Old Town

"Poole has a wealth of Georgian mansions, arguably the best in Dorset.

These are the legacy of a group of men who controlled Poole's lucrative trade with Newfoundland.

General supplies were shipped from Poole to Newfoundland where salt cod was loaded for transport to Southern Europe. The ships then brought back wine, oil and other goods to Poole.

Profits were made at each of these stages, and what profits these were! Two of the merchants died in the 1790s. Samuel White left two hundred thousand pounds and John Slade left seventy thousand pounds.

That's the equivalent today of eleven million and four million pounds respectively.

Unfortunately this wealth did not spread throughout the town. At the peak of the trade it was estimated that about half of the families in Poole were in poverty.

The whole system of barter and payment in truck gave unfair advantage to the merchants who could charge what they liked for their goods and mortgage their seamen's wages so that in many cases the men were actually in debt to their employers at the end of the voyage.

When times grew harder for the merchants they found little good will from their employees."