October is Black History Month in the UK and today we hear from Dr Paul Seaward, our former Director and British Academy/ Wolfson Foundation Research Professor about the politics of footmen and the amateur political ambition of a black servant… In November 1710, the satirist, clergyman and Tory activist Jonathan Swift went to Westminster to see the opening of Parliament following his party’s success in … Continue reading Black History Month: “Pompey, Colonel Hill’s black”, and the politics of footmen in Queen Anne’s London