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In memory of a former slave
A FORMER slave turned entrepreneur who lived at the present site of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in King Charles Street was commemorated with a plaque on Tuesday.
Ignatio Sancho, right, arrived in England and was sold as a child slave. He waited on the Duke of Montagu who employed him as a butler and ran a grocers in Charles Street, Victoria.
Jean Brown, standing alongside junior minister Meg Munn MP and former Mayor of Westminster Cllr Angela Hooper, said: “Because of Sancho’s voice he was able to lift the voices of people who were not able to speak.”
Sancho’s mother died while giving birth on a slave ship crossing the Atlantic from Africa to the West Indies in 1729 and his father committed suicide rather than live a life of slavery.
Attending the unveiling Dianne Abbott MP said: “For me it’s one of the highlights of the bicentenary. There’s been a tendency to talk about Wilberforce and abolitionists and it’s important to talk about the former slaves.”
Educational charity Nubian Jak is responsible for putting up the plaque. |
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