the USA claims Wheatley as the first female African American published poet, she is also the first female black African published poet. There is a blue plaque for Wheatley at 9 Aldgate High St, the site of her first publishers’s offices. The plaque reads: On this site in September 1773 A.Bell Booksellers published a volume of poems by Phillis Wheatley 1753-1784 the first work of an African American female writer published in English. Wikipedia and The Poetry Foundation have biographies of Wheatley which include more detail of her later life. The menagerie at The Tower of London has been called ‘London’s First Zoo.

  • Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London
  • Augarten Concert Hall, Vienna

Beethoven Could Not Believe His Ears

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Written by

James Rampton

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Performed by

Stephen Fry

About this story

In 1803 child prodigy, West Indian-German George Bridgetower, travels to Vienna to play the violin with composer and pianist Ludwig van Beethoven.

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The British Museum has a graphite portrait of Bridgetower. The British Library has the tuning fork Beethoven gave to Bridgetower and The Beethoven House Museum, at his birthplace in Bonn, Germany, has the original manuscript with Beethoven’s dedication to Bridgetower. Bridgetower studied at Trinity Hall College, The University of Cambridge, and received a Bachelor of Music degree in 1811.