A free Webinar as part of the season of Regional History Talks in partnership with the Regional History Centre at the University of the West of England (UWE) and Bristol Museums.

Colston’s Last Journey is a work of soundart created by writer and poet Ralph Hoyte in response to the toppling of the statue of Edward Colston in June 2020. Its theme is Bristol and the Transatlantic trafficking of enslaved Africans.

Colston’s Last Journey is accessible through an app that can be downloaded on a smartphone for a self-directed tour around Bristol harbourside. The soundscape starts at the former Colston plinth where you immediately embark on the Sea of Woe. Afloat on this sea are the audio-ghosts of 9 actual ships which sailed from this very port in the 17th and 18th centuries. They were bound for the West Coast of Africa, then onwards to the New World. Each ship represents one particular aspect of this transatlantic trafficking of enslaved Africans. You can ‘board’ the ships and listen in to what they have to say. The audio-trail proceeds along the Arnolfini side of the quay, then crosses Pero’s Bridge to where the Colston statue was dumped in the water