Barclays Denies Alleged Ties To Slave Trade

Amid criticism by black leaders in Brooklyn over the naming rights deal for the Nets stadium, Barclays Bank late last week issued a letter denying allegations that it had links to slave trading in the 18th century.

After staying relatively mum on the issue for two weeks, Barclays failed to pacify many outspoken critics with its letter, though it prompted a correction from the Brooklyn Paper.

In its letter dated February 1 signed by the head of corporate communications, Peter Truell, Barclays rejected allegations that early bank partner David Barclay was a Quaker slave trader, a claim they say was first printed in a 1944 book "Capitalism and Slavery."

"This book makes serious, unsupported and mistaken allegations about Barclays," Mr. Truell wrote. "The ‘David Barclay' referred to in this book also had no connection with the bank."

The Brooklyn Paper issued a correction, but not a retraction, of its first article on the naming rights deal. Under the headline "Blood money: Nets arena to be named after bank founded on slave money," the article highlighted opponents' allegations against Barclays concerning links to slavery, apartheid funding, and cooperation with the Nazis.

On Friday, the paper corrected a quotation it lifted from a British paper, initially cited to a Barclays official, that acknowledged the company was linked to slave traders. The quotation actually was from a reader apparently unaffiliated with Barclays, Brooklyn Paper's editor, Gersh Kuntzman, said.

The paper has seemingly been feeding some of the firestorm surrounding the naming rights issue, and coverage similar to the paper's has appeared in the Independent of London, among other press outlets.

However Mr. Kuntzman cautioned that he didn't think his paper provoked the initial outcry, saying opponents were approaching him about the slavery links before any articles were written.

City Council Member Charles Barron, who has repeatedly spoken out against the naming rights deal, said the letter did nothing to change his view of Barclays.

"Whether the Brooklyn Paper had highlighted the link to slavery or not, many of us involved in the reparations movement were aware of Barclays for a long time," he said.