Creating a Time Line   

CRVs were encouraged to create their own time line, so that they could fit events and developments into the dates of the project 1650 - 1850 

The project timespan was chosen to start at the time of the British capture of Jamaica and the development of plantations using a workforce of enslaved Africans. By this time the North American colonies began to turn away from indentured servitude and instead rely on chattel slavery. The Spanish and Portuguese had been trading with West Africans to purchase Africans to work on their South African plantations and in their mines since 1444. 

The project timespan continues through from the days when the Welsh woollen cottage industry produced cloth to meet local needs, but was also exporting wool and cloth through Shrewsbury to London for sale to international merchants. The increase in demand for this trade saw packhorses carrying lengths of  Welsh cloth to Shrewsbury or later directly to Liverpool. The rise of mechanisation of the industry took away the potential for local work and along with increased rents and taxes this forced families in Mid Wales into poverty. The abolition of the Slave Trade and later the abolition of slavery meant that Welsh Plains was no longer the prefered fabric and the production ceased by 1850.

Joy produced this timeline: 

1655 Britain claimed Jamaica from the Spanish - this was the time of the Parliamentarian rule under Oliver Cromwell

1660 Charles II is restored to the throne

1666 Great Fire of London destroys two-thirds of the city

1672 Royal African Company is established to regulate the African slave trade

1699  80% of those living in the Caribbean are African slaves

1707 Act of Union of England and Scotland is ratified

1737 Richard Pennant born, owner of Penrhyn estate, six sugar plantations in Jamaica, and hundreds of enslaved African workers. He was a staunch anti-abolitionist

1747  Liverpool overtakes Bristol as Britain's busiest slave trading port

1760 Tacky leads the first major slave rebellion in Jamaica

1771  'Factory Age' begins with the opening of Britain's first cotton mill

1772  Slavery is effectively outlawed in England

1774 Methodist John Wesley publishes 'Thoughts Upon Slavery' and the Abolution Movement starts in Britain

1775  American War of Independence begins

1787  First fleet of convicts sails from Britain to Australia

1788  First edition of 'The Times' of London is published on 1st January 

1789  French Revolution begins with the storming of the Bastille

1791  Parliament rejects William Wilberforce's bill to abolish the slave trade

1801 Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales) and Ireland were formally joined under the Act of Union to create the United Kingdom in 1801.

1807 The Slave Trade was abolished 

1808  Richard Pennant died after year camaigning against the abolition of the slave trade 

1811 - 1812  Luddite protesters attack industrial machinery in protest against unemployment

1838  Newtown, Montgomeryshire - the first great Chartist demonstration in Wales was held on 10 October

Click HERE for a more detailed time line reflecting an interest in the shared history between Wales and Jamaica bringing together information from various sources. 

Or click HERE for the BBC Empire and Sea Power History timeline