_Mr. Wilberforce_,
ON
The Abolition of the Slave Trade.
A LETTER
ON
THE ABOLITION
OF THE
SLAVE TRADE;
ADDRESSED TO THE
FREEHOLDERS AND OTHER INHABITANTS
OF
YORKSHIRE.
BY W. WILBERFORCE, ESQ.
“There is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision,
Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but CHRIST is all, and in all.
Put on therefore bowels of mercies, kindness,” &c.—COL. iii. 11. 12.
“GOD hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all
the face of the earth.”—ACTS xvii. 26.
LONDON:
_Printed by Luke Hansard & Sons_,
FOR T. CADELL AND W. DAVIES, STRAND; _And_,
J. HATCHARD, PICCADILLY.
1807.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS.
Page
INTRODUCTION 1
Sources of Information 11
Methods by which the Slaves are supplied in Africa 18
Slave Trade’s Effects in the Interior and on the Coast 30
Proof of Abolitionists’ Facts decisive, and contrary
Allegations groundless 47
Pleas against Abolition, that Negroes are an inferior Race 53–4
Opponents’ description of Negro Character contrasted with
other Accounts 57
Argument from Africa’s never having been civilized,
considered 71
New Phœnomenon—Interior of Africa more civilized than Coast 86
Plea of Opponents, that Slaves State in Africa extremely
miserable 89
Plea from Cruelty of African Despots 92
Ditto, that refused Slaves would be massacred in case of
Abolition 95
Middle Passage 96
Opponents’ grand Objection—that Stock of Slaves cannot be
kept up in West Indies without Importations 103
Presumptive Arguments against the above Allegation, from
universal Experience 104
Positive Proof that the Stock of Slaves might be kept up
without Importations—Argument stated 109
I.—Abuses sufficient to account for great Decrease.
The Increase a subordinate Object of Attention 116
Insufficient Feeding 119
Defective Clothing and Lodging, and overworking 122
Moral Vices of the System 123
Especially Degradation of the Negro Race, and its important
Effects 127
Proofs of Degradation—a Negroe-Sale 133
Sale of Negroes for Owners Debts 136
Working under the Whip 140
Cruel and indecent Public Punishments 144
Inadequate legal Protection 147
Ditto, considered in its Effect of degrading, and late
Barbadoes Incidents 153
Three other Vices of the System—Absenteeship 177
Pressure of the Times 186
West Indian Speculations 190
Admirals and Governors contrary Evidence and Remarks 192
Decisive Proof that Slaves’ State is miserable 205
II.—Yet, though Abuses so great, the Decrease quite
inconsiderable 211
III.—Hence, Abuses being corrected, Slaves would rapidly
increase 215
West Indians most plausible Objections, and remaining Pleas
against Abolition 216
Grand Plea, that Co-operation of Colonial Legislatures
necessary 219
Disproved, both by Reason 222
And Experience 225
Mr. Burke’s supposed Plan 238
Efficacy and beneficial Consequences of Abolition 241
Immediate, preferable to gradual, Abolition 254
Abolitionists vindicated for not emancipating 256
Abolition’s Effects on Commerce and Manufactures 261
Present West Indian System ruinous 266
West Indian Opposition to Abolition accounted for, 274
Strong Party Spirit Proofs 282
No Hopes of West Indian Opposition ceasing 288
Appeal to gradual Abolitionists 288
Objection to Abolition on the ground of Slave Trade’s
Effects on our Marine 302
Objection, that Foreign Nations would carry on Slave Trade
if we relinquished it 305
Objection to Abolition on grounds of Justice 312
Objection on grounds of Religion 318
Abolitionists’ further Plea against Slave
Trade—Insurrection, extreme danger of 321
Our Population drained to defend the West Indies 330
Summary View of the Miseries produced by the Slave Trade 333
Instance of Individual Misery 340
Conclusion 345
APPENDIX.—A few Specimens in Proof of Effects of the Slave
Trade in Africa, and of the natural Dispositions and
Commercial Aptitudes 353 to 394
English Slave Trade as carried on so late as Henry 2d’s Time.
INTRODUCTION.
For many years I have ardently wished that it had been possible for me
to plead, in your presence, the great cause of the Abolition of the
Slave Trade. Conscious that I was accountable to you for the discharge
of the important trust which your kindness had committed to me, I have
longed for such an opportunity of convincing you, that it was not
without reason that this question had occupied so large a share of my
parliamentary life. I wished you to know, that the cause of my complaint
was no minute grievance, which, from my eyes having been continually
fixed on it, had swelled by degrees into a false shew of magnitude; no
ordinary question, on which my mind, warming in the pursuit of its
object, and animated by repeated contentions, had at length felt
emotions altogether disproportionate to their subject. Had I however
erred, unintentionally, I have too long experienced your candour not to
have hoped for your ready forgiveness. On the contrary, if the Slave
Trade be indeed the foulest blot that ever stained our National
character, you will not deem your Representative to have been unworthily
employed, in having been among the foremost in wiping it away.
Besides the desire of justifying myself in the judgment of my
Constituents, various other motives prompt me to the present address.
Fourteen long years have now elapsed since the period when the question
was fully argued in Parliament; and the large share of national
attention which it then engaged, has since been occupied successively by
the various public topics of the day. During the intervening period,
also, such strange and interesting spectacles have been exhibited at our
very doors, as to banish from the minds of most men all recollection of
distant wrongs and sufferings. Thus it is not only by the ordinary
effects of the lapse of time, that the impression, first produced by
laying open the horrors of the Slave Trade, has been considerably
effaced, but by the prodigious events of that fearful interval.
It should also be remembered, that, within the last fourteen or fifteen
years, a great change has taken place in the component parts of
Parliament, especially in those of the House of Commons; not merely from
the ordinary causes, but also from the addition which has been made to
the National Legislature by our Union with Ireland. Hence it happens,
that, even in the Houses of Parliament themselves, though a distinct
impression of the general outlines of the subject may remain, many of
its particular features have faded from the recollection. For hence
alone surely it can happen, that assertions and arguments formerly
driven fairly out of the field, appear once more in array against us.
Old concessions are retracted; exploded errors are revived; and we find
we have the greater part of our work to do over again. But if in
Parliament, nay even in the House of Commons itself, where the subject
was once so well known in all its parts, the question is but imperfectly
understood, much more is it natural, that great misconceptions should
prevail respecting it in the minds of the people at large. Among them,
accordingly, great misapprehensions are very general. To myself, as well
as to other Abolitionists, opinions are often imputed which we never
held, declarations which we never made, designs which we never
entertained. These I desire to rectify; and now that the question is
once more about to come under the consideration of the legislature, it
may not be useless thus publicly to record the facts and principles on
which the Abolitionists rest their cause, and for which, in the face of
my country, I am willing to stand responsible.
But farther I hesitate not to avow to you; on the contrary, it would be
criminal to withhold the declaration, that of all the motives by which I
am prompted to address you, that which operates on me with the greatest
force, is, the consideration of the present state and prospects of our
country, and of the duty which at so critical a moment presses
imperiously on every member of the community, to exert his utmost powers
in the public cause.
That the Almighty Creator of the universe governs the world which he has
made; that the sufferings of nations are to be regarded as the
punishment of national crimes; and their decline and fall, as the
execution of His sentence; are truths which I trust are still generally
believed among us. Indeed to deny them, would be directly to contradict
the express and repeated declarations of the Holy Scriptures. If these
truths be admitted, and if it be also true, that fraud, oppression, and
cruelty, are crimes of the blackest dye, and that guilt is aggravated in
proportion as the criminal acts in defiance of clearer light, and of
stronger motives to virtue (and these are positions to which we cannot
refuse our assent, without rejecting the authority not only of revealed,
but even of natural religion); have we not abundant cause for serious
apprehension? The course of public events has, for many years, been such
as human wisdom and human force have in vain endeavoured to controul or
resist. The counsels of the wise have been infatuated; the valour of the
brave has been turned to cowardice. Though the storm has been raging for
many years, yet, instead of having ceased, it appears to be now
increasing in fury; the clouds which have long been gathering around us,
have at length almost overspread the whole face of the heavens with
blackness. In this very moment of unexampled difficulty and danger,
those great political Characters, to the counsels of the one or the
other of whom the nation has been used to look in all public exigencies,
have both been taken from us. If such be our condition; and if the Slave
Trade be a national crime, declared by every wise and respectable man of
all parties, without exception, to be a compound of the grossest
wickedness and cruelty, a crime to which we cling in defiance of the
clearest light, not only in opposition to our own acknowledgments of its
guilt, but even of our own declared resolutions to abandon it; is not
this then a time in which all who are not perfectly sure that the
Providence of God is but a fable, should be strenuous in their
endeavours to lighten the vessel of the state, of such a load of guilt
and infamy?
Urged by these various considerations, I proceed to lay before you a
summary of the principal facts and arguments on which the Abolitionists
ground their cause, referring such as may be desirous of more complete
information to various original records,[1] and for a more detailed
exposition of the reasonings of the two parties, to the printed Report
of the Debates in Parliament,[2] and to various excellent publications
which have from time to time been sent into the world.[3] The advocates
for abolition court inquiry, and are solicitous that their facts should
be thoroughly canvassed, and their arguments maturely weighed.
I fear I may have occasion to request your accustomed candour, not to
call it partiality, for submitting to you a more defective statement
than you might reasonably require from me. But when I inform you that I
had just entered on my present task when I was surprized by the
dissolution of Parliament, I need scarcely add, that I have been of
necessity compelled to employ in a very different manner the time which
was to have been allotted to this service. Under my present
circumstances, I had almost resolved to delay addressing you till I
could look forward to a longer interval of leisure, than the speedily
approaching meeting of Parliament will now allow me; but I hope that
this address, though it may be defective, will not be erroneous. It may
not contain all which I might otherwise lay before you; but what it does
contain will be found, I trust, correct; and if my address should bear
the marks of haste, I can truly assure you that the statements and
principles which I may hastily communicate to you, have been most
deliberately formed, and have been often reviewed with the most serious
attention. But I already foresee that my chief difficulty will consist
in comprising within any moderate limits, the statements which my
undertaking requires, and the arguments to be deduced from them; to
select from the immense mass of materials which lies before me, such
specimens of more ample details, as, without exhausting the patience of
my readers, may convey to their minds some faint ideas, faint indeed in
colouring but just in feature and expression, of the objects which it is
my office to delineate. If my readers should at any time begin to think
me prolix, let them but call to mind the almost unspeakable amount of
the interests which are in question, and they will more readily bear
with me.
[Sidenote: Probable Effects of the Slave Trade.]
It might almost preclude the necessity of inquiring into the actual
effects of the Slave Trade, to consider, arguing from the acknowledged
and never failing operation of certain given causes, what must
necessarily be its consequences. How surely does a demand for any
commodities produce a supply. How certainly should we anticipate the
multiplication of thefts, from any increase in number of the receivers
of stolen goods. In the present instance, the demand is for men, women,
and children. And, can we doubt that illicit methods will be resorted to
for supplying them? especially in a country like Africa, imperfectly
civilized, and divided in general into petty communities? We might
almost anticipate with certainty, the specific modes by which the supply
of Slaves is in fact furnished, and foretell the sure effects on the
laws, usages, and state of society of the African continent. But any
doubts we might be willing to entertain on this head are but too
decisively removed, when we proceed in the next place to examine, what
are the actual means by which Slaves are commonly supplied, and what are
the Slave Trade’s known and ascertained consequences? To this part of my
subject I intreat peculiar attention; the rather, because I have often
found an idea to prevail; that it is the state of the Slaves in the West
Indies, the improvement of which is the great object of the
Abolitionists. On the contrary, from first to last, I desire it may be
borne in mind, that Africa is the _primary_ subject of our regard. It is
the effects of the Slave Trade on Africa, against which chiefly we raise
our voices, as constituting a sum of guilt and misery, hitherto
unequalled in the annals of the world.
[Sidenote: Evidence against the Slave Trade difficult to be procured.]
But, before I proceed to state the facts themselves, which are to be
laid before you, it may be useful to make a few remarks on the nature of
the evidence by which they are supported; and more especially on the
difficulties which it was reasonable to suppose would be experienced in
establishing, by positive proof, the existence of practices
discreditable to the Slave Trade, notwithstanding the great numbers of
British ships which for a very long period have annually visited Africa,
and the ample information which on the first view might therefore appear
to lie open to our inquiries.
Africa, it must be remembered, is a country which has been very little
visited from motives of curiosity. It has been frequented, almost
exclusively, by those who have had a direct interest in it’s peculiar
traffic; as, the agents and factors of the African Company, or of
individual Slave merchants, or by the Captains and Officers of slave
ships. The situation of captain of an African ship is an employment, the
unpleasant and even dangerous nature of which must be compensated by
extraordinary profits. The same remark extends in a degree to all the
other officers of slave ships; who, it should also be remarked, may
reasonably entertain hopes, if they recommend themselves to their
employers, of rising to be Captains. They all naturally look forward,
therefore, to the command of a ship, as the prize which is to repay them
for all their previous sacrifices and sufferings, and some even of the
Surgeons appear, in fact, to have been promoted to it. Could these men
be supposed likely to give evidence against the Slave Trade? nay, must
not habit, especially when thus combined with interest, be presumed to
have had it’s usual effect, in so familiarizing them to scenes of
injustice and cruelty, as to prevent their being regarded with any
proportion of that disgust and abhorrence which they would excite in any
mind not accustomed to them? In truth, were the secrets of the
prison-house ever so bad, these men could not well be expected to reveal
them. But let it also be remembered, that when the call for witnesses
was made by Parliament, the question of the Abolition of the Slave Trade
had become a party question; and that all the West Indian as well as the
African property and influence were combined together in it’s defence.
The supporters of the trade were the rich and the powerful, the men of
authority, influence and connection. They had ships and factories and
counting houses, both at home and abroad. Theirs it was, to employ
shopkeepers and artizans; theirs to give places of emolument, and the
means of rising in life. On the other hand, it was but too obvious (I am
sorry to say my own knowledge fully justifies the remark) that, in the
great towns especially, in which the African, or West Indian Trade, or
both, were principally carried on, any man who was not in an independent
situation, and who should come forward to give evidence against the
Slave Trade, would expose himself and his family to obloquy and
persecution, perhaps to utter ruin. He would become a marked man, and be
excluded from all opportunities of improving his condition, or even of
acquiring a maintenance among his own natural connections, and in his
accustomed mode of life. Any one who will duly weigh the combined effect
of all these circumstances, will rather be surprized to hear that any of
those who had been actually engaged in carrying on the Slave Trade, were
found to give evidence of it’s enormities, than that this description of
persons was not more numerous.
[Sidenote: Evidence actually obtained.]
For, notwithstanding all the obstacles to which I have been alluding,
much oral testimony of the most valuable kind was obtained from persons
who had been engaged in the actual conduct of the Slave Trade. And of by
far the greatest part of those witnesses it may be truly said, that the
more closely they were examined, and the more strongly their evidence
was illustrated by light from other quarters, the more was it’s truth
decisively established. So much I have thought it the more necessary to
observe; because insinuations, to use the softest term, have been not
seldom cast against some of the witnesses who gave evidence unfavourable
to the Slave Trade, before the House of Commons.—Happily, however, some
other sources of information were discovered; and the exact conformity
of the intelligence derived from these, with that which has been already
mentioned, gave to both indubitable confirmation. A very few men of
science were found, who from motives of liberal curiosity had visited
those parts of the coast of Africa where the Slave Trade was carried on.
Some few also of His Majesty’s naval and military officers, who, while
on service in Africa, had opportunities of obtaining useful information
concerning the Slave Trade, consented to be examined. They were indeed
little on shore, and they went to no great distance within the country;
but still the facts they stated, were of the utmost importance; the more
so, because of the credit which they reflect on the testimony of others,
who, on account of their inferior rank in life, might in the judgment of
some persons be more exceptionable witnesses.
[Sidenote: Other sources of information:—Old Authors.]
Lastly, there lay open to the Abolitionists another source of
information, to which great attention was due; the acknowledged
publications of several persons who at different periods had resided in
Africa, some of them for many years, and in high stations, in the employ
of the chief Slave trading Companies of the various European nations,
and whose accounts had been given to the world long before the Slave
Trade had become a subject of public discussion.
It might indeed be presumed, that though no attack had yet been made on
the Slave Trade, such persons would be disposed to regard it with a
partial and indulgent eye. To it they had owed their fortunes; and, even
independently of all pecuniary interest, no man likes to own that he is
engaged in a way of life which is hateful and dishonourable, Still, if
it be not the express purpose of a narrative to deceive, the truth is
apt to break out at intervals, and the Advocates for Abolition might
therefore expect to find some indirect proofs, some occasional and
incidental notices of the real nature and effects of the Slave Trade.
They were at least entitled to claim the full benefit of any facts to
the disparagement of the Slave Trade, which should be found in this
class of writings; and where these earlier publications, of writers so
naturally biassed in favour of the Slave Trade, should exactly accord,
in what they might state to it’s disparagement, with other living
witnesses, several of them, men most respectable in rank and character,
and utterly uninterested either way in the decision of the question
concerning it’s abolition; men too, whose testimony was the result of
their own personal knowledge; the facts which should be thus proved,
would be established by a force of evidence, little short of absolute
demonstration.
[Sidenote: Modern valuable information.]
Lastly, there are several other printed accounts of Travels in Africa,
which contain much valuable information. The authors of the publications
here referred to, having visited Africa of late years, can scarcely
indeed be said to be so unexceptionably free, as those who wrote before
the Slave Trade had become a subject of public discussion, from all
bias, either from their connections, their interest, or their
preconceived opinions. No imputation, however, is hereby intended to be
thrown out against them. With the character of one of them, Dr.
Winterbottom, I have long been well acquainted, and it is such as must
alone entitle him to the full credit which he has universally obtained.
But Mr. Parke justly stands at the head of all African travellers. There
prevails throughout his work a remarkable air of authenticity, and to
all the facts which it contains, entire credit is due. At the same time,
I have heard, from persons who saw his original minutes, that they
contained several statements favourable to the views of the
Abolitionists, which are not inserted in the publication. His work,
however, must ever be read with avidity, from its containing that which
perhaps of all human spectacles is the most interesting, the exhibition
of superior energies, called into action by extraordinary difficulties
and dangers. Other publications concerning Africa have since appeared.
That of Golberry, was drawn up and published under the patronage of
Bonaparte, about the very time when the latter entered on his crusade
against the Blacks in St. Domingo; the Abolitionists may therefore claim
the benefit of any facts to the discredit of the Slave Trade which it
contains. Barrow’s highly interesting account of the Cape of Good Hope,
and his late work, containing the account of the expedition to the
Booshuana country, reflect also much light on the African character, and
indirectly on the effects of the Slave Trade.
[Sidenote: Methods by which Slaves are supplied.]
[Sidenote: Wars.]
Let us now proceed to examine what are the principal sources from which
the Slave market is furnished with its supplies. The result of that
Inquiry will enable us to judge what effect that traffic produces on the
happiness of Africa. A very large proportion of the Slaves consists of
prisoners of war. But here it becomes advisable to rectify some
misconceptions, which have prevailed on this head. The Abolitionists
have been represented as maintaining, that in Africa, wars never arise
from the various causes whence wars have so commonly originated in the
other quarters of the globe; but that they are undertaken solely for the
purpose of obtaining captives, who may be afterwards sold for Slaves. In
contradiction to this position, various African wars have been cited,
which historians state to have arisen from other causes; and it has been
denied that wars furnish any considerable supply to the Slave market.
Can it be necessary to declare, that the advocates for abolition never
made so foolish, as well as so false an assertion, as that which has
been thus imputed to them? Africans are men—The same bad passions
therefore which have produced wars among other communities of human
beings, produce the same wasteful effects in Africa likewise. But it
will greatly elucidate this point to state, that, as we are informed by
Mr. Parke, who has travelled farther into the interior of Africa than
any modern traveller, there are two kinds of war in Africa. The one
bears a resemblance to our European contests, is openly avowed, and
previously declared. “This class however, we are assured, is generally
terminated in a single campaign. A battle is fought; the vanquished
seldom think of rallying; the whole inhabitants become panick struck;
and the conquerors have only to _bind their slaves_,[4] and carry off
their plunder and their victims.” These are taken into the country of
the invader, whence, as opportunities offer, they are sent to the Slave
market.
[Sidenote: Predatory expeditions.]
But the second kind of warfare, called Tegria, which means, we are told,
plundering or stealing, and which appears to be no other than the
practice of predatory expeditions, is that to which the Slave market is
indebted for its chief supplies, and which most clearly explains the
nature and effect of the Slave Trade. Mr. Parke indeed tells us, that
this species of warfare arises from a sort of hereditary feud, which
subsists between the inhabitants of neighbouring nations or districts.
If we take into the account that the avowed compiler of Mr. Parke’s
work, the patron to whose good will he looked for the recompense of all
his labours, was one of the warmest and most active opposers of the
abolition of the Slave Trade, we shall not wonder that the fact alone is
stated, without being traced to it’s original cause. This however is a
case, if such a case ever existed, in which the features of the
offspring might alone enable us to recognise the rightful parent. But in
truth we know from positive testimony, that though hereditary feuds of
the deadliest malignity are but too surely generated by these predatory
expeditions, and consequently that hatred and revenge may sometimes have
a share in producing a continued course of them, yet that, speaking
generally, the grand operating motive from which they are undertaken,
and to which therefore, as their primary cause, they may be referred, is
the desire of obtaining Slaves. “These predatory expeditions,” Mr. Parke
tells us, “are of all dimensions, from 500 horsemen, headed by the son
of the king of the country; to a single individual, armed with his bow
and arrow, who conceals himself among the bushes, until some young or
unarmed person passes by. He then, tyger-like, springs upon his prey,
drags his victim into the thicket, and at night _carries him off as a
slave_.” (Vide note, p. 19). “These incursions,” Mr. Parke goes on to
inform us, “are generally conducted with great secresy; a few resolute
individuals, led by some person of enterprize and courage, march quietly
through the woods, surprize in the night some unprotected village, and
_carry off the inhabitants_, (vide note, p. 19) and their effects,
before their neighbours can come to their assistance.”—“One morning,”
says Mr. Parke, “during my residence at Kamalia, we were all much
alarmed by a party of this kind. The prince of Focladoo’s son, with a
strong party of horse, passed secretly through the woods, a little to
the southward, and the next morning plundered three towns belonging to a
powerful chief of Jollonkadoo. The success of this expedition encouraged
the governor of another town to make a second inroad on a part of the
same country. Having assembled about 200 of his people, he passed the
river in the night, and _carried off a great number of prisoners_. (Vide
note, p. 19). _Several of the inhabitants_ who had escaped these
attacks, were _afterwards seized_ by the Mandingoes (_another people_,
let it be observed) as they wandered about in the woods, or concealed
themselves in the glens and strong places in the mountains.”
[Sidenote: Predatory expeditions very common.]
“These plundering excursions are very common, and the inhabitants of
different communities watch every opportunity of undertaking
them.”—“They always,” as Mr. Parke adds, “produce speedy retaliation;
and when large parties cannot be collected for this purpose, a few
friends will combine together, and advance into the enemy’s country,
with a view to plunder, _or carry off the inhabitants_.” (Note, vide,
pa. 19). Thus hereditary feuds are excited and perpetuated between
different nations, tribes, villages, and even families, each waiting but
for the favourable occasion of accomplishing it’s revenge. Such is the
picture of the Interior of Africa, as it is given by one who penetrated
much further inland than any other modern traveller, and of whom it must
be at least confessed, that he was not disposed to exaggerate the evils
produced by the Slave Trade.
[Sidenote: Sources of supply continued.]
[Sidenote: Village-breaking.]
In another part of the country, we learn from the most respectable
testimony, a practice prevails called Village-breaking. It is precisely
the Tegria of Mr. Parke, with this difference, that though often termed
making war, it is acknowledged to be practised for the express purpose
of obtaining victims for the Slave market. It is carried on, sometimes
by armed parties of individuals; sometimes by the soldiers of the petty
kings and chieftains, who, perhaps in a season of drunkenness, the
consequences of which when recovered from the madness of intoxication
they have themselves often most deeply deplored, are instigated to
become the plunderers and destroyers of those very subjects whom they
were bound to protect. The village is attacked in the night; if deemed
needful, to increase the confusion, it is set on fire, and the wretched
inhabitants, as they are flying naked from the flames, are seized and
carried into slavery. This practice, especially when conducted on a
smaller scale, is called _panyaring_; [Sidenote: Panyaring, or
kidnapping.] for the practice has long been too general not to have
created the necessity of an appropriate term. It is sometimes practised
by Europeans, especially when the ships are passing along the coast, or
when their boats, in going up the rivers, can seize their prey without
observation; in short, whenever there is a convenient opportunity of
carrying off the victims, and concealing the crime: and the
unwillingness which the natives universally shew to venture into a ship
of war, until they are convinced it is not a Slave ship, contrasted with
the freedom and confidence with which they then come on board, is thus
easily accounted for[5]. But these depredations are far more commonly
perpetrated by the natives on each other; and on a larger or a smaller
scale, according to the power and number of the assailants, and the
resort of ships to the coast, it prevails so generally, as, throughout
the whole extent of Africa, to render person and property utterly
insecure.
[Sidenote: Allegation, “that a small proportion of Slaves are prisoners
of war,” considered.]
And here, before we proceed to other sources of supply, let us for a
moment recur to the assertions formerly mentioned, on which our
opponents lay very considerable stress,—that but a small proportion of
the whole supply of the market consists of prisoners of war, and that
African wars do not often originate from the desire of obtaining Slaves.
Should we even concede these points, we are now abundantly qualified to
estimate the force of the concession; for though we should grant, that
declared and national wars are not often undertaken for the purpose of
obtaining Slaves, yet it is at least equally undeniable, that those
predatory expeditions which are so common, and of which it is the
express object to acquire Slaves, are often productive of national wars
on the largest scale, and of the most destructive consequences; while
they also are the sure and abundant cause of those incessant quarrels
and hereditary feuds, which are said to be universal in Africa, and
which acts of mutual outrage cannot fail to generate, in countries where
the artificial modes of controlling and terminating the disputes and
hostilities of adverse tribes and nations are unknown. It appears also,
that wars are in Africa rendered singularly cruel and wasteful, by the
peculiar manner in which they are carried on. So that though we cannot
fairly lay to the charge of the Slave Trade all the wars of Africa, we
yet may allege that to the causes which produce wars elsewhere, the
Slave Trade superadds one entirely new and constant source of great
copiousness and efficiency, while it gives to the wars, which arise from
every other cause, a character of peculiar malignity and desolation. But
happy even, from what has been already stated, happy would it be for
Africa, if her greatest miseries were those of avowed and open warfare.
War, though the greatest scourge of other countries, is a light evil in
the African estimate of suffering. Direct and avowed wars will happen
but occasionally, as the circumstances which produce them may arise.
Wars, besides, between uncivilized nations, scarcely ever last long;
those of Africa, Mr. Parke tells us, seldom beyond a single campaign;
and the very consciousness that an evil will be of short duration,
mitigates the pain which it occasions. But it is not of accidental or
temporary injuries that Africa complains. Her miseries, severe in
degree, are also permanent; they know neither intervals or remissions.
[Sidenote: Sources of supply continued.]
[Sidenote: Administration of justice.]
But the Slave Trade is not sustained exclusively by acts of hostile
outrage. The administration of justice is turned into another engine for
its supply. The punishments, as we are told by some of the old
writers,[6] were formerly remarkable for their lenity; but by degrees,
they have been moulded, especially on the coast, into a more productive
form. The most trifling offences are punished by the fine of one or more
Slaves, which if the culprit be unable to pay, he himself is to be sold
into slavery, often for the benefit of the very judges by whom he is
condemned.[7] When the necessity for obtaining Slaves becomes more
pressing, new crimes are fabricated, accusations and convictions are
multiplied; the unwary are artfully seduced into the commission of
crimes. The imaginary offence of witchcraft becomes often a copious
source of supply, a conviction being punished by the sale of the whole
family.
[Sidenote: Native superstitions: Witchcraft.]
Indeed, on some parts of the country bordering on the coast, this charge
furnishes the ready means of obtaining, especially for a chieftain, the
supply of European articles. A person accused of this crime is required
to purge himself by the ordeal of drinking what is called ‘red water’.
If the accused drinks it with impunity, he is declared innocent, but if,
as more commonly happens, the red water being generally medicated for
the purpose, the party is taken sick, or dies, in general the whole, or
at the least a certain number of his family, are immediately sold into
slavery. An eye witness, who stated the effects of this system,
mentioned his having seen king Sherbro, the chief of the river of that
name, kill six persons in that way in a single morning. In some
extensive districts near the windward coast of Africa, almost every
death is believed by the natives to be occasioned by magical influence;
and the belief, it is difficult to say, whether real or pretended, in
this superstition, is carried to such an extent as to break every tie of
natural affection. In these districts it is estimated that two-thirds of
the whole export of Slaves were sold for witchcraft. Every man who has
acquired any considerable property, or who has a large family, the sale
of which will produce a considerable profit, excites in the Chieftain
near whom he resides, the same longings which are called forth in the
wild beast, by the exhibition of his proper prey, and he himself lives
in a continual state of suspicion and terror.
[Sidenote: Famine and Insolvency.]
To this long catalogue are to be added two other sources, famines, and
insolvency. In times of extreme scarcity, persons sometimes sell
themselves for subsistence; and still more frequently, it is said,
children are sold by their parents to procure provisions for the rest of
the family. These famines, Mr. Parke, who mentions this source of
slavery, observes, are often produced by wars. But while on the one hand
we must remark, that this effect arises chiefly out of that peculiarly
wasteful manner of carrying on war in Africa, which we have already
noticed; so may we not fairly presume that to the Slave Trade also, and
to the habits of mind which it generates, it is to be ascribed, that in
such seasons of general distress, he who possesses food refuses to part
with so much as will suffice for the bare maintenance of his neighbours
and fellow sufferers, at any price except that of selling themselves or
their children into perpetual slavery? With respect to debt or
insolvency, the laws respecting debtor and creditor which prevail in
Africa, furnish a striking illustration of the effect of the Slave
Trade, in gradually moulding to it’s own purpose all the institutions
and habits of the country in which it prevails, and rendering them
instrumental in forwarding the grand object of furnishing a supply for
the Slave market. Creditors, in compensation of their claims on the
debtor, have not only a right to seize his own person, and sell him for
a Slave, but also any of his family; and if he or they cannot be taken,
any inhabitants of the same village, or, as Mr. Parke says, any native
of the same kingdom. Indeed it is very rarely that the debtor himself is
molested, it is his neighbours or townsmen who are the sufferers. Hence
persons become debtors more freely, because, while they gratify their
appetites by obtaining the European goods they want, they are not likely
to pay for their rashness in their own persons. The Captains of Slave
ships are in their turn less backward in advancing goods on credit to
the Black factors, and they again to other native dealers, knowing that
from some quarter or another the Slaves will surely be supplied.
[Sidenote: Distinctions between the Interior countries, and those on the
Coast.]
In giving this general account of the manner of procuring Slaves, it
ought to be observed, that the number and extent of the countries whence
the Slaves are furnished, and their varying circumstances, will
doubtless occasion some variations in the manner of carrying on the
traffic: still we might presume that the same causes, operating for a
long course of years, on human beings, in something like the same rude
state of society, would produce nearly similar effects. In fact we find,
from positive testimony, that there is this general similarity in the
consequences of the Slave Trade wherever it exists. But there is one
distinction which ought to be noticed, that between the inland countries
and those on the coast. The proportion furnished by them respectively
varies in different parts of Africa; but every where the greater number
is supplied from the interior. Many of them come from great distances
inland, and the sufferings of these unhappy beings during their journey
are such as would alone, if the voice of humanity were to be heard,
prompt us to abandon at once so horrid a traffic. Mr. Parke travelled
down with a small party of them; and hard indeed must be the heart of
that man who can read his account without shuddering.
The difference between the circumstances of the inland districts and
those adjacent to the coast, will of course create some corresponding
difference in the effects produced on them by the Slave Trade. In the
interior of the country, the kingdoms, though even they are often split
into a number of independent states, are generally of greater extent
than on the coast, which is often, especially on the Windward and Gold
coast, separated into numberless petty communities, under their
respective Chieftains or Aristocracies. It should likewise be remarked,
that on one extensive part of the coast of Africa which is divided into
a number of different states, every black or white factor who has
acquired a little property, forms a settlement or village, and becomes a
petty chieftain, and carries on against his neighbours a predatory
warfare, by which they are of course excited to reciprocal acts of
hostility. In the interior, acts of depredation on members of another
community, though, as we are told, very common, are not near so frequent
as on the coast; except, perhaps, on the boundaries of kingdoms: and it
is remarkable, that Mr. Parke informs us, that the boundaries even of
the most populous and powerful kingdoms are commonly very ill peopled.
On members of the same community also, these depredations, though
undoubtedly frequent, are for many reasons much less common than in the
countries bordering on the shore. The concealment of any such act of
rapine would be obviously much more difficult; neither might it be easy
for private traders to secrete their victims, during the long interval
which might elapse, before an opportunity might offer of disposing of
them. Again, the chieftains or kings of these large communities, while
on the one hand, their more abundant revenues place them above the
necessity of resorting to such ruinous means of supplying their wants,
as the pillage of their own villages, so on the other, not coming into
immediate contact with the Slave Traders, they are not so liable to be
suddenly instigated, in the madness of intoxication, to the commission
of such outrages. The same difference in the circumstances of the
interior, prevents the administration of justice, or the native
superstitions, being resorted to in the same degree as on the coast. And
it is remarkable, that though Mr. Parke speaks of crimes as one source
of supply to the Slave Trade, we do not find in his narrative, one
single instance specified of a Slave having been so furnished.
[Sidenote: Evils of Slave Trade aggravated on the Coast.] But, above
all, let it be remembered, on the coast the grand repository of
temptations is palpable, and on the spot; of temptations commonly of
that precise kind, which, by the gratifications they hold out to the
depraved appetites, and bad passions of man, spirituous liquors,
gunpowder, and fire-arms, the incentives to acts of violence, and the
means of committing them, are apt to operate most powerfully on
uncivilized men. The love of spirituous liquors, is a passion also,
which becomes from indulgence, more craving, and difficult to be
resisted. The Captains of Slave ships, who are sound practical
philosophers, thoroughly conversant, at least, with all the bad parts of
human nature, are well aware of these propensities, and of the
advantages which may be derived from them; and hence, they often begin
by giving to the petty king or chieftain a present of brandy or rum,
anticipating the large returns for this liberality, which future acts of
depredation will supply. It is almost a happy circumstance when the
chieftain, by possessing the implements of war, is tempted to revenge
some old injury, or to ravage and carry off the inhabitants of some
neighbouring district, instead of preying on his own miserable subjects.
Meanwhile the Slave factor himself takes no part in the quarrels between
contending chieftains, but which party soever is victorious, he finds
his advantage in the war. He supplies all the contending parties with
fire-arms and ammunition, and receives all the Slaves which are made on
both sides with perfect impartiality. Under such circumstances, might we
not anticipate, what we know from positive evidence, that the factor
stirs up and inflames dissensions, from which, whoever else may be the
loser, he is sure to gain. It has been even imputed to neighbouring
chiefs, who, assisted by their respective allies, have carried on with
each other a long protracted war, that by a mutual understanding, they
have abstained from wasting each other’s territories, while each carried
on his ravages against the allies of his enemy with great activity and
success. But it is not to kings or chieftains only, that the Slave Trade
holds out strong temptations. The appetite for spirituous liquors is
universal. European commodities are coveted by all. Whether for attack
or defence, fire-arms and gunpowder are most desirable. In such a loose
state of society, almost every one has some malice to wreak, some injury
to retaliate. Thus sensuality, avarice, hostility, revenge, every bad
passion is called into action; while there lies the Slave ship, ready to
receive old and young, males and females, all in short who are brought
to it, and, without question or exception, to furnish the desired
gratification in return. The Captains of Slave ships themselves, who
gave evidence before the House of Commons, frankly and invariably
acknowledged, that it is the universal practice, if the price can be
agreed on, to purchase all who are brought to them, without examination
as to the manner in which the Slave has been obtained, as to his former
condition, or the vendor’s right to sell. So well did they seem to be
aware how much the success of their traffic might depend on this mode of
conducting it, that they even resented it as an insult on their
understandings, when they were asked whether any questions of this kind
were put by the purchaser. Thus, whenever a Slave ship is on the coast,
a large and general premium is immediately held out for the perpetration
of acts of fraud, violence, and rapine. Every child, every unprotected
female that can be seized on, can be immediately turned to account. No
wonder that, as Captain Wilson informs us, the inhabitants are afraid of
venturing out of their own doors without being armed; a practice of
which one of themselves gave him the explanation, by significantly
pointing to a Slave ship which then lay in sight, completing her cargo.
But it is not only without doors that the Slave ship holds out its lure;
it is not only by open violence that it operates. When the Slave ships
arrive, unjust convictions are multiplied. Accusations for witchcraft
become frequent. And it is well worthy of remark, that these native
superstitions, being thus maintained in continued life and action, have
continued in full force in those very districts, where the intercourse
of the natives with the Europeans has been the longest, and the most
intimate; while in the interior, the same barbarous practices have
either gone into decay of themselves, or seem to have faded away before
the feeble light of Mahometanism. Even among private families the seeds
of insecurity and cruelty are copiously sown; and from the pressure of
present temptation, a husband or a master is often induced, in a fit of
temporary anger or jealousy, to sell his wife or his domestics, whom
afterwards he often in vain wishes he could recover.
[Sidenote: Practice of receiving relations as pawns, and consequences of
it.]