John Bolton’s name appears in early documents relating to the supply of raw cotton to the Darley Abbey Mill. He is selling to brokers like Nicholas Waterhouse, who in turn, fulfill the orders to the mill.

You can find out more about John Bolton on the University College London’s Legacies of British Slave-Ownership site.

John Bolton was a Liverpool Merchant, who was actively involved in the Transatlantic Slave Trade and who also acquired a number of estates worked by enslaved people. Some of these estates grew cotton. There is no direct trace (yet) between the cotton grown on these estates and the Darley Abbey Mill. At present, it is unclear which specific cotton estates, Bolton sourced his raw cotton from that he supplied his British customers with, including the Evans family.