
Southampton in Jane Austen’s day was a watering place famed for sea bathing, but it was also a town dominated, in politics, by the ‘West Indian Party’ – plantation owners who fought against abolition and made their money from sugar and rum. It was a town of admirals, shipbuilders and colonialists who were at the forefront of a growing empire.
This walk is commissioned as part of the University of Southampton’s Arts & Humanities Research Council-funded Maritime Communities research project.
Starting from Holy Rood Church, High Street, Southampton SO14 3AU.