Liverpool slave trade

During the 1700s and 1800s, Liverpool, England was a very important port city for trading goods around the world. Unfortunately, some of the goods were human beings who were taken away from their homes in Africa and shipped to Liverpool. This was called the 'slaving trade'. People in England who wanted to make money from the trade bought these African people from the ship captains and then sold them as slaves to work on plantations in the British colonies and in the Caribbean. The people who were taken away from their homeland against their will were treated badly and had to work hard in terrible conditions. Liverpool was a major centre of this trade, so it became known as the “slave capital of the world”. Sadly, this system of human exploitation lasted for many years before it finally ended.