Crown Brand on Enslaved Africans Traced to Monarchy
A public register published on 14 September 2026 names thousands of people who put money into Britain's trafficking of enslaved African people. The Register of British Slave Traders, a research project into investors in the trade, gives biographical detail for as many as 10,500 investors from historical records. It describes the trafficking of more than 3 million African people over nearly 250 years as an official national enterprise led by monarchs.
The starkest detail is a brand. Dr Nicholas Radburn, a historian at Lancaster University and a lead investigator for the Register, found the evidence in the archives of the South Sea Company, a crown-backed enterprise that trafficked thousands of enslaved African people to plantations in the 1700s. The company's board in London sent its agents in Buenos Aires a small silver crown and told them to heat the mark red hot and press it into the left shoulder of enslaved people.
Company papers from 1714 include a drawing of a brand for use at Barbados headed 'Mark for Negroes at Barbados'. The board, which included MPs and Bank of England directors, pressed ahead even after its own medical adviser, Dr Dover, warned that the large mark could endanger the people being branded. Agents were instructed to proceed with branding.
The research places the heaviest royal involvement after the restoration of the monarchy in 1660. The account of the findings published by The Guardian traces the story from Elizabeth I's backing of early voyages onwards. Once restored, the monarchy chartered and led monopoly trading companies in enslaved people, a step historians link to efforts to rebuild its economic standing.
A spokesperson for King Charles III said he was 'grateful to all those undertaking academic work in this area' in response to the reporting. Earlier research reported in January 2026 said the British crown and the navy expanded and protected the trade for hundreds of years, with one book arguing the crown was the world's largest buyer of enslaved people by 1807. Separate documents reported in 2023 showed that King Charles III's direct ancestors owned enslaved people.
King's College London, one of the institutions behind the work, said on 14 September 2026 that the Register reveals English investors and their influence on the nation, as reported by King's College London. The project team says its database covers investors between 1563 and 1807 and records where traders lived, what other businesses and organisations they were linked to, and what legacies they left.
The findings are set out in an interactive article titled "The royal crown branded on enslaved Africans: Britain's monarchy and the slave trade", alongside a short film and a comment piece titled "Slavery was not a footnote to British history. It helped shape the nation". All appeared on 14 September 2026. The records themselves are now open to search.
