Peterloo Commander's Family Fortune Tied to Transatlantic Enslavement

Research by Global Threads links Hugh Hornby Birley — commander of the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry charge that killed protesters among 60,000 gathered at St Peter's Field on 16 August 1819 — to a family fortune built on transatlantic enslavement. It connects Peterloo's cotton workers and enslaved Africans in the Caribbean in one Atlantic history.