Thomas Walker (slave trader)

Thomas Walker (1758–1797) (a.k.a. Beau Walker) was a British slave trader.

Thomas Walker
Born1758 (1758)
Died1797(1797-00-00) (aged 38–39)
at sea
Cause of deathMurder
OccupationSlave trader
SpouseCatherine McLelland
Children2 sons, 1 daughter, including George E. Walker
RelativesDavid Davis Walker (grandson)
George Herbert Walker (great-grandson)
George Herbert Walker Jr. (great-great-grandson)
George H. W. Bush (great-great-great-grandson)
George W. Bush (great-great-great-great-grandson)

Early life

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Thomas Walker was born 1758 in Henbury, now a suburb of Bristol, England.[1][2]

Career

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Walker worked as a slave trader, when Bristol was one of the three major slave trading ports in Britain.[2] He served as a slave ship Captain and was resident slave trader who operated in the Sierra Leone region of West Africa.[2]

He did much of his slave trading at Bunce Island, a British slave castle in the Sierra Leone River, owned at that time by the Company of John & Alexander Anderson, based in London.[2] He was involved in at least eleven slave trading voyages between 1784 and 1792, taking African captives from Sierra Leone to the British West Indies and the United States.[2]

Personal life

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On 22 February 1785, Walker married Catherine McLelland (1770–1806) at St. Andrew's Church in Clifton.[2] She died on 18 October 1806, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, a decade after her husband, leaving their older son as the guardian for his sister and a younger son, George E. Walker (1797–1864).[2]

Death and legacy

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Walker was murdered in 1797 at sea in a mutiny.[2] He is an ancestor of two U.S. presidents, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush.[2]

References

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  1. ^ Baptismal record
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i "George W. Bush's Great-Great-Great-Great-Grandfather Was a Slave Trader". Slate. 19 June 2013.
  • "Americans of Gentle Birth and Their Ancestors" v1 ed. Pittman, Baltimore Genealogical Publishing Company, 1970, pp. 312–318