Drax Hall Estate

• This would include compensation for loss of life and liberty, uncompensated labour, personal injury, mental pain and anguish and gender-based violence.
• But then centuries of value derived from the trade in human beings produced for Britain an equally unimaginable sum.
• According to the Treasury, the loan was only finally paid off in 2015.
• One example is the Drax family of the Charborough Estate in Dorset, which is now owned by Conservative MP, Richard Drax.

Drax family legacy

• For the past three years I have been researching – and have just completed – an unauthorised history of the Drax family.
• The family appears to be unique in having an unbroken history of owning sugar plantations in the Caribbean from their inception until the present day.
• Their ancestor James Drax (c.1609-1662) was one of the first settlers in Barbados in 1627 and is credited with inventing the British sugar industry in the 1630s.
• His descendant – the Conservative MP for South Dorset, Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax, (who prefers to be known as Richard Drax) heads the family that owns the vast Charborough Estate and the Drax Hall Plantation in Barbados.
• Although he is a public figure, Richard Drax and his family are very private, not least about their wealth which is locked into a number of trusts.

Mounting pressure for reparations

• In the three years since I first wrote about Richard Drax MP, the call for reparations has gotten much louder.
• Globally, Drax has come to symbolise those whose families benefited from slavery but rebuff formal apologies and paying reparations.
• Pressure has grown on him and in October 2022 he flew to Barbados to meet with the country’s prime minister, Mia Mottley.
• In the meeting between Drax and Mia Mottley, he was offered two options, one a package of reparations including all or a substantial part of Drax Hall.