Thomas Parke (merchant)

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Thomas Parke, 1769 portrait by Joseph Wright of Derby

Thomas Parke (1729/30 – 1819)[1] was a Liverpool slave trader, merchant, banker and privateer.[2] He was part of the complex network of business interests and finance behind the African and Atlantic slave trade of the later 18th century.

Early life[edit]

He originally from Swaledale, Yorkshire, the son of Thomas and Hannah Parke of Low Row; his father was a hosier and lead miner. He went into business as a linen merchant, initially with his brother John. His brother-in-law Christopher Wilson I of Kendal was another hosier, and Thomas Parke's merchant ventures included exporting Wilson's goods to North America.[3]

Slave trade[edit]

Parke invested in the Atlantic slave trade through many ventures; he withdrew from it in 1792. Another business partner was Wilson's son, Christopher Wilson II, of the Low Wood Gunpowder Company, gunpowder being part of the West Africa trade.[4][5]

Heywood's Bank in the 18th century.

Parke was a member of the Company of Merchants trading to Africa, of Liverpool.[6] He was in business with Arthur Heywood.[7] Parke & Heywood were involved in two slaving ventures in 1783/4,[8] and in all in 50 journeys in the "triangular trade". The firm was significant as a major player in the local insurance trade, and its business had many dealings in common with the partnership of Thomas Staniforth and Joseph Brooks (junior).[9] Heywood & Parke became one of the ten largest Liverpool firms (period 1783 to 1793) responsible for the trade of West African slaves to the West Indies.[10] Their ventures employed the slaver Captain Joseph Fayrer.[4][11]

Among Parke's clients for slaves were Rainford, Blundell & Rainford of Kingston, Jamaica.[12] The percentage of Liverpool's slave trade in 1790 attributable to Thomas Parke and Co., of five partners, has been given as 1.1%.[13] Parke reduced his investment in the direct trade, and concentrated more on the production of cotton goods for it, a business in which one of his sons was involved.[14]

Parke was a director of the Liverpool fire insurance office established in 1777.[15] He was a partner in Heywood's Bank.[16]

Personal life[edit]

Parke married Anne, daughter of William Preston.[17][18]

Their sons included:

  • Thomas John, the eldest. He married Bridget Colquitt, the daughter of John Colquitt IV.[19][20][21] He was a partner in William Gregson, Sons, Parke & Morland.[22][19] With Thomas Staniforth, Richard Watt and Joseph Jackson, he founded Old Swan Charity School (1792).[23][24]
  • John and Preston Fryer, who were bankrupts. John was in the textile ("African check") business, but failed, and took a position as consul to Iceland.[19][25][26]
  • James Parke, 1st Baron Wensleydale.

Their daughter Alice married Sitwell Sitwell.[27] Another daughter Anne married John Croome Smythe.[19]

Parke lived in Water Street;[28] later he moved to Duke Street, and resided at Highfield House, West Derby, Liverpool, previously owned by Charlotte Murray, Duchess of Atholl, which he bought about 1781.[22]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ David Richardson, Anthony Tibbles, Suzanne Schwarz, Liverpool and Transatlantic Slavery (2007), p. 202.
  2. ^ "Liverpool chamber of commerce 1774-96, members" (PDF). geog.cam.ac.uk. Retrieved 14 May 2023.
  3. ^ Satchell & Wilson 1988, pp. 15–6
  4. ^ a b David Richardson, Anthony Tibbles, Suzanne Schwarz, Liverpool and Transatlantic Slavery (2007), p. 130; Google Books.
  5. ^ Satchell & Wilson 1988, p. 3
  6. ^ Gomer Williams (3 February 2011). History of the Liverpool Privateers and Letters of Marque: With an Account of the Liverpool Slave Trade. Cambridge University Press. p. 679. ISBN 978-1-108-02627-7. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
  7. ^ "The Heywood family of Manchester | Revealing Histories". www.revealinghistories.org.uk. Retrieved 10 July 2019.
  8. ^ Inikori 1981, p. 771
  9. ^ Pearson, Robin; Richardson, David (November 2001). "Business Networking in the Industrial Revolution". The Economic History Review. New Series. 54 (4): 670–1. doi:10.1111/1468-0289.00207. JSTOR 3091626.
  10. ^ Inikori, J.E. (1977). "The Import of Firearms into West Africa 1750-1807: A Quantitative Analysis". The Journal of African History. 18 (3): 353. doi:10.1017/S0021853700027304. JSTOR 180637. S2CID 161693017.
  11. ^ Morgan, Kenneth (2005). "Remittance Procedures in the Eighteenth-Century British Slave Trade". The Business History Review. 79 (4): 736. doi:10.2307/25097112. JSTOR 25097112. S2CID 154338547.
  12. ^ Sheryllynne Haggerty (15 November 2011). 'Merely for Money'?: Business Culture in the British Atlantic, 1750-1815. Liverpool University Press. p. 181. ISBN 978-1-84631-817-7. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
  13. ^ Inikori 1981, p. 751
  14. ^ Inikori 1981, p. 770, Note 84
  15. ^ Thomas Baines (1852). History of the commerce and town of Liverpool: and of the rise of the manufacturing industry in the adjoining counties. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans. pp. 453–. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
  16. ^ Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (1944) p. 99; archive.org.
  17. ^ Jones, Gareth H. "Parke, James, Baron Wensleydale". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/21283. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  18. ^ Edward Foss (30 January 2000). Biographia Juridica: A Biographical Dictionary of the Judges of England from the Conquest to the Present Time, 1066-1870. The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. p. 497. ISBN 978-1-886363-86-1.
  19. ^ a b c d Jeremiah Finch Smith (editor), The Admission Register of the Manchester School, vol. II, Chetham Society Miscellanies vol. 73 (1868) p. 91; archive.org.
  20. ^ Ernest Axon, Bygone Lancashire (1892), p. 152; archive.org.
  21. ^ Sir Richard Phillips (1804). Monthly Magazine and British Register. R. Phillips. p. 456. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  22. ^ a b John Hughes, Liverpool Banks and Bankers, 1760-1837 (1906), pp. 111–2; archive.org.
  23. ^ Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, Liverpool; Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, Liverpool Proceedings and papers. Transactions. Robarts - University of Toronto. Liverpool [etc.]
  24. ^ "M - Q". liverpool-schools.co.uk. Retrieved 10 July 2019.
  25. ^ Issue 16864 The London Gazette
  26. ^ Issue 15940 The London Gazette
  27. ^ R. G. Thorne (1986). The House of Commons. Boydell & Brewer. p. 187. ISBN 978-0-436-52101-0. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  28. ^ Richard Brooke (1853). Liverpool as it was during the last quarter of the eighteenth century. 1775 to 1800. J. Mawdsley and son. pp. 465–6.

References[edit]

  • Inikori, J.E. (December 1981). "Market Structure and the Profits of the British African Trade in the Late Eighteenth Century". The Journal of Economic History. 41 (4): 745–776. doi:10.1017/s0022050700044880. JSTOR 2120644. S2CID 154206808.
  • Satchell, John; Wilson, Olive (1988). Christopher Wilson of Kendal: An Eighteenth Century Hosier and Banker. Kendal Civic Society & Frank Peters Publishing. ISBN 0-948511-50-8.

Sources[edit]

  • Richardson, David (2007). Liverpool and Transatlantic Slavery. Liverpool, UK: Liverpool University Press. ISBN 978-1-84631-066-9.
  • Williams, Gomer (1897). History of the Liverpool Privateers. UK: Liverpool University Press.
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