Catalogue description Private Books

These books include journals, minutes, letterbooks and financial records. Many are written in an informal style and may have been intended as records of events or transactions for personal use only. These include payments to labourers, slaves and soldiers, personal letters containing details of deaths at the station, arrivals and departures of visitors (including company representatives and stowaways), and the tasks assigned to bricklayers, stoneblowers and coopers. The journals and minutebooks give detailed accounts of the merchants' experiences in Africa, describing alliances and skirmishes with indigenous peoples, diplomatic negotiations with Dutch forces in the region, acts of piracy, and details of everyday life for employees of the Royal African Company serving in Sierra Leone and Ghana.