With pirate ships they infested the seas, and spread their ravages
along the coasts of Spain and Italy, until Charles the Fifth was
aroused to undertake their overthrow. The various strength of his broad
dominions was rallied in this new crusade. "If the enthusiasm," says
Sismondi, "which had armed the Christians in the old Crusades was
nearly extinct, a new sentiment, more rational and legitimate, united
the vows of Europe with the efforts of Charles against the infidels.
The object was no longer to reconquer the tomb of Christ, but to
defend the civilization, the liberty, the lives of Christians."[32]
A stanch body of infantry from Germany, veterans of Spain and Italy,
the flower of the Spanish nobility, knights of Malta, with a fleet of
near five hundred vessels, contributed by Italy, Portugal, and even
distant Holland, commanded by Andrew Doria, the great sea-officer of
the age,--the whole under the immediate eye of the Emperor himself,
with the countenance and benediction of the Pope, and composing one of
the most complete armaments which the world had hitherto seen,--were
directed upon Tunis. Barbarossa opposed them bravely, but with unequal
forces. While slowly yielding to attack from without, his defeat
was hastened by unexpected uprising within. Confined in the citadel
were many Christian slaves, who, asserting the rights of freedom,
obtained a bloody emancipation, and turned its artillery against their
former masters. The place yielded to the Emperor, whose soldiers
soon surrendered to the inhuman excesses of war. The blood of thirty
thousand innocent inhabitants reddened his victory. Amidst these scenes
of horror there was but one spectacle that afforded any satisfaction to
the imperial conqueror. It was that of ten thousand Christian slaves
rejoicing in emancipation, who met him as he entered the town, and,
falling on their knees, thanked him as their deliverer.[33]
[32] Histoire des Français, Tom. XVII. pp. 101, 102.
[33] Robertson, History of Charles the Fifth, Book V.
In the treaty of peace which ensued, it was expressly stipulated on the
part of Tunis, that all Christian slaves, of whatever nation, should
be set at liberty without ransom, and that no subject of the Emperor
should for the future be detained in slavery.[34]
[34] Robertson, History of Charles the Fifth. Book V.
The apparent generosity of this undertaking, the magnificence with
which it was conducted, and the success with which it was crowned
drew to the Emperor the homage of his age beyond any other event of
his reign. Twenty thousand slaves freed by treaty or by arms diffused
through Europe the praise of his name. It is probable that in this
expedition the Emperor was governed by motives little higher than
vulgar ambition and fame; but the results by which it was emblazoned,
in the emancipation of so many fellow-Christians from cruel chains,
place him, with Cardinal Ximenes, among the earliest Abolitionists of
modern times.
This was in 1535. Only a few short years before, in 1517, he conceded
to a Flemish courtier the exclusive privilege of importing into the
West Indies four thousand blacks from Africa. It is said that Charles
lived long enough to repent what he had thus inconsiderately done.[35]
Certain it is, no single concession of king or emperor recorded in
history has produced such disastrous far-reaching consequences. The
Fleming sold his monopoly to a company of Genoese merchants, who
organized a systematic traffic in slaves between Africa and America.
Thus, while levying a mighty force to check the piracies of Barbarossa,
and to procure the abolition of Christian slavery in Tunis, the
Emperor, with criminal inconsistency, laid the corner-stone of a new
slavery, in comparison with which the enormity he warred against was
trivial and fugitive.
[35] Clarkson, History of the Abolition of the Slave-Trade, Vol. I.
p. 33.
Elated by the conquest of Tunis, filled also with the ambition of
subduing all the Barbary States, and of extirpating Christian slavery,
the Emperor in 1541 directed an expedition of singular grandeur against
Algiers. The Pope tardily joined his influence to the martial array.
But Nature proved stronger than Pope and Emperor. Within sight of
Algiers a sudden storm shattered his proud fleet, and he was driven
back to Spain, discomfited, with none of those trophies of emancipation
with which his former expedition was crowned.[36]
[36] Robertson's Charles the Fifth, Book VI. A lamentable and
piteous Treatise, verye necessarye for euerie Christen Manne to
reade, wherin is contayned, not onely the high Entreprise and
Valeauntnes of Themperour Charles the v. and his Army (in his
Voyage made to the Towne of Argier in Affrique, etc.) Truly and
dylygently translated out of Latyn into Frenche, and out of Frenche
into English, 1542: Harleian Miscellany, Vol. IV. p. 504.
The power of the Barbary States was now at its height. Their corsairs
became the scourge of Christendom, while their much dreaded system of
slavery assumed a front of new terror. Their ravages were not confined
to the Mediterranean. They entered the ocean, and penetrated even to
the Straits of Dover and St. George's Channel. From the chalky cliffs
of England, and from the remote western coasts of Ireland, unsuspecting
inhabitants were swept into cruel captivity.[37] The English government
was aroused against these atrocities. In 1620, a fleet of eighteen
ships, under the command of Sir Robert Mansel, Vice-Admiral, was
despatched to punish Algiers. It returned without being able, in the
language of the times, to "destroy those hellish pirates," though it
obtained the liberation of "some forty poore captives, which they
pretended was all they had in the towne." Purchas records, that the
English fleet was indebted for information to "a Christian captive,
which did swimme from the towne to the ships."[38] Not in this respect
only does this expedition recall that of Charles the Fifth, which
received important assistance from rebel slaves; we observe also a
similar inconsistency in the government which directed it. It was in
the year 1620,--dear to all the descendants of the Pilgrims of Plymouth
Rock as an epoch of freedom,--while an English fleet was seeking the
emancipation of Englishmen held in bondage by Algiers, that African
slaves were first introduced into the English colonies of North
America,[39] thus beginning that dreadful system whose long catalogue
of humiliation and woes is not yet complete.
[37] Guizot, Histoire de la Révolution d'Angleterre, Liv. II. Tom.
I. p. 78. Strafford's Letters and Dispatches, Vol. I. p. 68. Sir
George Radcliffe, the friend and biographer of the Earl, boasts
that the latter "secured the seas from piracies, so as only one
ship was lost at his first coming [as Lord Lieutenant to Ireland],
and no more all his time; whereas every year before, not only
several ships and goods were lost by robbery at sea, but also
Turkish men-of-war usually landed and _took prey of men to be made
slaves_."--Ibid., Vol. II. p. 434.
[38] Purchas's Pilgrims, Vol. II. pp. 881-886. Southey, Naval
History of England, Vol. V. pp. 60-63. There was a publication
specially relating to this expedition, entitled "Algiers Voyage, in
a Journall, or briefe Reportary of all Occurrents hapning in the
Fleet of Ships sent out by the Kinge his most excellent Majestie,
as well against the Pirates of Algiers as others," London, 1621,
4to.
[39] Bancroft, History of the United States, Vol. I. p. 189.
The expedition against Algiers was followed, in 1637, by another
against Sallee, in Morocco. Terrified by its approach, the Moors
desperately transferred a thousand captives, British subjects, to
Tunis and Algiers. "Some Christians that were slaves ashore, who
stole away out of the town and came swimming aboard," together with
intestine feud, aided the fleet, and the cause of emancipation speedily
triumphed.[40] Two hundred and ninety Britons were released, and a
promise was extorted from the enemy to redeem the wretched captives
sold away to Tunis and Algiers. Shortly afterwards an ambassador from
the King of Morocco visited England, and on his way through the streets
of London to his audience at court was attended by "four Barbary horses
led along in rich caparisons, and richer saddles, with bridles set with
stones; also some hawks; _many of the captives whom he brought over
going along afoot clad in white_."[41] Every emancipated slave was a
grateful witness to English prowess.
[40] Journal of the Sallee Fleet: Osborne's Voyages, Vol. II. p.
493. See also Mrs. Macaulay's History of England, Chap. IV. Vol.
II. p. 219.
[41] Strafford's Letters and Despatches, Vol. II. pp. 86, 116, 129.
The importance attached to this achievement is inferred from the
singular joy with which it was hailed in England. Though on a
limited scale, it was nothing less than _a war of liberation_. Poet,
ecclesiastic, and statesman now joined in congratulation. It inspired
the Muse of Waller to a poem called "The Taking of Sallee," where the
submission of the slaveholder is thus described:--
"Hither he sends the chief among his peers,
Who in his bark proportioned presents bears
To the renowned for piety and force,
_Poor captives manumised_, and matchless horse."
It gladdened Laud, and lighted with exultation the dark mind of
Strafford. "For Sallee, the town is taken," said the Archbishop in a
letter to the Earl, then in Ireland, "and all the captives at Sallee
and Morocco delivered,--_as many, our merchants say, as, according to
the price_ _of the market, come to ten thousand pounds at least_."[42]
Strafford saw in the popularity of this triumph fresh opportunity to
commend the tyrannical designs of Charles the First. "This action of
Sallee," he wrote in reply to the Archbishop, "I assure you, is full of
honor, will bring great content to the subject, and should, methinks,
_help much towards the ready, cheerful payment of the shipping
moneys_."[43] Thus was this act of emancipation linked with one of the
most memorable events of English history.
[42] Strafford's Letters and Despatches, Vol. II. p. 131.
[43] Ibid., p. 138.
The coasts of England were now protected; but her subjects at sea
continued the prey of Algerine corsairs, who, according to the
historian Carte, now "carried their English captives to France,
_drove them in chains overland to Marseille, to ship them thence with
greater safety for slaves to Algiers_."[44] The increasing troubles
which distracted the reign of Charles the First, and finally brought
his head to the block, could not divert attention from the sorrows of
Englishmen, victims to Mahometan slave-drivers. At the height of the
struggle between King and Parliament, an earnest voice was raised in
behalf of these fellow-Christians in bonds. Edmund Waller, who was
orator as well as poet, speaking in Parliament in 1641, said, "By the
many petitions which we receive from the wives of those miserable
captives at Algiers (being between four or five thousand of our
countrymen) it does too evidently appear that to make us slaves at home
is not the way to keep us from being made slaves abroad."[45]
[44] History of England, Book XXII. Vol. IV. p. 231.
[45] Works, p. 270.
Publications pleading their cause are yet extant, bearing date 1637,
1640, 1642, and 1647.[46] The overthrow of an oppression so justly
odious formed a worthy object for the imperial energies of Cromwell;
and in 1655, when, amidst the amazement of Europe, the English
sovereignty settled upon his Atlantean shoulders, he directed into the
Mediterranean a navy of thirty ships, under the command of Admiral
Blake. This was the most powerful English force which had sailed into
that sea since the Crusades.[47] Its success was complete. "General
Blak," said one of the foreign agents of Government, "has ratifyed
the articles of peace at Argier, and included therein Scotch, Irish,
Jarnsey and Garnsey-men, and all others the Protector's subjects.
He has lykewys redeemed from thence al such as wer captives ther.
_Several Duch captives swam aboard the fleet, and so escape theyr
captivity._"[48] Tunis, as well as Algiers, was humbled; all British
captives were set at liberty; and the Protector, in his remarkable
speech at the opening of Parliament, announced peace with the
"profane" nations in that region.[49] To my mind no single circumstance
gives higher impression of that vigilance with which the Protector
guarded his subjects than this effort, to which may be applied the
"smooth" line of Waller,--
"telling dreadful news
To all that piracy and rapine use."[50]
[46] Compassion towards Captives: urged and pressed in Three
Sermons on Heb. xiii. 3, by Charles Fitz-Geffry, Oxford, 1637.
Libertas, or Reliefe to the English Captives in Algier, by Henry
Robinson, London, 1642. Letters relating to the Redemption of
the Captives in Argier and Tunis, by Edmond Cason, London, 1647.
A Relation of Seven Years Slavery under the Turks of Algier,
suffered by an English Captive Merchant, etc., together with a
Description of the Sufferings of the Miserable Captives under that
Merciless Tyranny, etc., by Francis Knight, London, 1640. The last
publication is preserved in the Collection of Voyages and Travels
by Osborne, Vol. II. pp. 465-489.
[47] Hume says, "No English fleet, except during the Crusades, _had
ever before sailed in those seas_." (History of England, Chap. LXI.
Vol. VII. p. 529.) He forgot the expedition of Sir Robert Mansel,
already mentioned (_ante_, p. 408), which was elaborately debated
in the Privy Council as early as 1617, three years before it was
finally undertaken, and was the subject of a special work. See
Southey's Naval History of England, Vol. V. pp. 149-157.
[48] Thurloe's State Papers, Vol. III. p. 527.
[49] Carlyle's Letters and Speeches of Cromwell, Part IX. Speech V.
Vol. II. p. 235.
[50] Panegyric to my Lord Protector, st. 9.
His vigorous sway was succeeded by the voluptuous tyranny of Charles
the Second, inaugurated by an unsuccessful expedition against Algiers
under Lord Sandwich. This was soon followed by another, with more
favorable result, under Admiral Lawson.[51] Then came a treaty, bearing
date May 3, 1662, by which the piratical government stipulated, "that
all subjects of the king of Great Britain, now slaves in Algiers, or
any of the territories thereof, shall be set at liberty, and released,
upon paying the price they were first sold for in the market; and for
the time to come no subjects of His Majesty shall be bought or sold, or
made slaves of, in Algiers or its territories."[52] This seems to have
been short-lived. Other expeditions ensued, and other treaties in 1664,
1672, 1682, and 1686,--showing, by their constant iteration, the little
impression produced upon these barbarians.[53] Insensible to justice
and freedom, how could they be faithful to stipulations in restraint of
robbery and slaveholding?
[51] Rapin, History of England, Book XXIII. Vol. II. pp. 858, 864.
[52] Recueil des Traitez de Paix, Tom. IV. p. 43.
[53] Ibid., pp. 307, 476, 703, 756.
Legislation turned aside in behalf of these captives. The famous
statute of the forty-third year of Queen Elizabeth for charitable
uses designates among proper objects the "relief or redemption of
prisoners or captives," meaning especially, according to recent
judicial decision, those suffering in the Barbary States. A bequest by
Lady Mico, in 1670, "to redeem poor slaves in what manner the executors
should think convenient," came under review as late as 1835, when
slavery in the Barbary States was already dead, and the British Act
of Emancipation had commenced its operation in the West Indies; but
the court sanctioned the application of the fund to the education of
the Africans whose freedom was then beginning.[54] Thus was a charity
originally inspired by sympathy for white slaves applied to the benefit
of black.
[54] Attorney-General _v._ Gibson, 2 Beav. R. 317, note.
During a long succession of years, complaints of English captives
continued. In 1748 an indignant soul found expression in these words:--
"O, how can Britain's sons regardless hear
The prayers, sighs, groans (immortal infamy!)
Of fellow-Britons, with oppression sunk,
In bitterness of soul demanding aid,
Calling on Britain, their dear native land,
The land of liberty?"[55]
But during all this time the slavery of blacks, transported to the
colonies under British colors, continued also!
Meanwhile France plied Algiers with embassies and bombardments. In 1635
three hundred and forty-seven Frenchmen were captives there. M. de
Samson was dispatched on an unsuccessful mission for their liberation.
They were offered to him "for the price they were sold for in the
market"; but this he refused to pay.[56]
[55] The Gentleman's Magazine, Vol. XVIII. p. 531.
[56] Relation of Seven Years Slavery under the Turks of Algier:
Osborne's Voyages, Vol. II. p. 468.
Two years later, M. de Manti, who was called "that noble captain, and
glory of the French nation," was sent "with fifteen of his king's
ships, and a commission to enfranchise the French slaves." He also
returned, leaving his countrymen still in captivity.[57] Treaties
followed, hastily concluded, and abruptly broken, till at last Louis
the Fourteenth, in the pride of power, did for France what Cromwell had
done for England. Algiers, twice bombarded[58] in 1683, sent deputies
to sue for peace, and to surrender all her Christian slaves. Tunis and
Tripoli made the same submission. Voltaire, with his accustomed point,
says that by this transaction the French became respected on the coast
of Africa, where they had before been known only as slaves.[59]
[57] Relation of Seven Years Slavery: Osborne's Voyages, Vol. II.
p. 470.
[58] In the melancholy history of war, this is remarked as the
earliest instance of _bombarding_ a town. Sismondi, who never
fails to regard the past in the light of humanity, remarks,
that "Louis the Fourteenth was the first to put in practice the
atrocious method, newly invented, of bombarding towns,--of burning
them, not to take them, but to destroy them,--_of attacking, not
fortifications, but private houses, not soldiers, but peaceable
inhabitants, women and children,--and of confounding thousands of
private crimes, each one of which would cause horror, in one great
public crime, one great disaster, which he regarded only as one of
the catastrophes of war_." (Histoire des Français, Tom. XXV. p.
452.) How much of this is justly applicable to the recent sacrifice
of women and children by forces of the United States at Vera Cruz!
Algiers was bombarded in the cause of _freedom_; Vera Cruz, to
extend _slavery_!
[59] Siècle de Louis XIV., Chap. XIV.
An unhappy incident is mentioned by the historian, which attests how
little the French at that time, even while engaged in securing the
redemption of their own countrymen, cared for the cause of general
freedom. An officer of the triumphant fleet, receiving the Christian
slaves surrendered to him, observed among them many English, who,
with national vainglory, maintained that they were set at liberty out
of regard to the king of England. At once the Frenchman summoned
the Algerines, and, returning the foolish captives into their hands,
said: "These people pretend that they have been delivered in the name
of their monarch. Mine does not take the liberty to offer them his
protection. I return them to you. It is for you to show what you owe
to the king of England."[60] The Englishmen were hurried again to
prolonged slavery. The power of Charles the Second was impotent in
their behalf, as was the sense of justice and humanity in the French
officer or the Algerine slave-masters.
[60] Voltaire, Siècle de Louis XIV., Chap. XIV.
I cannot pause to develop the course of other efforts by France; nor
can I dwell upon the determined conduct of Holland, one of whose
greatest naval commanders, Admiral de Ruyter, in 1661, enforced at
Algiers the emancipation of several hundred Christian slaves.[61] The
inconsistency which we have before remarked appears also in these two
powers. Both, while using their best endeavors for the freedom of their
white people, were cruelly engaged selling blacks into distant American
slavery,--as if every word of reprobation fastened upon the piratical,
slave-driving Algerines did not return in eternal judgment against
themselves.
[61] Gentleman's Magazine, Vol. XVIII. p. 441.