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Art historian Sam Smiles’s 2026 book, Turner and the Slave Trade, argues that J. M. W. Turner’s The Slave Ship is almost certainly not a depiction of the 1781 Zong massacre. The book also examines Turner’s documented investment in a Jamaican cattle-farming venture worked by enslaved people and considers how slavery shaped British art and wealth.
Art historian Sam Smiles’s 2026 book, Turner and the Slave Trade, argues that J. M. W. Turner’s famous painting The Slave Ship is almost certainly not a reference to the 1781 Zong massacre, despite the long-standing association between the two. The book revisits Turner’s relationship to slavery, including his investment in a Jamaican enterprise worked by enslaved people, and challenges how Romantic landscape painting is understood in relation to colonial wealth and propaganda.
In the book, Smiles examines the history and meaning of Turner’s 1840 painting, originally exhibited as Slavers Throwing overboard the Dead and the Dying–Typhoon Coming On. The scene shows enslaved people cast into the sea amid a storm. Its subject and imagery have led viewers to connect it with the Zong massacre, in which 133 enslaved Africans were thrown overboard and killed in 1781. But Smiles argues that the painting’s scene is almost certainly not based on that specific event.
That conclusion does not make the book an attempt to detach Turner from slavery. Smiles also assesses the painter’s financial connection to Jamaica, beginning with a £100 investment in 1805 in a consortium funding a cattle farm operated by an enslaved African workforce. The review says Smiles first uncovered evidence of the investment in 2007. He argues that Turner’s actions reflect how slavery was embedded in British wealth and absentee colonialism, rather than representing an isolated contradiction in the painter’s life.
The book places the painting and Turner’s biography within wider discussions of museum interpretation and colonial history. Smiles, an emeritus art historian at the University of Plymouth and a co-curator of Tate’s 2014 touring exhibition Late Turner: Painting Set Free, addresses the continuing stakes of writing about slavery and racial violence. The review notes that he says he left out offensive language and gratuitous images except where they were necessary to his analysis.
How Turner’s Record Shapes His Reputation
The book matters because it separates two issues that are often treated as one: whether The Slave Ship depicts the Zong massacre specifically, and how Turner’s art and personal finances relate to the wider system of slavery. Smiles’s argument challenges a familiar identification of the painting without disputing the massacre’s history or removing slavery from the painting’s interpretation.
That distinction affects how museums, scholars and audiences discuss a celebrated British artist whose work remains prominent in the national art story. Turner’s connection to a Jamaican venture worked by enslaved people also directs attention beyond the canvas to the economic structures that supported British life and culture. The source review connects these questions to present-day debates over reparations and colonial collections, while presenting those connections as part of the book’s critical framework rather than as a finding about Turner’s intentions.
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From the Zong to Turner’s Investment
The Zong massacre took place in 1781, when 133 enslaved Africans were killed after being thrown overboard from the British slave ship. Turner’s painting appeared nearly six decades later, in 1840, at the Royal Academy. Its original title explicitly described slave traders throwing people overboard as a typhoon approached, helping establish its association with the brutality of the slave trade.
The painting is now commonly linked to the Zong, but Smiles’s book argues against identifying the scene as a depiction of that event. The review describes the book as a reassessment of Turner’s changing ethical outlook and of the way Romantic landscape painting can be read in relation to colonial power. Smiles’s earlier research into Turner’s 1805 Jamaican investment provides a biographical strand to that reassessment. He later co-curated the Tate’s 2014 traveling Turner exhibition.
“The painting is almost certainly not a reference to the Zong Massacre.”
— Sam Smiles, as summarized in the Hyperallergic review
art history books on slavery and colonialism
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What the Painting Can Establish
The review reports Smiles’s conclusion about the painting but does not provide the full evidence or identify what specific historical episode, if any, Turner intended to represent. It is also unclear from the review how other scholars have responded to the book’s argument or whether it changes museum labels and interpretations of The Slave Ship.
The source material establishes Turner’s £100 investment in the Jamaican venture, but it gives no further details about the farm’s operations, the duration of his financial involvement or the returns he received. Smiles’s interpretation of that investment and of slavery’s role in British wealth should be distinguished from those reported biographical facts.
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Further Debate Over Turner’s Legacy
The immediate next step is for readers and art historians to assess Smiles’s argument against the historical record and earlier readings of The Slave Ship. The source review does not report a planned exhibition, institutional response or change to the painting’s display, so no specific follow-up action is confirmed.
Discussion is likely to continue around how museums explain Turner’s work, how his financial ties are represented, and how art history handles colonial archives and racial violence. Those debates will require keeping the book’s central distinctions clear: the proposed link to the Zong is contested by Smiles, while Turner’s investment in a Jamaican operation worked by enslaved people is a reported part of his financial history.
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Key Questions
What does Sam Smiles argue about The Slave Ship?
Smiles argues that Turner’s 1840 painting is almost certainly not a reference to the Zong massacre, despite the established association between them.
What was the Zong massacre?
In 1781, 133 enslaved Africans were thrown overboard and killed from the British slave ship Zong. The review says the killings were connected to an insurance claim.
What was Turner’s connection to Jamaica?
According to the review, Turner invested £100 in 1805 in a consortium funding a Jamaican cattle farm operated by an enslaved African workforce. Smiles discovered evidence of the investment in 2007.
Does the book argue that Turner had no connection to slavery?
No. The book examines Turner’s financial involvement in a Jamaican enterprise worked by enslaved people. Its challenge is to the painting’s specific identification with the Zong, not to the broader historical connection between Turner, slavery and British wealth.
Has a museum changed how it displays The Slave Ship?
The source review does not report any change to a museum display or label. It is not clear whether institutions will revise their interpretation in response to the book.
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