"It was created by Stephen Lewis and focuses on his native Grenada where the British Trevelyan family has publicly apologised for its crimes against humanity for their ownership of more than 1,000 enslaved Africans. I'm the descendant of survivors. We've gone through hundreds of years of torture, torment, deprivation, hardships, said Lewis, 62. What I want to leave people with is a feeling that this is strength, this is courage, this is determination, this is why I am who I am today."
"Lewis's interest began with a trove of paperwork left behind by his father. He discovered from the wills, land transactions and letters dating back to 1838, that beyond his Windrush parents who came to the UK in the 50s, seven of his eight grandparents were enslaved people. The one outlier led him to University College London's Legacies of British Slavery database, which while helpful had gaps of its own."
Stephen Lewis created a searchable database, Depths of Paradise, that links records of enslaved African people with more than 1,000 British plantation owners who received compensation after abolition. The archive focuses on Grenada and incorporates wills, land transactions and letters dating back to 1838, revealing family histories including seven of Lewis's eight grandparents being formerly enslaved. The project fills gaps in University College London's Legacies of British Slavery database and supports genealogy, schools, researchers and reparative justice work. Lewis retired from the pharmaceutical industry to research claimant records, and he maintains a Facebook group of over 12,000 members sharing Grenada's collective history.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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