City of London — Black History
Eight sites from 18th-century abolition to the City’s modern reckoning
A west-to-east walk across the Square Mile that traces Black London from Francis Barber’s life in Samuel Johnson’s household, through the abolitionists who preached, wrote and testified in the City, to the institutions — the Bank, Lloyd’s, the Corporation — now confronting their role in the slave economy.
This walk starts at the western edge of the City and ends at Aldgate, covering roughly 2.7 km and around 75 minutes with reading time. Sites are arranged for walkability rather than chronology — the story moves between the 1740s and the 2020s, and the City has always carried both.
The walk crosses a deliberate range of stop kinds: a private house (Dr Johnson’s), an institutional yard (Guildhall), a quiet street (Aldermanbury), three centres of modern finance (Bank of England, Royal Exchange, Lloyd’s), an active parish church (St Mary Woolnoth), and an open neighbourhood (Aldgate). Together they argue that Black London and the City have never been separable.
Most stops are step-free and visible from the street; St Mary Woolnoth has steps to the nave but is otherwise accessible, and Guildhall Yard is paved and open.
Stops (in order)
- Francis Barber at Dr Johnson’s House
- Aldermanbury — Anti-Slavery Society & Mary Prince
- Guildhall — Revealing the City’s Past
- Bank of England — Slavery & the Bank
- Royal Exchange — Equiano’s bookseller
- St Mary Woolnoth — Newton & the abolitionist church
- Lloyd’s of London — the Zong and the 2020 apology
- Olaudah Equiano in the City