CPMH Peter Davies Seminar 2025
Posted: Friday 12th September 2025
Event Date: 15 October 2025, 5:30pm
Location: Online and in person at University of Liverpool
Organisers: Centre for Port and Maritme History
Re-Imagining Josiah Wedgwood
This year's Centre for Port and Maritime History Peter N Davies Memorial Seminar 'Re-imagining Josiah Wedgeood' will be presented by Hannah Smith.
ABSTRACT: Josiah Wedgwood is held in high regard for his business acumen, philanthropy, and entrepreneurial flare.
His medallion ‘Am I Not a Man and a Brother’ became the official seal for the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Yet, there is a less well known and under-researched aspect of his business dealings.
The colonies, both in the West Indies and America, acted as a major export market for Wedgwood. This positioned Wedgwood within the transatlantic economy which was driven by the profits from slavery and the goods produced by enslaved people. Enslavers made up an important element of Wedgwood’s clientele and this seminar will reveal Wedgwood as a more nuanced character and will contribute to a broader reckoning of Britain’s historic relationship with slavery.
Hannah Smith is in the final year of a three-year ESRC-funded PhD at Keele University. Her thesis, ‘Staffordshire and Enslavement: a county’s connections to a colonial past’ demonstrates a range of ways in which Staffordshire can be connected to the slave trade, enslavement, and colonialism, including the role of women and Josiah Wedgwood’s benefit from the aforesaid institutions. Hannah completed her first degree and an ESRC funded MRes at University of Liverpool.
Online and in person at University of Liverpool, Roxby Building, 6th Floor Conference Room, L69 7ZT
The seminar is FREE, and all are welcome.
Online registration available via this link.
