The action unfolds during the 1780s on the doomed voyage of the slave ship Zong, and in the Lord Chief Justice’s study at Kenwood House, London. How could slaves be put to death and insurance claimed on them? How could the Lord Chief Justice justify this? Who will hold the murderers and the great judge to account?

A Peril of the Sea was first staged in December 2016 at the Lakeside Theatre in Colchester and the Bloomsbury Theatre in London, under the direction of Kate Lovell. Jeremy Krikler is an historian at the University of Essex. He is the author of Revolution from Above, Rebellion from Below (OUP 1993), White Rising – The 1922 Insurrection and Racial Killing in South Africa (MUP 2005) and numerous articles on a wide range of subjects. A Peril of the Sea has emerged from his research into the slave trade.