The Copybook

Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.

1585

© Christine Matthews, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

In the Nick of Time Clay Lane

Anti-slavery campaigner Granville Sharp had a court order preventing Thomas Lewis being shipped off to slavery, but he had to find him first.

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1586

Photo by Lalupa, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Martyrdom of St James the Great Clay Lane

James, brother of John the Evangelist, was executed for his faith by a close friend of the Emperor Caligula.

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1587

By John Singleton Copley (1738-1815), via Wikimedia Commons.

Somerset’s Case Prince Hoare

After James Somerset was loaded onto a British slave-ship bound for Jamaica, Granville Sharp and other committed Christians turned to the courts for justice.

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1588

© Przemysław Sakrajda, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 3.0.

The Speech of King Caratacus Cornelius Tacitus

A proud British king, taken to Rome as a trophy of Empire, refused to plead for his life.

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1589

By NASA, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

A Man called ‘Beta’ Clay Lane

For a perennial ‘runner-up’, Eratosthenes had a peculiar knack of being first.

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1590

© JayHeritageCenter, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 4.0.

The ‘Jay Treaty’ Clay Lane

The Jay Treaty can be seen as the start of the ‘special relationship’ between Britain and America.

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