10 April 2025
Two New Eccles Fellowships for Creative Practitioners!
The British Library is well known as a scholarly research library holding millions of printed books, archives and manuscripts. Less known are the vast resources in a wide array of formats and from all over the world, available to artists and creatives looking to find new sources of inspiration for their practice, and new spaces to think and research in.
The Eccles Institute for the Americas and Oceania is therefore excited to announce two new fellowship opportunities for UK-based creative practitioners to immerse themselves in the British Library’s Americas collections.
The first fellowship offers a chance for a UK-based creative with an interest in research-based practice (such as a print- or zine-maker, graphic designer, illustrator or writer) to explore the British Library’s collections of popular print and political ideas from the Americas (including pamphlets, broadsides, comics, zines and ephemera), and to work with one of London’s leading print studios to create a new body of work. If you’re someone interested in an aspect of the Americas’ ideological histories, currents and futures, and fascinated by how materials and design, images and text can work together to carry political meaning, this might be the fellowship for you. For more information on this fellowship, key dates and how to apply, please refer to the Popular Print Fellowship Brief.
The second fellowship is an opportunity for a UK-based lens-based artist (such as a photographer, filmmaker or content-creator) to explore the British Library’s collections of photographic material of and from Latin-America and the Caribbean (including travelogues, photo books, exhibition catalogues, magazines, newspapers and other photo-related media). If you are interested in interrogating how these regions, their peoples and diasporas have been represented and collected, this fellowship offers a great opportunity to incorporate these critical reflections into a new body of work. In addition to enhanced curatorial support to explore the collections, the fellow will be mentored by leading photographer and scholar of Caribbean and Latin American visual culture, James Clifford Kent. For more information on this fellowship, key dates and how to apply, please refer to the Photography Fellowship Brief.
The deadline for applications for both fellowships is the 2 June 2025 at 10:00 and the fellowships will start in September 2025.
03 April 2025
Photobooks and the Creative Journey: An Interview with James Clifford Kent
The Eccles Institute nurtures relationships with creative practitioners through the Eccles Institute & Hay Festival Global Writer’s Award, our Visiting and Creative Fellowship programmes and our public engagement activities. An artist we work closely with is photographer James Clifford Kent, who has been using the British Library both as a source of inspiration and a creative workspace for many years.
When did you start coming to the British Library? What brought you here?
Studying at the University of London, I regularly visited the Senate House Library and discovered photobooks there but quickly moved on to the British Library in search of books that were harder to find. It became my go-to place for developing ideas for creative projects—somewhere I associated with getting stuff done.
London is an exciting place, and I’m easily distracted, but I was struck by the peace and quiet of working in the various Reading Rooms, and that helped me to focus. I’d leave my phone in a locker and found I could be much more productive. It did feel like there was a world of knowledge available to you and that sense of discovery was exciting! You’d order some books, leave the Reading Room for a coffee, and they’d be waiting for you on your return.
It felt very different to libraries I’d visited growing up—where you’d browse and see what they have on the shelves. Here you could be specific and go down the rabbit hole exploring a particular area of interest, and the resources were all there at your fingertips. I remember finding books I’d only ever read about that were considered some of the greatest photobooks of all time, such as A La Plaza con Fidel by Cuban photographer and cinematographer Mario García Joya, also known as ‘Mayito’ (BL shelfmark: Cup.24.q.14).1 Just holding the books—getting properly immersed in their pages, design and layout—was completely different from seeing them online, and it brought them to life. Those early experiences with books shaped my own ambitions and I set off on my own journey determined to make pictures that would eventually sit alongside some of those great works.
That’s what initially brought me to the British Library, but I kept returning with various projects. I wrote my book, Aesthetics and the Revolutionary City (Palgrave, 2019) in Humanities 1, and I’m certain it wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for having that space to work. But it’s not always about being able to focus—one of the biggest draws about the British Library is being surrounded by people working on all these incredible projects, including some really well-known artists and writers. I’ll never forget looking up and seeing the late, great Benjamin Zephaniah and feeling properly inspired!
How do you use the Library's collections and how have they informed your practice?
A friend recently described the photobook as the purest form of photography, and I think that’s true. It’s how I first found my way into making pictures —through dusty, battered books by photographers like Robert Frank, Diane Arbus, and Walker Evans. There are places all over London where I draw inspiration from photobooks — from The British Library to the Bookstore at The Photographers’ Gallery, and labs like Photofusion and Rapid Eye. Visiting these places not only means developing ideas/projects but also staying up to date with new work, making new connections and keeping in touch with the community.
I’ve found that the British Library can be all these things and more—a creative space that I’ve often described to artist friends as a sort-of giant mood board. It’s easy now to capture ideas and inspiration with your smartphone camera — snapping pictures of books, pages — and you don’t need a lot of time. You might have a huge stack of books in front of you, but you can quickly go through them, capture what you need, and expand your creative archive.
Over the years I’ve created a photo journal. I’m a visual person, so it’s been helpful to refer to books I’ve consulted at the Library. These are sometimes pictures of the books (or videos of me turning the pages) in situ, alongside my notebooks full of scribbles. These pictures transport me back to the research I’ve done for different projects and remind me what’s inspired me along the way.
I’m currently working with GOST Books on my first photobook and I’m looking at more books than ever! The first thing I did when I began working with the GOST team was visit the British Library and take out all their books. Carving out time for more focused work (planning, writing and editing photographs) has become increasingly difficult. But the Library gives you a way to shut out the noise and step away from the hustle and bustle—it’s like a little oasis in the middle of London.
Can you describe a typical day for you in the British Library Reading Rooms? And what is your advice for any creative person considering coming to the Library?
Visiting the British Library is an important part of my week and people know they’ll usually find me there developing projects on research days (when I’m not lecturing, taking pictures, working in the lab etc). I know a lot of people that work at the Library—some have followed my projects from inception through to completion and in many ways they’re an important part of my creative journey.
But for some people, libraries can feel exclusive and/or restrictive, and I’m passionate about exploring how we can shift perceptions around space like the British Library, making them more open and accessible. There’s potential to break down barriers and create a more inclusive environment for learning and discovery. I always say that for people unfamiliar with the space, it helps to have someone guide you. The restrictions don’t seem as intimidating when you understand how things work and that’s when you begin making connections! For artists, it’s a great way for exploring connections and doing research—you’ll always stumble upon things you weren’t expecting.
In an AI-driven digital era, books feel more important than ever. But I’ve found that my students don’t engage with physical books like before, so I’ve started taking photobooks to lectures—big stacks of them—so students can properly immerse themselves in them in the way that was intended.
Any favourite collection items or exciting finds you’d like to share?
There are several comprehensive volumes on the development of the photobook, including Martin Parr and Gerry Badger’s The Photobook: A History trilogy (BL shelfmark: m05/.17063), and those are a good place to start.2 But the British Library also has an incredible collection of magazines and journals.
For my recent project ¡No hay más na’! (There’s nothing left, 2022–)—focusing on the challenges faced by Cubans amid a worsening humanitarian crisis—I began researching the work of British photographers who’d documented marginalised communities at home and abroad. This helped me to think about ethics and positionality, specifically insider–outsider perspectives.
I found a photo essay by Colin Jones published in the Sunday Times Magazine—later published as The Black House by Colin Jones (BL shelfmark: LC.31.b.3706)—which documented the lives of young black people at Harmabee (a North London hostel), which served as both a refuge and a site of racial identity formation amid societal alienation and prejudice in 1970s London.3 The work is really powerful—and I found myself down the rabbit hole again. It felt like I was having a sort of imaginary dialogue with this celebrated photojournalist as I thought about everything from storytelling to sequencing.
There have been lots of moments like this at the British Library and I’m very grateful for the way they’ve shaped my practice.
References
- Fidel Castro, A la plaza con Fidel: Un ensayo fotográfico de Mayito. La Habana: Instituto del Libro, 1970. (Cup.24.q.14)
- Martin Parr and Gerry Badger, The Photobook: A History. London: Phaidon, 2004-2014. (Vol. 1: m05/.17063; Vol. 2: LC.31.b.2932. & m06/.42511; Vol. 3: LC.31.b.13620)
- Colin Jones, The Black House. Munich; London: Prestel, 2006. (LC.31.b.3706 & fm06/.1541.)
James Clifford Kent (@jamescliffordkent) is based in London and lectures on visual culture at Royal Holloway, University of London: https://www.jamescliffordkent.com.
20 March 2025
‘America Now!’ continues: True Crime in the USA
The Eccles Institute and BAAS’s America Now! series continues on Tuesday 25 March 2025, with ‘True Crime in the USA’. Ahead of the event, here’s a look at the speakers joining us for the evening, and some materials related to true crime in the British Library’s collections.
"True crime" is a very American genre, and a very American obsession. Evolving from the yellow journalism of press barons like Hearst and Pulitzer, and new forms of literature like Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, true crime has also been central to the rise of new media and technology content creation and consumption over the past decade. Podcasting, streaming, and social media would not be what they are today without the American public's fascination with narrativizing violence, deception, and intrigue involving their fellow citizens. This panel of experts is on the case and will trace the threads that connect everything from Billy the Kid to Luigi Mangione, and from Serial and Making a Murderer to TikTok detectives and the very online, real-time, true crime-style storytelling of the present moment.
Chaired by our friends at BAAS, the event will include a panel of experts to lead what’s sure to be an engaging and enlightening discussion:
Dr George Larke-Walsh (University of Sunderland)
George is currently Senior Lecturer in Arts and Creative Industries at the University of Sunderland. She began her academic career in the north east, but then moved to the USA, teaching at the University of North Texas from 2004 to 2020. She has published books and articles on mythologies of the mafia on screen, including the Wiley-Blackwell Companion to the Gangster Film (2018) [when the British Library’s digital services are fully restored this item is available to consult at BL shelfmark ELD.DS.326648]*. More recently she has turned her attention to documentary and specifically true crime. Her articles have explored numerous media examples from histories of the mafia wars to well-known series such as Making a Murderer, and The Staircase. Her most recent book is an edited collection of new scholarship called True Crime in American Media (Routledge, 2023).
Megan Lupton (De Montfort University)
Megan is a final year PhD candidate at De Montfort University in Leicester. To investigate the ethics of true crime, she has conducted interviews with true crime podcasters and is using her findings to inform the characters, plot and themes in a fictional novel. Megan has previously spoken about child safety on TikTok at the TikTok Cultures Research Network symposium, presented at the 2024 Great Writing Conference, and written for the National Centre of Academic Excellence. She is also the co-founder of an independent, cooperative newspaper in Leicestershire, and a passionate storyteller with a master's degree in creative writing. Through her solutions-focused PhD, Megan’s novel and ethical reflections framework will take true crime practitioners on a journey through ethics.
Her Instagram account, documents her research journey.
Dr Lindsay Steenberg (Oxford Brookes University)
Lindsay is Reader/Associate Professor in Film Studies at Oxford Brookes University where she is Chair of their Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Research Network. She has published numerous articles on the crime and action genres and is the author of Forensic Science in Contemporary American Popular Culture: Gender, Crime, and Science (2017) [BL shelfmark: YK.2013.a.8439], Are You Not Entertained? Mapping the Gladiator in Visual Culture (2021) [BL shelfmark: YC.2022.a.14] and the forthcoming The Hollywood Fight Scene. She is particularly interested in the gender and race politics of violence in the popular media, from the lighter mode of ‘cozy crime’ to the darker obsessions of ‘dark tourism.’
The British Library collections hold a host of materials reflecting the American true crime genre and conversation. Secondary sources include true stories of domestic terrorism [BL shelfmark: m22/.10005] to anthologies offering comprehensive examinations of how American writers have explored crime in a multitude of ways, from Nathaniel Hawthorne to James Ellroy [BL shelfmark: m08/.33001]. True crime events which have proven ongoing subjects of fascination and discussion, such as the bloody St. Valentine's Day massacre of 1929, can be examined through online access to FBI documents* and music scores from the 1967 film of the same name [BL shelfmark: VOC/1967/NEWMAN]. If you really want to investigate early depictions of sensationalised crime, look at A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre in Boston perpetrated in the evening of the fifth day of March 1770 by soldiers of the XXIXth Regiment [BL shelfmark: 1061.h.11.] which includes Paul Revere’s engraving of the event we know now as the Boston Massacre, a pivotal event leading up to the American Revolution.
For those interested in early sensationalised journalism, 1883 examples of the The New-York World can be viewed on microfilm at BL shelfmark: MFM.MA79. The New-York World was established in 1860 but by the late 1870s the newspaper was losing money, tens of thousands of dollars a year. In 1883 it was purchased by Joseph Pulitzer who turned around its precarious fate. Hiring investigative journalists, it became a newspaper that concentrated on human-interest stories, scandal and exaggerated material, capturing readers' attention and upping its daily circulation. In response, William Randolph Hearst purchased the New York Journal in 1895 and employed an approach like Pulitzer. Pulitzer and Heart’s use of promotional schemes, overemphasised stories, and focus on illustrations and colour supplements, became known as yellow journalism and would have a lasting impact on the history of popular American newspaper production.
On our whistlestop tour of true crime through the 19th to 21st centuries in British Library collections, you may also be interested to find Pat F. Garrett's Authentic Life of Billy the Kid (William H. Bonney) [BL shelfmark: 010884.f.37.]. Originally published one year after the killing of Billy the Kid by Sheriff Pat Garrett, Sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico, this is considered one of the most authoritative biographies of William H. Bonney and the foundation of the Billy the Kid legend.
Truman Capote is often a name that springs to mind on the subject of true crime. His 1966 novel, In Cold Blood, reconstructs the real-life murder in 1959 of a Kansas farmer, his wife and both their children, combining factual reporting with the imaginary possibilities of storytelling. The book is deemed by many to represent a milestone in the evolution of American true crime writing with Capote himself promoting the book as a new genre: the ‘literary non-fiction' novel. First published serially, in The New Yorker in 1965, Readers at the British Library can consult a first edition of the novel, published by Random House, New York, in the same year, at BL shelfmark: W13/2998 and later British-published edition from 1966 at BL shelfmark: 12208.a.1/2682.
We move swiftly into the era of podcasts and giant streaming services. The story of a 1999 murder case in Baltimore was reinvestigated in 2014 by Serial, an investigative journalism podcast, in which host Sarah Koenig narrated the nonfiction story over multiple episodes. The show became a cultural phenomenon, launching podcasts into the mainstream. The experience of the young man examined in relation to the murder, Adnan Syed, can be explored further in collection item Adnan's story: the search for truth and justice after Serial [BL shelfmark: YD.2017.a.627]. And finally, with the likes of Netflix tapping into the true crime trend, tough, sometimes controversial, and often needs-to-be-seen-to-be-believed watching has been provided through shows like Tiger King (2020), Monsters (2024) and Apple Cider Vinegar (2025) all of which can be examined in BL items ELD.DS.732936,* YK.1994.a.14823, and YKL.2018.a.20024 respectively.
From the Supreme Court to Cowboy Carter, you can catch up on the other topics we’ve covered in America Now! via our blog series:
- “America Now!” events series launches at the Eccles Institute
- On the Road Again: “America Now!” events series continues at the Eccles Institute
- The Inauguration of a New President: Where Will American Politics Go From Here?
If you’ve attended one of our America Now! events or have ideas about what you think we should discuss in the series, we’d love to hear from you. Share your thoughts and feedback via our online form.
*Access to some digital items and e-resources is currently limited while we recover from the cyber-attack of 2023. We are working to reinstate these and hope to provide full access again when possible. Visit our website for full details of what is currently accessible.
06 March 2025
Call For Papers: Twentieth-Century Black Periodicals and Space
Twentieth-Century Black Periodicals and Space Symposium
Thursday 8 May 2025
British Library, St Pancras, London
This symposium is about space and geography in the context of twentieth-century periodicals from across the Black Atlantic. Over the course of the twentieth century, Black periodicals negotiate space at several scales: in their pages, in their interests, in their circulation, and in the ways we conceptualise and archive them. How do Black periodicals occupy and traverse space, and how do the spatial forms of Black periodicals shape their meanings? How have theorists understood periodicals and blackness through spatial metaphors? How do spatial contingencies affect the ways that Black periodicals are collected, archived and accessed?
In December 2024, Elizabeth McHenry gave the 39th Annual Panizzi lectures at the British Library.1 Focusing on Black Bibliography, McHenry identified an overarching question which her three lectures asked of themselves and of the field more broadly: What does it mean to inhabit the space of black print? The symposium takes McHenry’s ending question as its beginning. It invites scholars, librarians and researchers from a variety disciplines whose primary objects of study are Black periodicals (magazines, newspapers, etc) published 1900-2000 in the Americas, Europe, and Africa to submit papers that ask about what it means to traverse the space of 20th Century Black Atlantic periodicals and what spaces these periodicals themselves traverse.
Participants are welcome to submit papers on topics including
- The circulations of specific periodicals
- Black bibliography, in particular its diasporic aspects
- Page layout and print space in Black periodicals
- Internationalism, diaspora and Pan-Africanism in Black periodical cultures
- Reflections on the spatial conceptualisations of Black periodicals
- The space of the Black periodical archive
International scholars, librarians and researchers from beyond the UK are also invited to get in touch. Although the symposium is in-person, there is the possibility of a follow up event held online if there is enough interest.
Please submit proposals for 10-minute work-in-progress papers, 20-minute papers, or 10-minute round table contributions. Proposals should be 300-500 words and sent along with a brief CV or bio to [email protected] by Thursday 17 April 2025. Email enquiries are also welcome.
This symposium is a product of the AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership (CDP) PhD Studentship African American short fiction and magazines in the mid-twentieth century with the University of Cambridge and the Eccles Institute for the Americas & Oceania at the British Library. The Eccles Institute builds, cares for and shares the Americas and Oceania collection at the British Library, and champions knowledge and understanding of these regions through a rich programme of fellowships and awards, cultural events, research training, guides to the collections and programmes for schools.
References
1. Lecture One, 5 Dec 2024: Panizzi Lectures 2024: In Search of Black Readers
Lecture Two, 10 Dec 2024: Panizzi Lectures 2024: Thinking Bibliographically
Lecture Three, 12 Dec 2024: Panizzi Lectures 2024: Spaces of Black Study
13 February 2025
PhD placement scheme in North and Latin American sections at the British Library - applications open until 21 February 2025
We are delighted to offer two PhD placements for 2025 within the Eccles Institute for the Americas and Oceania. The scheme offers doctoral researchers from all disciplines the chance to develop and apply transferable skills and expertise outside the university sector.
PhD placement projects offered by the British Library cover activities ranging from cataloguing, conservation and interpretation to policy research, resource development and research or community engagement. The duration for each placement is 3 months (or part-time equivalent). Most placements are also suitable for part-time students, and there may be opportunities to undertake placements remotely which will be indicated on the individual project profiles.
For the full list of British Library placements on offer for 2025 visit our Research Collaboration webpages. See below for the placements related to the North and Latin American collections respectively.
Examination of the British Library’s collection of American underground comix and related ephemera
Are you interested in illustration, underground comix, or the history of comix publishing? Do you enjoy problem solving and project management? Would you like to come and work behind the scenes on collections in the cultural heritage sector? This PhD placement will give you an invaluable insight into the holdings of US underground comix and related ephemera at the British Library.
You will be given the opportunity to understand collection management and library cataloguing systems, and you’ll be able to make a real difference in improving access to a number of important and unique items for the research, inspiration and enjoyment of future generations using the Library.
Continuing legacy work in this area you will have the opportunity to use and develop previous work, including meticulous record-keeping and cross-referencing of donations of comix and related ephemera. Among the holdings which speak to this subject are rare items with unique illustrations and inscriptions which offer a fascinating picture of the underground comix landscape from the 1960s onwards.
The collections are a cornucopia of material for interdisciplinary research examining comics/x, book dealing, publishing, and/or illustration. Underground and alternative comix are important to the study of 20th century American countercultures, offering socially relevant reflections on subjects that would often be excluded from mainstream publishing, for example sexuality, violence and drug use.
For more information see the full placement description. For enquiries related to this placement email [email protected] FAO Rachael Culley, with 'American underground comix and related ephemera' in the subject line.
Afro-Brazilian History and Culture in Print: Surveying the British Library Collections
Afro-Brazilian history and culture is central to our understanding of Brazil and the wider world. Building on the work of Afro-Brazilian activists, Brazilian society has seen a reckoning with the country’s racism and colourism in recent years bringing Afro-Brazilian voices to the fore.
The British Library holds extensive collections relating to, and created by Afro-Brazilians, from Brazil, Portugal, as well as material connected to colonial Brazil and the Transatlantic slave trade. Despite this, our understanding of the Library’s holdings of published material in this area requires significant improvement.
In the context of these current debates challenging racism and, specifically, a forthcoming UK/Brazil Season of Culture 2025-26, this is a timely project to increase access to important, interconnected, but also underrepresented areas of the Library’s collection. It is envisaged that the placement student would survey the Library’s holdings of published material relating to and created by Afro-Brazilians in order to produce a bibliography / research guide, as well as helping us to recognise gaps in our collection and working with the Latin American curators to identify material which could be acquired to remedy these.
For more information see the full placement description. For enquiries related to this placement email [email protected] FAO Laurence Byrne/Iris Bachmann, with ' Afro-Brazilian History and Culture in Print PhD placement' in the subject line.
21 January 2025
The Inauguration of a New President: Where Will American Politics Go From Here?
The Eccles Institute and BAAS’s America Now! series continues on Tuesday 23 January 2025, with ‘The Inauguration of a New President: Where Will American Politics Go From Here?’ Ahead of the event, here’s a closer look at the speakers joining us for the evening, and some materials related to presidential inaugurations in the Library’s collections.
In his inauguration speech in January 2017 Donald Trump promised to ‘make America great again’ and stem the ‘American carnage’ he saw in US society. Coming just weeks after the January 6 insurrection at the US Capital, Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration speech urged the American people to come together, even though he conceded that ‘speaking of unity can sound to some like a foolish fantasy these days.’ Donald Trump returned to power as President of the United States on 20 January 2025, after an election cycle marked by violence and division.
Following the inauguration, we will reflect on 2024’s electoral activity in the US, and the role of democracy in American political life, in our first American Now! event for 2025. What will the new President mean for the future of the US, and the world?
Chaired by our friends at BAAS, the event will include a panel of experts to lead what’s sure to be a fruitful and frank discussion:
Ursula Hackett (Royal Holloway)
Ursula Hackett is Reader in Politics at Royal Holloway, University of London. She specialises in the study of public policymaking and litigation in the United States, with a particular focus on religion, race, and education. Dr Hackett is the author of America's Voucher Politics: How Elites Learned to Hide the State (Cambridge University Press) and the essay writing guide, Brilliant Essays (Bloomsbury Study Skills). In the academic year 2023-4 she was a British Academy Mid-Career Fellow.
Amy Tatum (University of Bournemouth)
Amy Tatum is a Lecturer in Communication and Media at Bournemouth University. Her research explores gender and political leadership, political psychology and representation. Her recent work explores the impact of generative AI on US politics and the psychological responses to women in political leadership.
Nick Witham (UCL)
Nick Witham is Professor of American Studies and Dean of Social and Historical Sciences at UCL. He is a historian of American culture and politics. His most recent book is Popularizing the Past: Historians, Publishers, and Readers in Postwar America (University of Chicago Press, 2023).
So what is the inauguration? Inauguration Day is when the president-elect and vice-president-elect are sworn in and take office. George Washington was sworn in as the nation's first president on 30 April 1789, on the balcony of Federal Hall in New York.
To mark this historic day, here is the speech that Washington made to the Senate and the House of Representatives on 30 April 1789, taken from the Chester Chronicle, Friday 26 June 1789 (BL shelfmark: MFM.M18894).
The ceremony today typically takes place at the US Capitol building in Washington, DC. However, it was announced last week that Trump’s inauguration would happen indoors due to dangerously cold weather being forecast in Washington. The address and other speeches took place inside the US Capitol's rotunda, rather than outside the building. The last president to be sworn-in indoors was Ronald Reagan in 1985, when cold weather also plagued the US Capitol.
Vice president-elect JD Vance was the first to take his oaths of office on Monday 20 January 2025, followed by Mr Trump, at around midday local time (about 5pm UK time).
John Roberts, the chief justice of the Supreme Court (for more information on the Supreme Court read our previous blog in the America Now! series), administered the oath to the incoming president. Mr Trump held up his right hand while taking his presidential oath as first lady Melania Trump stood next to the him holding two Bibles, one being her husband's personal Bible which was given to him by his mother, and the other the Lincoln Bible that President Abraham Lincoln used to take the oath of office in 1861.
In recent years, inaugurations have attracted famous faces to sing the national anthem on the steps of The Capitol. Beyoncé and Lady Gaga have occupied this role in 2013 and 2021 respectively. Yesterday, country-folk singer Lee Greenwood, prior to the start of the inauguration ceremony, offered a rendition of ‘God Bless the U.S.A.’, followed by Carrie Underwood performing ‘America the Beautiful’ (see F.1893.w.(51.)), and opera singer Christopher Macchio closed with the national anthem 'The Star-Spangled Banner’ (of which the the Library holds various scores).
Turning to Library collections on contemporary political ephemera, over 60 years of American electoral history can be seen via the Philip Davies Collection of US election archive material (Add MS 89357) which was donated to the Library in 2018. The material gives a picture of the competing sides of the US political landscape from the 1950s to the 2010s, and includes election campaign placards, newspaper cuttings, nomination petitions and promotional scripts for telephone calls made to recruit votes.
Specifically, users can look at a Barack Obama Pride Poster supporting LGBT rights (Add MS 89357/4/27), President Trump's Inauguration Invitation 2017 (Add MS 89357/3/3), Democratic vs Republican flyer on environmental issues from 2000 (Add MS 89357/1/10), 1988 promotional posters for ‘Bold Leadership, New Direction’ under Jesse Jackson (Add MS 89357/1/7) and campaign posters calling for the protecting of women’s health (Add MS 83957/1/14).
More on this collection can be read on our blog from 2019.
America Now! is organised by the Eccles Institute and BAAS, and supported by the US Embassy London. You can book tickets for our next event in the series now: True Crime in the USA Tickets | Tuesday, 25 Mar 2025 at 6:30 PM
Please note: as a result of the cyber attack in 2023, access to some of our collections and online resources is limited. Visit our website for full details of what is currently accessible.
07 January 2025
Delayed Promises and Steadfast Dreams: Mapping Out a Young Black Loyalist’s Fictional Journey
Monique Hayes is a historical fiction author, poet, and screenwriter from Maryland. She was a 2023 Eccles Institute Visiting Fellow at the British Library.
As an author who often utilizes young adult protagonists, I have to think about what passions and promises propel my characters to act. Will they ultimately get what they want? My novel-in-progress Sally Forth focuses on two enslaved brothers with disparate dreams and journeys, who go boldly into the Revolutionary War when they’re promised freedom for their service. While younger brother Brook’s path as a Continental Army soldier comes with difficult challenges, his older brother Albie, a Black Loyalist, goes down a rockier road full of weak promises, debilitating hardships, and dehumanizing moments. It becomes increasingly hard for Albie to get what he wants and deserves.
My Eccles Institute Visiting Fellowship gave me access to rich resources so I could flesh out Albie’s journey, from his first time holding a uniform emblazoned with “Liberty to Slaves” in Dunmore’s Ethiopian Regiment to his days of crippling doubt in Nova Scotia and then his struggle to survive in Sierra Leone.
My primary goal during my Visiting Fellowship was to unearth as much information as I could about the Black Loyalist settlement of Birchtown and the Freetown colony in Sierra Leone. Unlike his brother who craves education, Albie’s passion is land ownership. He’s denied this as a slave in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and brightens at the promise of getting his own land in Birchtown after he emigrates to Nova Scotia. My eyes were truly opened by the British Library’s holdings. There were enlightening eyewitness accounts and secondary sources detailing how much the 1,521 free Blacks of Birchtown were disenchanted by the poor soil, the delays in receiving their land allotments, the lack of food and housing supplies, and the prejudice that forced them to take low-paying labour jobs.
The most stunning account came from a white landowner’s grandfather: “They just dug a hole in the ground and put a little packed roof over it…There was a small trapdoor in one side of the roof and the negroes entered the house by dropping right down through. And that was the black man’s home - a hole in the ground with a roof over the hole.”1 Others erected crude huts, but the Black settlers often received lumber and tools after their white counterparts. It became much easier for me to compose scenes focused on Albie dealing with these injustices and waiting years for his longed-for land.
Inefficient surveyors and harsh winter conditions frustrated the Black Birchtown settlers as well. Some surveys for Black settlers were halted when new white Loyalists arrived looking for land. Other land allotments guaranteed to the Black Loyalists were taken away and used for other purposes.
I particularly gravitated to a passage about Black Loyalist Caesar Perth who went to his 34-acre lot for the first time, only to find “a rocky outcropping that was not suitable for crops.”2 This was what Perth and 183 men received after several years of patience. I was heartbroken and inspired to craft a scene between Albie and Perth, arriving to see the “rewards” for their service, another crushing blow years after the loss at Yorktown.
After this devastating realization, Albie accepts the offer Thomas Peters gave to nearly 1,200 Black Nova Scotians to emigrate to Sierra Leone in 1792. According to naturalist Henry Smeathman, the land in Sierra Leone was a “suitable location”: “An opportunity so advantageous may perhaps never be offered to them again; for they and their posterity may enjoy perfect freedom.”3
However, that freedom was not at all perfect. Studying Mary Louise Clifford’s From Slavery to Freetown allowed me to truly see the major distrust between abolitionist John Clarkson and Peters, the negative influence the Sierra Leone Company had over the budding colony, and the emasculation of Peters over time.
Still, I was very moved when reading about the emigrants’ experiences, including the eldest emigrant that made the journey funded by the Sierra Leone Company. The one-hundred- and four-year-old woman, possibly the mother of famous preacher Cato Perkins, was determined to go so “that she may lay her bones in her native country.”4 Albie is just as eager to connect with his African past and start a family in the newly formed Freetown.
What most surprised and inspired me was Thomas Peters’ downfall during the early days of Freetown. I was well aware that Sierra Leone’s intense rainy season and various illnesses plagued the settlers, but Peters’ life was more complex than I thought. Former Black pioneer Peters went from the settlers’ preferred leader to an outcast among his peers due to the machinations of Clarkson and other officials.
Orphan Albie views Peters as a father figure. He admires Peters, who protested when authorities delayed land distribution and failed to let the colonists govern themselves. Peters’ sudden death after being accused of theft is an event neither the settlers nor Albie are prepared for, and it’s a haunting historical example of what a life of dashed dreams can do.
I’m incredibly grateful for the Eccles Institute Visiting Fellowship which fulfilled one of my dreams to study these materials in-depth so I could give Albie a more historically accurate and meaningful journey. As he pursues his passions, Albie’s heart and spirit are tested on and beyond American shores, and I hope his story finds its way into the hearts of many readers.
References
1. "Birchtown: The History and the Material Culture of an Expatriate African-American Community", by Laird Navin and Stephen Davis. Chapter 4 of Moving On: Black Loyalists in the Afro-Atlantic World, ed. by John Pulis (London: Garland, 2013), p. 72. Shelfmark Y.C. 2003. a. 12259.
2. Mary Louise Clifford. From Slavery to Freetown (London: MacFarland, 1999) p. 60. Shelfmark Y.C. 1999. b. 6067
3. Henry Smeathman, Plan of a settlement to be made near Sierra Leone, on the Grain Coast of Africa (London: 1786). Shelfmark B.496.(1).
4. “The Black Loyalists in Sierra Leone” by Wallace Brown. Chapter 6 of Moving On: Black Loyalists in the Afro-Atlantic World, ed. by John Pullis (London: Garland,1999), p. 109. Y.C. 2003. a. 12259.
10 September 2024
Moving Texts and Individuals between New England and England in the Mid-Seventeenth Century
Weiao Xing (PhD in History, University of Cambridge, 2023, @WeiaoX) is a visiting postdoctoral fellow at the Global Encounters Platform and Institute of Modern History, University of Tübingen in Germany. He works on cultural and literary history in early modern English-Indigenous and French-Indigenous encounters and was a 2022 Eccles Institute Visiting Fellow at the British Library.
Among the items I consulted at the British Library as an Eccles Institute Visiting Fellow was a 215-folio manuscript entitled ‘State papers of John Thurloe, Secretary of State, 1650–1658’ (Add MS4156).1 Its compiler, John Thurloe, made use of his intelligence network across Europe, playing a pivotal role in domestic politics and foreign affairs during the Interregnum (1649–1660).2 Within the manuscript, on its second folio, rests a copy of a letter that has traversed the Atlantic. Dated 2 October 1651, the original letter was sent from Oliver Cromwell to John Cotton, the esteemed pastor of the Boston church in New England. ‘I receaued yours a few days sithence’ [sic], as Cromwell commenced his letter in a continuing dialogue, the circulation of texts intertwined political and religious circumstances in England and New England.
This letter concisely conveyed the prevailing political situation in England. Just one month prior to its writing, the Battle of Worcester, a major event at the end of the English Civil War (1642–1651), witnessed the Parliamentarians defeating a predominantly Scottish Royalist force led by Charles II. In his letter, Cromwell celebrated this victory with Cotton – when Charles II and his ‘malignant party’ invaded England, ‘the Lord rained upon them such snares’.3 Moreover, Cromwell earnestly sought religious support from Cotton, emphasising the need for prayers ‘as much as ever’ given the recent successes, or ‘such mercies’ in his own words. This letter affirms Cotton’s interest in English politics and his significance among Puritans in England during the Interregnum.4
The transatlantic movement of texts and individuals unveils intricate connections within the political and religious realms of England and New England. In the summer of 1651, five Massachusetts ministers, including John Cotton, corresponded with their fellow ministers in England.5 They defended the embargo placed by the colony’s General Court on a theological book entitled The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption […], authored by William Pynchon, one of the founding figures of the colony.6 Pynchon had managed to publish and sell his book in London in 1650 while residing in the colony. At the British Library, a copy of this work, annotated with ‘June 2d’, is under the shelf-marked E.606.(3.). It was acquired from ‘Thomason Tracts’, a collection of imprints dated from 1640 to 1661, curated by the London-based bookseller George Thomason (c. 1602–1666). The provenance of this copy suggests that Pynchon’s work, albeit heretical in New England, entered the intellectual spheres amid the political upheaval in England. Facing religious tensions and sanctions, Pynchon relocated to England in 1652 and continued publishing books that reflected his theological views. Pynchon to some extent maintained his ‘New England’ identity; he identified himself as ‘late of New England’ in his The Meritorious Price reprinted in 1655.7
Between the 1640s and the 1660s, a convergence of political, religious, and economic motives prompted numerous English settlers in New England to return home. While this statement articulated by William Sachse in 1948 holds merit, it does not fully alter the prevalent presumption of seventeenth-century transatlantic migrations as one-way journeys from Europe to the Americas.8 Many returnees from New England embarked on careers in England while maintaining their transatlantic connections. Sir George Downing exemplifies this pattern. As an ambassador in the Hague from 1657 to 1665, he facilitated England’s acquisition of New Amsterdam from Dutch settlers – in 1642, he had previously graduated from Harvard College in its inaugural graduate cohort.9 The tapestry of transatlantic migration is also woven from ordinary lives. In the prologue of her monograph Pilgrims, Susan Moore zooms in on Susanna Bell (d. 1672), an English merchant’s wife who crossed the Atlantic twice. Bell’s testimony, published in London upon her death, encapsulates her experiences, rhetoric, and mentalities.10
Within the British Library’s holdings, a myriad of manuscripts unfolds stories of texts and individuals crossing the Atlantic. Egerton MS 2519, for instance, encompasses correspondence and papers of Samuel Desborough (or Disbrowe), who assumed the role of the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland from 1657 onwards.11 Desborough, after setting off for New England in 1639 and settling in Guilford, New Haven, returned to England in 1650 amid the Civil War before relocating to Scotland.12 In this manuscript, on folios 10 and 11, a letter dated 1654 from Guilford by William Leete appears (see Fig. 1).13 Leete, who would later become the governor of New Haven and Connecticut colonies, shared recent affairs in New England with Desborough, particularly his operation of Desborough’s colonial estate and several settlers who returned to England. This letter epitomises multiple connections between New England and England, ranging from personal careers and businesses to colonial affairs. As Moore suggests, it underscores the ‘delicate relation’ between those who remained in the settlements and those who returned to England.14 Additionally, as the letter tells, Desborough had addressed Cromwell, expressing his concern about potential threats from the Dutch on the settlement. Therefore, such transatlantic movements of texts and individuals repositioned overseas affairs of New England within the scope of domestic and European politics.
For the New Englanders who made the voyage back to England during the mid-seventeenth century, their ‘American’ identities were ill-defined as they ‘returned’ to their careers and lives in England, but many maintained connections with the settlements. Their experiences, in both New England and England, contribute to our comprehension of their engagement in and perceptions of transatlantic travels, mobility, Puritanism, colonisation, and English politics.
Notes
1. John Thurloe, ‘State Papers of John Thurloe, Secretary of State, 1650–1658 (Especially 1654–1655)’ (1658), Add MS 4156, British Library, https://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Add_MS_4156.
2. Timothy Venning, ‘Thurloe, John (Bap. 1616, d. 1668)’, in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2008, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/27405.
3. In his letter, Cromwell enclosed a short narrative (possibly available on 26 September), see C. H. Firth and R. S. Rait, eds., ‘Table of Acts: 1651’, in Acts and Ordinances of the Interregnum, 1642–1660 (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1911), British History Online, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/acts-ordinances-interregnum/lxxxii-lxxxvii.
4. John Cotton, The Correspondence of John Cotton, ed. Sargent Bush (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 458–61.
5. Cotton, 454–58.
6. William Pynchon, The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption, Iustification, &c. Cleering It from Some Common Errors (London: Printed by J.M. for George Whittington, and James Moxon, and are to be sold at the blue Anchor in Corn-hill neer the Royall Exchange, 1650); Michael P. Winship, ‘Contesting Control of Orthodoxy among the Godly: William Pynchon Reexamined’, The William and Mary Quarterly 54, no. 4 (1997): 795–822.
7. William Pynchon, A Farther Discussion of That Great Point in Divinity the Sufferings of Christ (The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption [...]) (London: Printed for the Author, and are to bee sold at the Signe of the three Lyons in Corn-hill, over against the Conduit, 1655).
8. William L. Sachse, ‘The Migration of New Englanders to England, 1640–1660’, The American Historical Review 53, no. 2 (1948): 1640–1660.
9. Jonathan Scott, ‘Downing, Sir George, First Baronet (1623–1684)’, in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2008, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/7981.
10. Susan Hardman Moore, Pilgrims: New World Settlers & the Call of Home (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 1–15; Susanna Bell, The Legacy of a Dying Mother to Her Mourning Children Being the Experiences of Mrs. Susanna Bell, Who Died March 13, 1672 (London: Printed and are to be sold by John Hancock, Senior and Junior at the three Bibles in Popes-Head Alley in Cornhill, 1673).
11. Samuel Desborough, ‘Correspondence and Papers of Samuel Disbrowe, or Desborough, of Elsworth, Co. Cambridge, Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland, 1651/2–1660’ (1660), Egerton MS 2519, British Library, http://searcharchives.bl.uk/permalink/f/1r5koim/IAMS032-001983482.
12. Susan Hardman Moore, Abandoning America: Life-Stories from Early New England (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2013), 90–91.
13. Bruce P. Stark, ‘Leete, Williamunlocked (1613–16 April 1683)’, in American National Biography, 2000, https://doi.org/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.article.0100511.
14. Hardman Moore, Abandoning America, 91.
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