London marks slave trade ban
2007-03-24 18:39
London - The leader of the world's Anglicans on Saturday led more than one thousand people through London to mark the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade.
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, and his number two in the Church of England, Archbishop of York John Sentamu, blessed the crowd with a short prayer before the procession set off from the Whitehall government district.
At the head of the marchers was a banner reading: "March of Witness, Remembrance, Repentance, Restoration" while some bore wooden crosses, according to an AFP reporter at the scene.
The march, which included people of all ages, Britons and foreign guests, including many from Africa, passed the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, where the law banning the trade in slaves was passed on March 25, 1807.
On the banks of the River Thames, a wreath with the inscription "2704" - the number of British boats that left from London docks to transport slaves across the North Atlantic Ocean - was placed on a boat.
The wreath was taken to the docks before being returned up river for a bicentenary service on Tuesday at Westminster Abbey.
Williams said in a prayer: "We command to (God) all those who died as a consequence of the slave trade - in raids, in convoys of captives, in the holds of prisons and of slave ships, in labour and in loneliness."
The Church of England, which itself had slaves on plantations in the Caribbean, made a formal apology last year for its involvement.
Nearly three million black people are thought to have been shipped across the North Atlantic Ocean in British slave boats between 1700 and the start of the 19th century.
Trade in black slaves was banned throughout the British empire by the 1807 law, imposing a fine of £100 per slave found on any British boat.
Slavery was completely outlawed in British colonies in 1833.
Among the walkers were a group who walked 402 kilometres in yokes and chains from Hull, north-eastern England, the parliamentary seat of the abolitionist lawmaker William Wilberforce.