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Legacy

Activity 1: Pero's Bridge

Task:
You have been commissioned to make a short radio story (3 minutes) about the life of Pero and the fact that a bridge has been named in his honour in the heart of Bristol.

Use the sources here, and any other materials you feel are useful, to create your script.You might include:

• Something brief about the Transatlantic Slave Trade?
• A description of the bridge (Remember that it is a radio story!)
• Pero's Story
• An interview with someone at the bridge (Maybe a passer by? Do they know Pero's story? Maybe someone from the City Council? Maybe they want to talk about why the bridge is important?)

Source 1: Picture of Pero's bridge

Source 2.
This bridge was built in 1999 and named after a man known as 'Pero' who lived from around 1753 to 1798. He was an enslaved man who was the personal servant of a very rich Bristol merchant called John Pinney (1740-1818).
Pero came to England in 1783. By 1791 he was the servant of the Pinney family in Bristol, in their house near the top of Park Street. Naming the new bridge 'Pero's Bridge' was an important act by Bristol City Council for three reasons:
· It showed that the contribution of black people to the development of the city was recognised;
· It showed that Slavery had helped make Bristol a wealthy city in the past;
· It showed that the City wanted people to know that it was sorry for the suffering that this had caused and that the racism of the past would no longer be ignored or hidden.

Source 3: Pero's Story: An outline biography.

Pero (1753-1798) was a man of African-Caribbean origin, who was the personal servant of the Bristolian John Pinney (1740-1818). Pero came to England in 1783 as a slave. By 1791 he lived, as a servant, with the Pinney family in Bristol, in a fine house near the top of Park Street on 5 Great George Street.

Pero was probably born in the tiny Caribbean island of Nevis. Pero's parents were black slaves and probably African-born. When Pero was 12 years old, he and his younger sisters: Nancy, who was 8, and Sheeba who was 6, were sold to John Pinney who had recently inherited two sugar plantations on the island. Soon after, Pero seems to have escaped the cruel and exhausting life of a field slave. At 14, he was taught how 'to shave and dress hair.' When he was in his twenties, he learned how to pull teeth, something barbers traditionally did in those days before dentists. He could read and had an eye for business, trading whenever he could in small goods (like goats and wheelbarrows) on the plantation.

When John Pinney returned to live with his family in Bristol, he brought Pero with him but left Pero's sisters behind to work on the Montravers plantation in Nevis. John Pinney sold this plantation to a man known for his cruelty, Charles Huggins. Pero kept in touch with his family in Nevis and visited them in Nevis when the Pinneys travelled there in 1794. Pero died in 1798, aged 45, in Ashton, Bristol.

Based on the research of David Small and Christine Eickelmann