Hello, my name is Shaheen Alikhan. I am working on a book, built from my thesis at the University of Virginia, on the architecture of purpose-built slaving vessels. Some information I came across led me to your website and your request for any information on Scarborough's potential involvement with the transatlantic slave trade; I can tell you that there was one. The obvious connection is not nearly as robust as we find it in Liverpool, Bristol or London, but it is very likely that Yorkshire benefitted in more subtle ways, such as merchants' goods going through several channels to be used for exchange, a wider system of banking or credit through London, etc. But there were at least two Scarborough vessels adapted to carry enslaved humans, in three known voyages.
The Success Packet and the Friendship were both built in Scarborough, before sailing to London (possibly for additional fitting out or collection of seamen or provisioning) before heading towards the coast of West Africa. Since the Success Packet was built in 1762 and her first recorded slaving voyage transpired in 1771, she was almost certainly built for another purpose carrying non-human cargo before being retrofit for the Guinea trade. The Friendship's approximate eight-year discrepancy between 1781-1789 indicates the same.
I have also very recently found that specifics for building a barricado in ships of varying tonnage were known to Scarborough shipwrights.
My book will be published in 2023..
The Slave Voyages website is a collaborative digital initiative that compiles and makes publicly accessible records of the largest slave trades in history. Search these records to learn about the broad origins and forced relocations of more than 12 million African people who were sent across the Atlantic in slave ships, and hundreds of thousands more who were trafficked within the Americas. Explore where they were taken, the numerous rebellions that occurred, the horrific loss of life during the voyages, the identities and nationalities of the perpetrators, and much more.
https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/database#timeline = TIMELINE
https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/database#maps = MAP
https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/database#timelapse = TIMELAPSE
https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/database#tables = TABLES
