The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition - Thomas Clarkson
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How then were we to decide this important question? for it was said that
no white man was ever permitted by the natives to go up in these canoes.
On mentioning accidentally the circumstances of the case, as I have now
stated them, to a friend, immediately on my return from my last journey,
he informed me that he himself had been in company, about a year before,
with a sailor, a very respectable-looking man, who had been up these
rivers. He had spent half an hour with him at an inn. He described his
person to me; but he knew nothing of his name, or of the place of his
abode. All he knew was, that he was either going, or that he belonged
to, some ship of war in ordinary; but he could not tell at what port. I
might depend upon all these circumstances if the man had not deceived
him; and he saw no reason why he should.
I felt myself set on fire, as it were, by this intelligence, deficient
as it was; and I seemed to determine instantly that I would, if it were
possible, find him out. For if our suspicions were true that the natives
frequently were kidnapped in these expeditions, it would be of great
importance to the cause of the abolition to have them confirmed; for as
many slaves came annually from these two rivers, as from all the coast
of Africa besides. But how to proceed on so blind an errand was the
question. I first thought of trying to trace the man by letter; but this
might be tedious. The examinations were now going on rapidly. We should
soon be called upon for evidence ourselves; besides, I knew nothing of
his name. I then thought it to be a more effectual way to apply to Sir
Charles Middleton, as comptroller of the navy, by whose permission I
could board every ship of war in ordinary in England, and judge for
myself. But here the undertaking seemed very arduous, and the time it
would consume became an objection in this respect, that I thought I
could not easily forgive myself, if I were to fail in it. My
inclination, however, preponderated this way. At length I determined to
follow it; for, on deliberate consideration, I found that I could not
employ my time more advantageously to the cause; for as other witnesses
must be found out somewhere, it was highly probable that, if I should
fail in the discovery of this man, I should, by moving among such a
number of sea-faring people, find others who could give their testimony
in our favour.
I must now inform the reader, that ships of war in ordinary, in one of
which this man was reported to be, are those which are out of
commission, and which are laid up in the different rivers and waters in
the neighbourhood of the king's dock-yards. Every one of these has a
boatswain, gunner, carpenter, and assistants on board. They lie usually
in divisions of ten or twelve; and a master in the navy has a command
over every division.
At length I began my journey. I boarded all the ships of war lying in
ordinary at Deptford, and examined the different persons in each. From
Deptford I proceeded to Woolwich, where I did the same. Thence I
hastened to Chatham, and then, down the Medway, to Sheerness. I had now
boarded above a hundred and sixty vessels of war. I had found out two
good and willing evidences among them; but I could gain no intelligence
of him who was the object of my search.
From Chatham I made the best of my way to Portsmouth harbour. A very
formidable task presented itself here; but the masters' boats were ready
for me, and I continued my pursuit. On boarding the Pegase, on the
second day, I discovered a very respectable person in the gunner of that
ship. His name was George Millar. He had been on board the Canterbury
slaveship at the dreadful massacre at Calabar. He was the only
disinterested evidence living, of whom I had yet heard. He expressed his
willingness to give, his testimony, if his presence should be thought
necessary in London. I then continued my pursuit for the remainder of
the day. On the next day I resumed and finished it for this quarter. I
had now examined the different persons in more than a hundred vessels in
this harbour, but I had not discovered the person I had gone to seek.
Matters now began to look rather disheartening, I mean as far as my
grand object was concerned. There was but one other port left, and this
was between two and three hundred miles distant. I determined, however,
to go to Plymouth. I had already been more successful in this tour, with
respect to obtaining general evidences than in any other of the same
length; and the probability was, that as I should continue to move among
the same kind of people, my success would be in a similar proportion
according to the number visited. These were great encouragements to me
to proceed. At length I arrived at the place of my last hope. On my
first day's expedition I boarded forty vessels, but found no one in
these who had been on the coast of Africa in the Slave Trade. One or two
had been there in king's ships; but they had never been on shore. Things
were now drawing near to a close; and, notwithstanding my success as to
general evidence in this journey, my heart began to beat. I was restless
and uneasy during the night. The next morning I felt agitated again
between the alternate pressure of hope and fear; and in this state I
entered my boat. The fifty-seventh vessel, which I boarded in this
harbour was the Melampus frigate. One person belonging to it, on
examining him in the captain's cabin, said he had been two voyages to
Africa; and I had not long discoursed with him before I found, to my
inexpressible joy, that he was the man. I found, too, that he unravelled
the question in dispute precisely as our inferences had determined it.
He had been two expeditions up the river Calabar in the canoes of the
natives. In the first of these, they came within a certain distance of a
village. They then concealed themselves under the bushes, which hung
over the water from the banks. In this position they remained during
day-light; but at night they went up to it armed, and seized all the
inhabitants, who had not time to make their escape. They obtained
forty-five persons in this manner. In the second, they were out eight or
nine days, when they made a similar attempt, and with nearly similar
success. They seized men, women, and children, as they could find them
in the huts. They then bound their arms, and drove them before them to
the canoes. The name of the person, thus discovered on board the
Melampus, was Isaac Parker. On inquiring into his character from the
master of the division, I found it highly respectable. I found, also,
afterwards, that he had sailed with Captain Cook, with great credit to
himself, round the world. It was also remarkable that my brother, on
seeing him in London, when he went to deliver his evidence, recognised
him as having served on board the Monarch man-of-war, and as one of the
most exemplary men in that ship.
I returned now in triumph. I had been out only three weeks, and I had
found out this extraordinary person, and five respectable witnesses
besides. These, added to the three discovered in the last journey, and
to those provided before, made us more formidable than at any former
period; so that the delay of our opponents, which we had looked upon as
so great an evil, proved in the end truly serviceable to our cause.
On going into the committee-room of the House of Commons on my return, I
found that the examinations were still going on in the behalf of those
who were interested in the continuance of the trade; and they went on
beyond the middle of April, when it was considered that they had closed.
Mr. Wilberforce moved accordingly, on the 23rd of the same month, that
Captain Thomas Wilson, of the royal navy, and that Charles Berns
Wadstrom and Henry Hew Dalrymple, Esqrs., do attend as witnesses on the
behalf of the abolition. There was nothing now but clamour from those on
the opposite side of the question. They knew well that there were but
few members of the House of Commons, who had read the privy council
report. They knew, therefore, that if the question were to be decided by
evidence, it must be decided by that which their own witnesses had given
before parliament. But this was the evidence only on one side. It was
certain, therefore, if the decision were to be made upon this basis,
that it must be entirely in their favour. Will it then be believed that
in an English House of Commons there could be found persons, who could
move to prevent the hearing of any other witnesses on this subject; and,
what is more remarkable, that they should charge Mr. Wilberforce,
because he proposed the hearing of them, with the intention solely of
delay? Yes, such persons were found; but happily only among the friends
of the Slave Trade. Mr. Wilberforce, in replying to them, could not help
observing that it was rather extraordinary that they, who had occasioned
the delay of a whole year, should charge him with that of which they
themselves had been so conspicuously guilty. He then commented for some
time on the injustice of their motion. He stated, too, that he would
undertake to remove from disinterested and unprejudiced persons many of
the impressions which had been made by the witnesses against the
abolition; and he appealed to the justice and honour of the house in
behalf of an injured people; under the hope that they would not allow a
decision to be made till they had heard the whole of the case. These
observations, however, did not satisfy all those who belonged to the
opposite party. Lord Penrhyn contended for a decision without a moment's
delay. Mr. Gascoyne relented; and said, he would allow three weeks to
the abolitionists, during which their evidence might be heard. At
length, the debate ended; in the course of which Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox
powerfully supported Mr. Wilberforce; when the motion was negatived
without any attempt at a division.
The witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave Trade now took
possession of the ground which those in favour of it had left. But what
was our surprise, when only three of them had been heard, to find that
Mr. Norris should come forward as an evidence! This he did to confirm
what he had stated to the privy council as to the general question; but
he did it more particularly, as it appeared afterwards, in the
justification of his own conduct: for the part which he had taken at
Liverpool, as it related to me, had become a subject of conversation
with many. It was now well known what assistance he had given me there
in my pursuit; how he had even furnished me with clauses for a bill, for
the abolition of the trade; how I had written to him, in consequence of
his friendly co-operation, to come up as an evidence in our favour; and
how at that moment he had accepted the office of a delegate on the
contrary side. The noise which the relation and repetition of these and
other circumstances had made, had given him, I believe, considerable
pain. His friends, too, had urged some explanation as necessary. But how
short-sighted are they who do wrong! By coming forward in this imprudent
manner, he fixed the stain only the more indelibly on himself; for he
thus imposed upon me the cruel necessity of being examined against him;
and this necessity was the more afflicting, to me, because I was to be
called upon not to state facts relative to the trade, but to destroy his
character as an evidence in its support. I was to be called upon, in
fact, to explain all those communications which have been stated to have
taken place between us on this subject. Glad indeed should I have been
to have declined this painful interference. But no one would hear of a
refusal. The Bishop of London, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Wilberforce considered
my appearance on this occasion as an imperious duty to the cause of the
oppressed. It may be perhaps sufficient to say that I was examined; that
Mr. Norris was present all the time; that I was cross-examined by
counsel; and, that after this time, Mr. Norris seemed to have no
ordinary sense of his own degradation; for he never afterwards held up
his head or looked the abolitionists in the face, or acted with energy
as a delegate, as on former occasions.
The hearing of evidence continued to go on in behalf of the abolition of
the trade. No less than twenty-four witnesses altogether were heard in
this session. And here it may not be improper to remark, that during the
examination of our own witnesses, as well as the cross-examination of
those of our opponents, no counsel were ever employed. Mr. Wilberforce
and Mr. William Smith undertook this laborious department; and as they
performed it with great ability, so they did it with great liberality
towards those who were obliged to come under their notice, in the course
of this fiery ordeal.
The bill of Sir William Dolben was now to be renewed. On this occasion
the enemies of the abolition became again conspicuous; for on the 26th
of May, they availed themselves of a thin house to propose an amendment,
by which they increased the number of the slaves to the tonnage of the
vessel. They increased it, too, without taking into the account, as had
hitherto been done, the extent of the superficies of the vessels which
were to carry them. This was the third indecorous attempt against what
were only reasonable and expected proceedings in the present session.
But their advantage was of no great duration; for the very next day, the
amendment was rejected on the report by a majority of ninety-five to
sixty-nine, in consequence, principally, of the private exertions of Mr.
Pitt. Of this bill, though it was renewed in other years besides the
present, I shall say no more in this _History_; because it has nothing
to do with the general question. Horrible as it yet left the situation
of the poor slaves in their transportation, (which the plate has most
abundantly shown,) it was the best bill which could be then obtained;
and it answered to a certain degree the benevolent wishes of the worthy
baronet who introduced it: for if we could conclude, that these voyages
were made more comfortable to the injured Africans, in proportion as
there was less mortality in them, he had undoubtedly the pleasure of
seeing the end, at least partially, obtained; though he must always have
felt a great drawback from it, by reflecting that the survivors, however
their sufferings might have been a little diminished, were reserved for
slavery.
The session was now near its close; and we had the sorrow to find,
though we had defeated our opponents in the three instances which have
been mentioned, that the tide ran decidedly against us, upon the general
question, in the House of Commons. The same statements which had struck
so many members with panic in the former sessions, such as that of
emancipation, of the ruin and massacre of the planters, and of
indemnification to the amount of seventy millions, had been
industriously kept up, and this by a personal canvass among them. But
this hostile disposition was still unfortunately increased by
considerations of another sort. For the witnesses of our opponents had
taken their ground first. No less than eleven of them had been examined
in the last sessions. In the present, two-thirds of the time had been
occupied by others on the same side. Hence the impression upon this
ground also was against us; and we had yet had no adequate opportunity
of doing it away. A clamour was also raised, where we thought it least
likely to have originated. They (the planters), it was said, had
produced persons in elevated life, and of the highest character, as
witnesses; whereas we had been obliged to take up with those of the
lowest condition. This idea was circulated directly after the
introduction of Isaac Parker, before mentioned, a simple mariner, and
who was now contrasted with the admirals on the other side of the
question. This outcry was not only ungenerous, but unconstitutional. It
is the glory of the English law, that it has no scale of veracity which
it adapts to persons, according to the station which they may be found
to occupy in life. In our courts of law, the poor are heard as well as
the rich; and if their reputation be fair, and they stand proof against
the cross-examinations they undergo, both the judge and the jury must
determine the matter in dispute by their evidence. But the House of
Commons was now called upon by our opponents, to adopt the preposterous
maxim of attaching falsehood to poverty, or of weighing truth by the
standard of rank and riches.
But though we felt a considerable degree of pain in finding this adverse
disposition among so many members of the Lower House, it was some
consolation to us to know that our cause had not suffered with their
constituents,--the people. These were still warmly with us. Indeed,
their hatred of the trade had greatly increased. Many circumstances had
occurred in this year to promote it. The committee, during my absence in
France, had circulated the plate of the slave-ship throughout all
England. No one saw it but he was impressed. It spoke to him in a
language which was at once intelligible and irresistible. It brought
forth the tear of sympathy in behalf of the sufferers, and it fixed
their sufferings in his heart. The committee, too, had been particularly
vigilant during the whole of the year with respect to the public papers.
They had suffered no statement in behalf of those interested in the
continuance of the trade to go unanswered. Dr. Dickson, the author of
the _Letters on Slavery_, before mentioned, had come forward again with
his services on this occasion; and, by his active co-operation with a
sub-committee appointed for the purpose, the coast was so well cleared
of our opponents, that, though they were seen the next year again,
through the medium of the same papers, they appeared only in sudden
incursions, as it were, during which they darted a few weapons at us;
but they never afterward ventured upon the plain to dispute the matter,
inch by inch, or point by point, in an open and manly manner.
But other circumstances occurred to keep up a hatred of the trade among
the people in this interval, which, trivial as they were, ought not to
be forgotten. The amiable poet Cowper had frequently made the Slave
Trade the subject of his contemplation. He had already severely
condemned it in his valuable poem _The Task_. But now he had written
three little fugitive pieces upon it. Of these, the most impressive was
that which he called _The Negro's Complaint_, and of which the following
is a copy:--
Forced from home and all its pleasures,
Afric's coast I left forlorn,
To increase a stranger's treasures,
O'er the raging billows borne;
Men from England bought and sold me,
Paid my price in paltry gold;
But, though theirs they have enroll'd me,
Minds are never to be sold.
Still in thought as free as ever,
What are England's rights, I ask,
Me from my delights to sever,
Me to torture, me to task?
Fleecy locks and black complexion
Cannot forfeit Nature's claim;
Skins may differ, but affection
Dwells in black and white the same.
Why did all-creating Nature
Make the plant, for which we toil?
Sighs must fan it, tears must water,
Sweat of ours must dress the soil.
Think, ye masters, iron-hearted,
Lolling at your jovial boards,
Think, how many backs have smarted
For the sweets your cane affords.
Is there, as you sometimes tell us,
Is there one, who rules on high;
Has he bid you buy and sell us,
Speaking from his throne, the sky?
Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
Fetters, blood-extorting screws,
Are the means, which duty urges
Agents of his will to use?
Hark! he answers. Wild tornadoes,
Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,
Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,
Are the voice with which he speaks.
He, foreseeing what vexations
Afric's sons should undergo,
Fixed their tyrants' habitations
Where his whirlwinds answer--No.
By our blood in Afric wasted,
Ere our necks received the chain;
By the miseries, which we tasted
Crossing, in your barks, the main;
By our sufferings, since you brought us
To the man-degrading mart,
All-sustained by patience, taught us
Only by a broken heart:
Deem our nation brutes no longer,
Till some reason you shall find
Worthier of regard, and stronger,
Than the colour of our kind.
Slaves of gold! whose sordid dealings
Tarnish all, your boasted powers,
Prove that you have human feelings,
Ere you proudly question ours.
This little piece Cowper presented in manuscript to some of his friends
in London; and these, conceiving it to contain a powerful appeal in
behalf of the injured Africans, joined in printing it. Having ordered it
on the finest hot-pressed paper, and folded it up in a small and neat
form, they gave it the printed title of _A Subject for Conversation at
the Tea-table_. After this, they sent many thousand copies of it in
franks into the country. From one it spread to another, till it
travelled almost over the whole island. Falling at length into the hands
of the musician, it was set to music; and it then found its way into the
streets, both of the metropolis and of the country, where it was sung as
a ballad; and where it gave a plain account of the subject, with an
appropriate feeling, to those who heard it.
Nor was the philanthropy of the late Mr. Wedgewood less instrumental in
turning the popular feeling in our favour. He made his own manufactory
contribute to this end. He took the seal of the committee, as exhibited
in Chap. XX., for his model; and he produced a beautiful cameo, of a
less size, of which the ground was a most delicate white, but the Negro,
who was seen imploring compassion in the middle of it, was in his own
native colour. Mr. Wedgewood made a liberal donation of these, when
finished, among his friends. I received from him no less than five
hundred of them myself. They, to whom they were sent, did not lay them
up in their cabinets, but gave them away likewise. They were soon, like
_The Negro's Complaint_, in different parts of the kingdom. Some had
them inlaid in gold on the lid of their snuff-boxes. Of the ladies,
several wore them in bracelets, and others had them fitted up in an
ornamental manner as pins for their hair. At length the taste for
wearing them became general; and thus fashion, which usually confines
itself to worthless things, was seen for once in the honourable office
of promoting the cause of justice, humanity, and freedom.
I shall now only state that the committee took as members within its own
body, in the period of time which is included in this chapter, the
Reverend Mr. Ormerod, chaplain to the Bishop of London, and Captain
James Bowen, of the royal navy; that they elected the Honourable
Nathaniel Curzon (afterwards Lord Scarsdale), Dr. Frossard, of Lyons,
and Benjamin Garlike, Esq., then secretary to the English embassy at the
Hague, honorary and corresponding members; and that they concluded their
annual labours with a suitable report, in which they noticed the
extraordinary efforts of our opponents to injure our cause in the
following manner:--"In the progress of this business, a powerful
combination of interest has been excited against us. The African trader,
the planter, and the West India merchant, have united their forces to
defend the fortress, in which their supposed treasures lie. Vague
calculations and false alarms have been thrown out to the public, in
order to show that the constitution, and even the existence, of this
free and opulent nation depend on its depriving the inhabitants of a
foreign country of those rights and of that liberty which we ourselves
so highly and so justly prize. Surely, in the nature of things, and in
the order of Providence, it cannot be so. England existed as a great
nation long before the African commerce was known amongst us, and it is
not to acts of injustice and violence that she owes her present rank in
the scale of nations."
CHAPTER XXVI.
[Sidenote:--Continuation from July, 1790, to July, 1791.--Author travels
again throughout the kingdom; object of his journey.--Motion in the
House of Commons to resume the hearing of evidence in favour of the
abolition; list of all those examined on this side of the question;
machinations of interested persons, and cruel circumstances of the times
previously to the day of decision.--Motion at length made for stopping
all further importation of Slaves from Africa; debates upon it; motion
lost.--Resolutions of the committee for the Abolition of the Slave
Trade.--Establishment of the Sierra Leone Company.]
It was a matter of deep affliction to us to think, that the crimes and
sufferings inseparable from the Slave Trade were to be continued to
another year. And yet it was our duty, in the present moment, to
acquiesce in the postponement of the question. This postponement was not
now for the purpose of delay, but of securing victory. The evidence, on
the side of the abolition, was, at the end of the last session, but half
finished. It was impossible, for the sake of Africa, that we could have
then closed it. No other opportunity might offer in parliament for
establishing an indelible record in her favour, if we were to neglect
the present. It was our duty, therefore, even to wait to complete it,
and to procure such a body of evidence, as should not only bear us out
in the approaching contest, but such as, if we were to fail, would bear
out our successors also. It was possible, indeed, if the inhabitants of
our islands were to improve in civilization, that the poor slaves might
experience gradually an improved treatment with it; and so far testimony
now might not be testimony for ever; but it was utterly impossible,
while the Slave Trade lasted, and the human passion continued to be the
same, that there should be any change for the better in Africa; or that
any modes, less barbarous, should come into use for procuring slaves.
Evidence, therefore, if once collected on this subject, would be
evidence for posterity. In the midst of these thoughts another journey
occurred to me as necessary for this purpose; and I prayed, that I might
have strength to perform it in the most effectual manner; and that I
might be daily impressed, as I travelled along, with the stimulating
thought, that the last hope for millions might possibly rest upon my own
endeavours.