Wealthy UK Family Establishes $120,000 Community Fund in Grenada as an Apology for Slavery

LONDON, UK - The Trevelyan family in the United Kingdom says they will offer a public apology to the people of Grenada where their ancestors had more than one thousand slaves.

Laura Trevelyan (Photo credit : BBC)According to an article published online by the BBC, the family , who owned six sugar plantations in Grenada, will also pay reparations.

The report stated that in 2022, a family member, who is also a BBC reporter, Laura Trevelyan, visited Grenada and was shocked that her ancestors had been compensated by the UK government when slavery was abolished in 1833 – but freed African slaves got nothing.

Speaking to the BBC in a personal capacity on Saturday,  Trevelyan recalled her visit to the island for a documentary.

“It was really horrific… I saw for myself the plantations where slaves were punished, when I saw the instruments of torture that were used to restrain them.”

“I felt ashamed, and I also felt that it was my duty. You can’t repair the past – but you can acknowledge the pain.”

Trevelyan said seven members of her family are planning to travel to Grenada later in February to issue a public apology.

The family will give US$120,000 to establish a community fund for economic development on the island. 

According to Trevelyan in 1834, her family received about £34,000 for the loss of their “property” on Grenada – the equivalent of about £3m in today’s money.

“For me to be giving £100,000 almost 200 years later… maybe that seems like really inadequate,” she said.

“But I hope that we’re setting an example by apologizing for what our ancestors did.”

The Grenada National Reparations Commission described the gesture as commendable.

 Trevelyan, currently a BBC correspondent in New York, said she wanted to go to Grenada in the wake of the racial reckoning in the United States.