Anti-slavery campaigners, the world's first Black professional footballer and a landmark on the Wicker.
Sheffield Against Slavery
In 1825 a group of Sheffield women, Mary Anne Rawson among them, founded the Sheffield Female Anti-Slavery Society. It is said to have been the first to call for slavery to end immediately rather than gradually. Its members gave lectures, printed pamphlets and persuaded people to stop buying sugar from the West Indies, because it was grown by enslaved people. The society wound up after the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833.
Arthur Wharton
Arthur Wharton was born in Jamestown in the Gold Coast, now part of Accra in Ghana. He equalled the amateur world record of 10 seconds for the 100 yards, and he is widely considered the first Black professional footballer in the world.
In 1894 he joined Sheffield United. He died in 1930 in Edlington, near Doncaster. He was buried in an unmarked grave. Since 2014 a statue of him has stood at St George's Park, the national football centre.
A Home On The Wicker
Sheffield's Caribbean community built its own places to meet: the Bug House in Upperthorpe in the 1960s, the Philadelphia Centre in the 1970s and the West Indian Centre in Attercliffe.
Out of the city's West Indies Association grew SADACCA, the Sheffield and District African Caribbean Community Association. In 1985 it moved into a derelict building on the Wicker, and it opened to members and the public on 1 April 1986, with the West Indies cricket captain Clive Lloyd at the opening.
Black Sheffield Today
SADACCA is still one of Sheffield's most significant landmarks and a vital space for the city's African and Caribbean community, running a Saturday school on African history and an archive project. Black-owned food spots, barbers, salons and brands are part of everyday life across the city.
Shop Black-owned businesses in Sheffield on CashBlack.
Photo Credits
Bramall Lane, home of Sheffield United. Photo: Bill Boaden, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons Lady's Bridge and the Wicker, Sheffield. Photo: Martin Speck, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons