Winston Churchill on slavery and the slave trade

'Our [Britain's] possession of the West Indies, like that of India... gave us the strength, the capital, the wealth at a time when no other European nation possessed such a reserve. It enabled us to come through the Napoleonic wars, the keen competition of the 18th and 19th centuries and enabled us to lay the foundation of that commercial and financial leadership which gave us a great position in the world.'

Winston Churchill addressing a banquet of West Indies sugar planters in London on 20 July 1939.