The Sugarhouse Name and its History

In the 18th century, Lancaster was the fourth most prolific port involved in the Transatlantic slave trade which involved the capture and enslavement of millions of African men, women and children. The Transatlantic slave trade was also known as the Triangle Trade, as it had three stages:       

• Manufactured goods from Europe such as cloth, beads and guns were taken to Africa where they were exchanged for captured people

• The captured Africans were transported to the West Indies and the Americas. This was known as the middle passage.

• Finally, raw materials and goods produced by slave labour such as cotton, sugar, rum, mahogany and tobacco were brought back to Europe from the Americas.

Between 1700-1800 at least 122 ships sailed from Lancaster to the coast of Africa and Lancaster slave-ship captains were involved in the capture and sale of around 30,000 people. [1]

Some of the goods produced by slave labour and transported from the Americas were processed and sold in Lancaster, including raw sugar refined in sugarhouses. [2] The first sugarhouse is thought to date from before 1680 and was established by John Hodgson. [3] Hodgson decided to build a sugarhouse in Lancaster to produce molasses for the distillery that he planned to establish in the town despite the fact that sugar was not imported directly into Lancaster at that time. [4]

It was this difficulty that initiated his relationship with John Lawson who he would later sell the sugarhouse to. Lawson was a prominent merchant who built a stone bridge over a mill stream towards the River Lune and was granted permission to erect a wharf 20 yards long on the river. This wharf would later enable ships from the West Indies to dock close to the refinery and unload large quantities of sugar into the sugarhouses for processing. [4]

Lawson’s sugarhouse stood roughly at the site of The Sugarhouse today, hence the street name Sugar House Alley and the name of the nightclub. The land has been later developed for various other purposes including the nightclub which was purchased by the Students’ Union from Mitchell’s Brewery in 1994.

Sugarhouses, and the associated trade of other raw materials and goods such as cotton, rum and mahogany, generated profits from slavery and the wealth from the slavery business supported the social and economic growth of Lancaster that turned it into the city that we know today. Lancaster became a wealthier city because of slavery and was one of the few towns in Britain that sent a petition to the government in favour of slavery.1 In a shocking letter written in 1792, one Lancaster merchant argued that “the people in England want to lower the prices of sugar and yet continue presenting petitions from all quarters to Parliament to procure the abolition of the slave trade”. [5]

It was only after many failed attempts that, in 1807, the Atlantic slave trade was abolished; an Act that was the consequence of repeated revolts and acts of resistance by enslaved people themselves. However, enslaved peoplewere not freed until 1838 – and only after slave-owners, rather than the enslaved themselves, received British tax-payer funded compensation for their ‘human property’. [6]

The historical roots of much of contemporary racism, discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerances are a consequence of the racist systems of human classification we inherited from slavery and colonialism. This is why it is imperative that we face these histories, and their legacies, so we can better understand, overcome and challenge the inequalities of the 21st century and future.  

We would like to give thanks to the students and community groups involved in initiating these conversations around the Sugarhouse name, including the Racial & Ethnic Minority Students’ Forum. We would also like to give thanks to University colleagues from the Departments of Sociology and History for supporting this research, and the Sugarhouse for embracing the project.

[1] Visit Lancaster (2023) The Transatlantic Slave Trade. Available at: https://visitlancaster.org.uk/museums/maritime-museum/the-transatlantic-slave-trade/

[2] Lancaster Civic Society (2021) Lancaster and the Slave Trade. Available at: http://www.lancastercivicsociety.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Lancaster-Slave-Trade-L.pdf

[3] Lancaster City Council (2022) Lancaster High Streets Heritage Action Zone: Mill Race Conservation Management Plan Part 1. Available at: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/c851ee5232ed41b58ed53f6b69732f5b

[4] Duggan, M. (2013) Sugar for the House: A History of Early Sugar Refining in North West England. Fonthill Media Ltd.

[5] Elder, M. (1992) The Slave Trade and the Economic Development of 18th-Century Lancaster. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

[6] UK Parliament (2023) 1807 Abolition of the Slave Trade. Available at: 1807 Abolition of the Slave Trade - UK Parliament.