People and Lives

Jacques Francis worked on the wreck of the Mary Rose and gave evidence in a dispute over another sunken ship. His story connects skilled African labour,…

Mary Fillis arrived in England as a child and worked in two London households. The detailed account of her baptism in 1597 preserves her father’s craft,…

Reasonable Blackman worked as a silk weaver in Elizabethan Southwark. Parish records connect his family to a neighbourhood of migrant craftspeople, while the deaths of two…

Diego helped Francis Drake’s men find allies and survive in Panama before travelling to England and across the Pacific. His recorded work as an intermediary, builder…

John Ystumllyn made a life as a gardener, craftsman, husband and father in north Wales. His portrait and the surviving accounts connect Black Welsh history with…

Francis Barber’s life included enslavement, naval service, education, marriage and teaching. Letters, family records and his contribution to Samuel Johnson’s biography reveal a man making choices…

John Blanke appears in Tudor wage accounts, a petition for higher pay and the painted Westminster Tournament Roll. Together, these records reveal a Black musician’s working…