Sam Sharpe: the slave-turned-preacher who helped to bring about abolition

Sam Sharpe was a Jamaican Baptist deacon who was hung for inciting a riot in 1831. He played a key role in ending the enslavement of Africans in the Caribbean. This Black History Month, Rev Dr Carlton Turner pays tribute to the faith of a man who sought to bring freedom to his people 

As we celebrate Black History Month in the UK and try to make sense of how Black people across the globe have managed to sustain their faith under the pervasiveness of racism, Sam Sharpe is a key figure.

Sharpe was an educated slave in Jamaica who converted to Christianity and became a Baptist deacon, ministering among many different groups of enslaved persons. Sharpe realised that his reading of the Bible conflicted with the brutality of enslavement that he and his people lived under and, when he became aware of rumours that Great Britain was debating the abolition of slavery, it was an opportune time to agitate for a kind of life in which all persons were free, regardless of ancestry or skin colour.