Issue 25 of Cutlass is now available to download here…

Articles on:

• Hands off Haïti, Ne touchez pas à Ayiti
• Communist Party of Kenya Rejects President Ruto’s Proposal to Deploy Kenya Police to Haiti
• Solidarity with the People of Palestine
• The Labour Party must restore the whip to Diane Abbott MP
• ONGOING FRENCH IMPERIALISM IN AFRICA
• Merely closing the borders is not an answer
• Jamaica teachers (and nurses) leaving in droves
• Book reviews
  • Nazneen AhmedPathak, City of Stolen Magic
  • Arun Kundnani, What is Anti-racism? And why it means Anti-capitalism
  • Tessa Murphy, The Creole Archipelago: Race and Borders in the

… Read on ...

The Beckford family had been involved in both the West India trade and as contractors supplying the Royal Navy since the mid-1600s. The London branch of the family, Richard Beckford (1619-1679) and his brother Sir Thomas (1628-1685) supplied the Navy with cheap clothing for the sailors, indeed, in 1668, Thomas is on record as bribing Samuel Pepys, Chief Secretary to the Admiralty, with a gift of £50 [£204,900] and a silver warming pan, which helped secure naval contracts worth £24,800 [£101,600,000].¹

Meanwhile, another branch of the family made their money in the West Indies. Peter Beckford (1643–1710) arrived in … Read on ...