Slavery in Britain His conversion to Evangelical Christianity in 1784 played a key role in interesting him in this social reform. William Wilberforce's Slave Trade Act 1807 abolished the slave trade in the British Empire. It was not until the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 that the institution finally was abolished, but on a gradual basis. Since land owners in the British West Indies were losing their unpaid labourers, they received compensation totaling £20 million. The Royal Navy established the West Africa Squadron (or Preventative Squadron) at substantial expense in 1808 after Parliament passed the Slave Trade Act of 1807. The squadron's task was
Burials and memorials in Westminster Abbey their Memorial Service in the Abbey, but were buried elsewhere: Sixteen Great War poets are commemorated on a slate stone unveiled 11 November 1985, in the South Transept (Poets' Corner): Above the Great West Door, ten 20th-century Christian martyrs from across the world are depicted in statues; from left to right: King Harold I was originally buried in the Abbey, but his body was exhumed, beheaded, and thrown into a fen in June 1040. The body was later rescued and re-buried in the church of St Clement Danes in Westminster. A number of Cromwellians were also buried in the Abbey