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The Compensation Agency Business: London Merchants, Bankers, and the Payment of Slavery Compensation, 1835-46

M. D. Bennett & Mike Anson

Enterprise and Society2025https://doi.org/10.1017/eso.2025.1article
AJG 3ABDC A
Weight
0.37

Abstract

Through analyzing the compensation accounts and stock ledgers in the Bank of England Archive, this article explores how British firms—especially those in the City of London—profited from the unique business opportunity that arose through the payment of slavery compensation in 1835. It uses a new dataset with 18,930 observations to establish that a cohort of 27 “compensation agents” handled as intermediaries approximately two-thirds of the transactions associated with £5 million paid in compensation as government stock (3.5% Reduced Annuities) to slave owners in Barbados, Mauritius, the Cape of Good Hope, and the Virgin Islands. The article argues that this demonstrates how the City’s financial capacity, infrastructure, and business community were significant in delivering the efficient payment of compensation. It also underscores the need to understand the slavery compensation process as contemporaries did; as an important moment in the history of the City and its financial markets.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/eso.2025.1

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@article{m.2025,
  title        = {{The Compensation Agency Business: London Merchants, Bankers, and the Payment of Slavery Compensation, 1835-46}},
  author       = {M. D. Bennett & Mike Anson},
  journal      = {Enterprise and Society},
  year         = {2025},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/eso.2025.1},
}

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Evidence weight

0.37

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.16 × 0.4 = 0.06
M · momentum0.53 × 0.15 = 0.08
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.