John and Mary: Black Children at Queen Anne's Court?

In just four lines in the baptism records of the Chapel Royal at St James's Palace, written in clear and cursive handwriting, all we learn about John and Mary are bare details. We do not know their names before they were baptised, or who their parents were. They were not baptised with surnames either, which might allow us to more easily trace how their lives unfolded.

But the brief description of them does indicate two things: that they were children (‘a boy and a girle’) and that they were Black and originated from either the Caribbean or West Africa (‘West India Blacks’). Although we might associate the West Indies with the Caribbean today, in the period when John and Mary were baptised, it was sometimes used to describe West Africa.

Searching the Archives

Archives such as these allow us to trace the lives of the people who inhabited the royal palaces in this period: courtiers, household servants, and their families. My interest in this archive stemmed from my research into the diverse group of people who made up the royal household during this era, especially those who were non-white and non-European.

Their histories can be much harder to trace in the archive. I went through several volumes of royal chapel records, at The National Archives and at the Royal Archives in Windsor, and only found a few entries which referenced Black or Asian people. In some instances, they were completely anonymous, such as the ‘Blackmoore’ baptised at Whitehall in 1663 [PRO 28/1]. Even where a given name does survive, as the baptism record for John and Mary indicates, there are absences in the historical record that we must navigate.

A Global Story

There are a few possibilities which might explain why two Black children came to be baptised in the royal residence. In the late 17th and early 18th century, England had colonies in North America, the Caribbean, and Indian Subcontinent, as well as trading ‘factories’, or forts, in West Africa and the East Indies. By the turn of the 18th century, the transatlantic trade in enslaved people was well underway. Most captives who were taken to English colonies in North America and the Caribbean originated from West Africa, with smaller numbers from East Africa and Indian Ocean Islands. One possibility, then, is that John and Mary were enslaved children, who had been taken captive in West Africa and trafficked to England (possibly via the Caribbean).

In West African forts like Cape Coast Castle, English merchants and officials belonging to the Royal African Company forged trading and diplomatic partnerships with local African elites. Another possibility, therefore, is that John and Mary were cultural ‘go-betweens’, the children of African elites who willingly sent their children to England to receive an education and help cement relationships with English elites.

During this period, the mixed-race children of English colonial elites were also sent ‘home’ to receive an education. Born in West Africa and the Caribbean to free women of colour and enslaved African women, some were acknowledged by their white fathers. If this was the case, then we cannot get away from the fact that their mother may have been subject to sexual abuse. Although the nomenclature of ‘mulatto’ (someone who was mixed-race) was widely used in the Caribbean by the early 18th century, in England it’s possible that someone who was mixed-race might still be described as Black.

What does this mean for John and Mary? Had they been taken from their family, or did they have family in England? Were they siblings or strangers? Could they understand or speak English? Were they traumatised?

All we know for certain is that they entered the Chapel Royal at St James’s on 20 August 1704. Following a fire at Whitehall Palace in 1702, the Chapel Royal at St James’s, which was first built by Henry VIII, became the focal point of royal worship. But even before this time, and after, it was an important royal residence for Queen Anne; it was where she gave birth to some of her children. It was not insignificant, therefore, that John and Mary were baptised there. The Queen must have given her permission and may have been in attendance, which raises questions about their potential role at her court.

Black Children at Court?

Young Black boys were in high demand to serve as pages to wealthy Britons; they appear frequently in portraits alongside white elites and sometimes in the written records of the time too. Take the painting by Peter Angelis of Queen Anne and the Knights of the Garter; completed around 1725, it depicts a ceremony which was performed at Kensington Palace in 1713. Two Black boys are depicted, wearing yellow silk livery and silver collars around their necks—a detail which I only spotted once this painting had been cleaned and displayed at Kensington Palace in 2024, as part of the Untold Lives: A Palace at Work exhibition. Although it may depict a scene some nine years after John’s baptism, is does add weight to the idea that he may have been destined for a role at court.

There is no visual evidence of young Black girls like Mary at the royal court. But we do know that they were also sought by wealthy householders as maids. In 1701, for example, the Royal African Company, advised its officials to seek boys and girls between the ages of 12 and 15 for the British market in enslaved servants [Fryer, Staying Power, 21-22].

Whether such children were considered enslaved or not is open to debate. My own view is that there is enough historical evidence now which confirms that in many cases, they were considered so. We find this evidence in legal wranglings over the issue, in correspondence and diaries, and in newspaper notices which were placed to seek the return of ‘runaway’ enslaved people—many who were made to wear collars around their necks. As historian Holly Brewer has argued, ‘real slavery did exist’ in 17th- and 18th-century England. Legal precedents established in the 17th century, that enslaved people were property, that their baptism did not change their status or grant manumission (freedom), was not erased until 1772.

Dr Misha Ewen
Lecturer in American History, University of Sussex

Archival Sources

• Two cheque books of the Chapel Royal, St James's Palace, 1561-1867, PRO 28/1, The National Archives, Kew
• Whitehall, St James and Windsor, Berkshire, Chapels Royal: births, baptisms, marriages, deaths and confirmations, 1647, 1675-1709, RG 8/110, The National Archives, Kew

Further Reading

• Susan Dwyer Amussen, Caribbean Exchanges: Slavery and the Transformation of English Society, 1640-1700 (Chapel Hill, 2007)
• Imtiaz Habib, Black Lives in English Archives, 1500-1677: Imprints of the Invisible (Aldershot, 2008)
• Peter Fryer, Staying Power: The History of Black People in Britain (London, 2018)
• Simon Newman, Freedom Seekers: Escaping from Slavery in Restoration London (London, 2022)