Business
John Gladstone made a fortune trading in corn with the United States and cotton with Brazil. He acquired large sugar plantations in Jamaica and Demerara, and was Chairman of the West India Association. He used slaves on these estates and when the slave trade was abolished in the British Empire in 1833, he was active in obtaining compensation for slave owners. He received £106,769 (modern equivalent £83m) for the 2,508 slaves he owned across nine plantations.
After the abolition of slavery, John Gladstone used Indentured servants from India to work in slavery-like conditions in his sugar plantations. Knowing that a number of Indians had been sent to Mauritius as indentured labour, he hit upon the idea of using them in his plantations in the West Indies as well. In a letter dated 4 January 1836 to Messrs. Gillanders, Arbuthnot & Co of Calcutta, Gladstone expressed his desire to obtain labour from India. He used false promises of light work, comfortable housing and schools to make work on Gladstone plantations appear attractive to prospective Indian migrants. Indians, on their arrival in British Guiana, became known as Hill Coolies. From 1838 to 1917, over 200,000 Indians arrived under indentureship in British Guiana alone. They lived under slave like conditions in the plantations.
After sixteen years of operations, Corrie, Gladstone & Bradshaw was dissolved and its business was continued by John Gladstone under the name of John Gladstone & Company. His six brothers followed him from Leith to Liverpool, and he took his brother Robert into partnership with him. Their business became very extensive, having a large trade with Russia, and as sugar importers and West India merchants. In 1814, when the monopoly of the British East India Company was broken and trade with India and China was opened to competition, Gladstone's firm was the first to send a private ship to Calcutta.
Read more about this topic: Sir John Gladstone, 1st Baronet
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