09/06/2026
Ripon International Festival would be very grateful if we could help spread the word about an evocative drama, coming to Ripon Cathedral, charting the deep involvement of the Anglican church in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Incidents in the Life of An Anglican Slave is a dramatic play-poem inspired by a rare letter written in the year 1723, discovered in the Church of England Archives within Lambeth Palace Library. The letter was addressed from an anonymous Virginian slave to the then Archbishop of Canterbury and to King George I pleading for freedom, while reporting the horrors, abuses and realities of chattel slavery that was approved by the Anglican church at the time. The Earl and Countess of Harewood (with their deep knowledge of and historic connections to the transatlantic slave trade) will be joining the audience.
