The Limits of Abolition: Government, Saints and the 'African Question', c. 1780-1820*

English Historical Review

Volumn 112, Issue 446, 1997, Pages 319-357

  Turner, Michael J ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF READING   (United Kingdom)

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EID: 85190742006     PISSN: 00138266     EISSN: 14774534     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/ehr/CXII.446.319     Document Type: Article

References (129)

1. Among the most important of these studies are R. T. Anstey, The Atlantic Slave Trade and British Abolition, 1760-1810 (London, 1975); S. Drescher, Capitalism and Antislavery: British Mobilisation in Comparative Perspective (London, 1986); J. Walvin, England, Slaves and Freedom, 1776-18)8 (London, 1986); D. Eltis, Economic Growth and the Ending of the Transatlantic Slave Trade (Oxford, 1987); R. Blackburn, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery, 1776-1848 (London, 1988); D. Turley, The Culture of English Antislavery 1780-1860 (London, 1991).
2. S. J. Braidwood, Black Poorand White Philanthropists: London's Blacksand thefoundation of the Sierra Leone Settlement, 1786-91 (Liverpool, 1994), and E. G. Wilson,/oAn Clarkson and the African Adventure (London, 1980), tell only part of the story. The general histories of Sierra Leone are also of limited use in this respect: e.g. C. Fyfe, A History of Sierra Leone (London, 1962); A. P. Kup, Sierra Leone: A Concise History (Newton Abbot, 1975). 'Sierra Leone' was the name coined by Portuguese seamen and merchants in the mid-fifteenth century.
3. ar>d Bradford 1847-5 2, ' ' 5 7~9- Dictionary of National Biography, ed. S. Lee (1898), lvi.224-6; L. G. Johnson, General T. Perronet Thompson: His Military, Literary and Political Campaigns (London, 1957); J- R- Morrison, 'Thomas Perronet Thompson. A Middle-Class Radical' (University of York, D. Phil, thesis, 1993); B. Fladeland, Abolitionists and Working Class Problems in the Age of Industrialisation (London, 1984), pp.93-110. Most of Thompson's remaining papers are in the B[rynmor] J[ones] Lfibrary], University of Hull. A huge and fascinating collection, they have been strangely neglected by historians. This article will draw heavily on the files relating to Thompson's governorship of Sierra Leone. I am grateful to Mr Brian Dyson, Archivist at the University of Hull, for permission to cite these manuscripts.
4. Philip Henry, s th Earl Stanhope, Life of the Rt Hon William Pitt (4 vols., London, 1861), ii. 143-*. For the debate in full see [Cobbett'sJ Parliamentary] Hist[oryJ, xxix, 1791-2, 1055-1158.
5. Part Hist., xxix. 1089.
6. E.g. Parl. Hist., xxix.2 $ 8-9. Wilberforce's racial assumptions and ideas about Africa are discussed in F. Spiers, 'William Wilberforce 1 50 Years On', Out of Slavery: Abolition and After, ed. J. Hayward (London, 1985), pp.47-68. Also useful is R. J. Hind, 'William Wilberforce and the Perceptions of the British People'', Historical Research, Ix (1987), 321-3;.
7. Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, ch. 2; J. D. Fage, A History of West Africa: An Introductory Survey (London, 1969), chs. 6, 8; Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation: Black Slaves and the British Empire, ed. M. Craton, J. Walvin, D. Wright (London, 1976), pp. 16-22, 51-3, 165, 171; E. C. Martin, The British West Africa Settlements, 17*0-1821 (London, 1927; Westport CT, 1970), chs. 1-7; C. W. Newbury, British Policy Towards West Africa: Select Documents, 1786-1874 (Oxford, 1965), ch. 1; D. Richardson, 'The British Slave Trade to Colonial South Carolina', Slavery and Abolition, xii (1991), 125-72; Fyfc, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 1-12; P. Thomas, 'Changing Attitudes in an Expanding Empire: The Anti-Slavery Movement, 1760-83'', Slavery and Abolition, v (1984-5), 50-72.
8. E.g. A. M. Falconbridge, Narrative of Two Voyages to the River Sierra Leone during the Years 1791-93, originally published 1794, 2nd edn. 1802 (London, 1967); J. Matthews, A Voyage to the River Sierra Leone (London, 1788). For earlier decades see Barbot on Guinea: The Writings ofJean Barbot on WestAfrica, 7678-/7/2, ed. P. E. H. Hair, A. Jones and R. Law (Hakluyt Society, vols. 175—6,1992); N. Tattersfield, The Forgotten Trade: Comprising the Log of the 'Daniel and Henry' of /700 and Accounts of the Slave Tradefrom the Minor Ports of England, 1698-1725 (London, 1991). Use of traders'records is also made in R. Law, The Slave Coast of West Africa, ijfo-ijjo (Oxford, 1991).
9. O. Equiano, Interesting Narrative of the life of Olaudah Equiano or Gustavat- Vassa. Written by Himself (1 vols., London, 1789). See also Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 38-42; P. Edwards, 'Master and Father in Equiano's Interesting Narrative', Slavery and Abolition, xi (1990), 216-26. Edwards has also edited a new version of Equiano's autobiography: The Life of Olaudah Equiano (Harlow, 1989).
10. Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 47-9, 169—70, 172-4; F. O. Shyllon, Black Slaves in Britain (London, 1974), chs. 6, 9, 12; Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 98-100; O. Warner, William Wilberforce and His Times (London, 1962), pp. 42-6; G. R. Mellor, British Imperial Trusteeship, 1783-1850 (London, 195 1), pp. 37-8; Walvin, England, Slaves and Freedom, p. 42. For the wider context, P. Langford, A Polite and Commercial People: England, 1727-8} (Oxford 1992), pp. 516-18; L. Colley, Britons. Forging the Nation 1707-1837 (London, 1992), pp. 350-53. Lord Mansfield's statement on the Somerset case is given in W. C. Costin and J. S. Watson, The Law and Working of the Constitution: Documents, 1660—1914 (2 vols., London, 1952), 1.314-15, but see also ii.256-9 for Lord Stowell's objections, uttered in 1827 with reference to the case of the slave 'Grace'.
11. Newbury, British Policy, pp.44-5; Fage, West Africa, pp. 116-31; The Records of the African Association, ed. R. Hallett (London, 1964); R. Hallett, The Penetration of Africa up to 181j (London, 1965); Martin, British West Africa, chs. 1-7.
12. H[ouse] of C[ommons] ][oumals], xlix, 1794, 304-5, petition dated 7 March 1794. Merchants engaged in African trade were quick to complain once the 1807 Abolition Act was passed. E.g. Parl. Debates, x, 1808, 710-11, petition dated 24 Feb. 1808.
13. Parl. Hist.,xxix, 1791-2,430-31,651-5.
14. E.g. Thoughts on Civilisation and the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in Africa and the West Indies (London, 1789), pp. 9-11. On the extent of British involvement in the slave trade, and the trade's importance to Britain's economic development, see D. Richardson, 'Slave Exports from West and West-Central Africa, 1700-1810: New Estimates of Volume and Distribution', Journal of African History, xxx (1989), 1-22; J. E. Inikori, 'Slavery and the Revolution in Cotton Textile Production in England', Social Science History, xiii (1989), 343-79.
15. E. Long, History of Jamaica, ed. G. Metcalf (London, 1970). Racist and pro-slavery opinions also informed Archibald DalzePs History of Dahomy (1793). Dalzel, a Scot, was a former surgeon and factor who had engaged in the slave trade and was to be governor of Cape Coast Castle for most of the 1790s: C. D. Rice, 'Archibald Dalzel, The Scottish Intelligentsia and the Problem of Slavery', Scottish Historical Review, Ixii (1983), 121-36.
16. j. Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 154-6.
17. T. Clarkson, History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (2 vols., London, 1808), ii. 502-3. On Clarkson's career generally, E. G. Wilson, Thomas Clarkson: A Biography (London, 1989).
18. E.g. Felix Fairfax's BristolJournal, 11 Nov. 1806, cited inS. Drescher,'Whose Abolition? Popular Pressure and the Ending of the British Slave Trade', Past and Present, 143 (1994), 145-
19. Drescher,'Whose Abolition?', 159-64.
20. E.g. Anthony Benezet, the Philadelphia Quaker and schoolteacher, Granville Sharp, closely associated with the Somerset case and one of the tireless champions of the abolitionist cause in Britain, and John Wesley, founder of Methodism: Benezet, Some Historical Account of Guinea (Philadelphia 1771, London 1788); Sharp, A Representation of the Injustice and Dangerous Tendency of Tolerating Slavery (London, 1769); Wesley, Thoughts Upon Slavery (London, 1774). See also Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 96-103; F. Baker, 'The Origins, Character and Influence of John Wesley's Thoughts Upon Slavery', Methodist History, xxn (1984), 75-86; Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 209-11, 215-17, 240-3; Fladeland, Abolitionists and Working Class Problems, pp. 1 —16.
21. A. D. Kriegel, 'A Convergence of Ethics: Saints and Whigs in British Antislavery', Journal of British Studies, xxvi (1987), 439, 447.
22. Blackburn, Overthrow ofSlavery, p.441; B. Knox, 'The Queen's Letter of 1865 and British Policy towards Emancipation and Indentured Labour in the West Indies, 1830-65', Historical Journal, xxix (1986), 362.
23. On Sturge, see Fladeland, Abolitionists and Working Class Problems, pp. 49-73; A. Tyrell, Joseph Sturge and the Moral Radical Party in Early Victorian Britain (London, 1987); and especially Tyrell's 'The Moral Radical Party and the Anglo-Jamaican Campaign for the Abolition of the Negro Apprenticeship System', ante, xcix (1984), 481-502.
24. E.g. Lord John Russell, colonial secretary, advocating the movement of Negroes from Africa to the West Indies in 1841 on the grounds that 'a regular intercourse between Africa and the West Indies will tend greatly not only to the prosperity of the British West India possessions, but likewise to the civilisation of Africa': memorandum of 20 March 1841, cited in W. A. Green, 'Emancipation to Indenture: A Question of Imperial Morality', Journal ofBritish Studies, xxii (1983), 106.
25. H. Temperley, White Dreams, Black Africa: The Anti-Slavery Expedition to the Niger, 1841-42 (London, 1991); J. Gallacher, 'Fowell Buxton and the New African Policy, 1838-42', Cambridge Historical Journal, x (1950), 36—58- On the general background see A. Porter, 'Commerce and Christianity: The Rise and Fall of a Nineteenth-Century Missionary Slogan', Historical Journal, xxviii (•985), 597-621; Green, 'Emancipation to Indenture', pp. 113-15; H. Temperley, 'Antislavery', in PressureFrom Without,ei. P. Hollis (London, 1974), pp. 27-si;Turley, fng/u/Mntu/awry, pp. 15,57, 100-1, 125, 208-9.
26. R. A. Austen and W. D. Smith, 'Images of Africa and British Slave-Trade Abolition: The Transition to an Imperialist Ideology, 1787-1807', African Historical Studies, ii (1969), 69—83.
27. Most were freed slaves or manumitted servants, unemployed seamen waiting for their next berth, or former members of the British forces who had fought against the American rebels, France and Spain. The phenomenon of manumission has been examined in S. Drescher, 'Manumission in a Society without Slave Law: Eighteenth-century England', Slavery and Abolition, x (1989), 85-101.
28. Braidwood, Black PoorandWhite Philanthropists;^arner, Wilberforce and HisTimes, pp. 88-91; P. Hoare, Memoirs of Granville Sharp (London, 1820), pp. 257-379; Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 13-25; Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 115-17; V. Harlow and F. Madden, British Colonial Developments, 1774—1834: SelectDocuments (Oxford, 1953), pp. 460,462; J. Peterson, Province of Freedom: A History of Sierra Leone, 1787—1870 (London, 1969), ch. 1; G. Sharp, A Short Sketch of Temporary Regulations (until better shall be proposed) for the Intended Settlement on the Grain Coast of Africa near Sierra Leone (3rd edn., London, 1788); Newbury, British Policy, pp. 7-8; Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 98, 156-7; Walvin, England, Slaves and Freedom, pp. J4-5, 57, 64-7, 103-6.
29. Significantly, the Sierra Leone project was taken up immediately after the unsuccessful attempt of spring 1791 to secure parliamentary approval for slave-trade abolition. Henceforth the two issues would be inseparable.
30. Pollock, Wilberforce, ch. 11; P. E. H. Hair, 'A History of Sierra Leone', Sierra Leone Studies, xvii (1963), 283-6; S. Wilberforce, The Life of William Wilberforce (London, 1868), pp.95-101; Martin, British West Africa, chs. 8-9; E. L. Griggs, Thomas Clarkson. The Friend of Slaves (London, 1936), pp. 65-72,74; R. I. and S. Wilberforce, The Life of William Wilberforce (j vols., London, 1838), i.305-8, 322-3; R. Coupland, Wilberforce (London, 1945), pp. 225-9; R. Furneaux, William Wilberforce (London, 1974), pp. 120-29; Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 25-37; Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 117-28. On the abolitionists' use of both economic and moral arguments, J. D. Bass, 'An Efficient Humanitarianism: The British Slave Trade Debates, 1791 -92', Quarterly Journal of Speech, Ixxv (1989), 15 2-65; S. Drescher, 'People and Parliament: The Rhetoric of the British Slave Trade',Journal of Interdisciplinary History, xx (1990), 561-80. On the passing of the Sierra Leone Settlement Act, Part. Hist.,xxix, 1791-2, 430-31, 651-5; HofCJ, xlvi, 1790-91, 245-6, 305, 353, 356, 405, 414, 442-3, 447, 454-s, 457-8, 5 5). 560, 565, 581, 630, 646, 655, 662-3, 682-3, 687.
31. Wilson,/o/m Clarkson and the African Adventure; R. Winks, The Blacks in Canada (London, 1971), pp. 67-70; A. P. Kup, 'John Clarkson and the Sierra Leone Company', International Journal of African Historical Studies, v (1972), 203-20; J. W. Walker, The Black Loyalists: The Search for a Promised Land in Nova Scotia and Sierra Leone, 1783-1870 (London, 1976); E.G. Wilson, The Loyal Blacks (New York, 1976).
32. An unfavourable account of the early years of the colony and the role of the Company directors, written by the wife of Alexander Falconbndge, their agent in Africa, can be found in Falconbridge, Narrative of Two Voyages. This account culminates with an indignant diatribe addressed to Henry Thornton, dated Bristol, 4 April 1794 (pp. 279-87).
33. Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 38-79; Harlow and Madden, Colonial Developments, pp. 459-63; An Account of the Colony of Sierra Leone, from its first establishment in 179J (London, 179 5); Newbury, British Policy, pp. 99-101,463-74,611-14; Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 119-41- The Nova Scotians were particularly rebellious in disposition, perhaps a symptom of emerging blancophobia: Hair, 'History of Sierra Leone', pp. 285-6.
34. Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 79-81; Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 141-50. On Macaulay's governorship see also G. O. Trevelyan, The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay (London, 1911), pp. 7-18; J. C. Colquhoun, William Wilberforce. His Friends and Times (London, 1867), pp. 237-47; J. Clive, Thomas Bahington Macaulay. The Shaping of the Historian (London, 1973), ch. 1. The dangers threatening Sierra Leone in 1799 are reflected in Wilberforce's journal entry for 14 August of that year: 'To town about Sierra Leone matters ... Our colony in extreme peril; I pressing Pitt to befriend us': S. Wilberforce, Life, pp. 209-10. On the Maroons, see W. R. Ward, 'Jamaica's Maroons', Slavery and Abolition, xi (1990), 399-403; S. E. Furness, 'The Maroon War of 1795',Jamaican Historical Review, v (1965), 30-40.
35. The problems of Sierra Leone again weighed heavily on Wilberforce's mind in the summer of 1802, when he made another parliamentary effort to abolish the slave trade. This followed two unsuccessful attempts to pass a Slave Trade Limitation Bill (in 1798-9), which was designed to restrain slaving along the Sierra Leone and West African coast: R. I. and S. Wilberforce, Life, iii.50; Furneaux, Wilberforce, pp. 176, 194-5; Coupland, Wilberforce, pp. 224-5.
36. British Parliamentary Papers (Irish University Press series, Shannon, 1968), Colonies, Africa, 1801-17:1801-1, ii. Select Committee Report with Appendix; 1804, iv. Select Committee Report with Appendices; 1806-7,»• Select Committee Report. See also Newbury, British Policy, pp. 475-7.
37. 6. 7^53. 774. 794~5. 798, 812, 830.
38. E.g. Thornton to Ludlam, 7 Feb. 1807, Macaulay to Ludlam, 17 June, 7 Oct. 1806, z6 Feb., 31 March, 2 April, 1 May, 28 Aug., 2 Nov. 1807, all in Tfhompson] Pfapers] (BJL) DTH 1/1,2.
39. See 'Report of the Directors, made to the Proprietors on 26 March 1807', TP DTH 1/3. On the manner in which the reforms of 1807, especially abolition, created new aims and attitudes towards Africa, see Austen and Smith, 'Images of Africa'.
40. Substance of the Report delivered by the Court of Directors of the Sierra Leone Company, to the General Court of Proprietors on Thursday 24 March 1808 (London, 180S), p. 12.
41. John Shore, Lord Teignmouth; Thomas Babington, MP; Thomas Clarkson; Charles Grant, MP; Joseph Hardcastle; Granville Sharp; Henry Thornton, MP; William Wilberforce, MP.
42. Macaulay to Ludlam, 31 March, 28 Aug., 2,4 Nov. 1807, 'Extract from the Minutes of the African Institution, 23 Oct. 1807': TP DTH 1/2,4. On the early activities of the African Institution, Coupland, Wilberforce,p. 323;Griggs, Thomas Clarkson, pp. 94-5,112-15; Walvin, England, Slaves and Freedom, p. 124; G. Stephen, Antislavery Recollections (1854; 2nd edn., London, 1971), pp. 10-11,45, j9;Turley, English Antislavery, pp. 32-6, 55-6, 75-7; Furneaux, Wilberforce, p.332; Newbury, British Policy, pp. 103-6; Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 319, 326; Harlow and Madden, Colonial Developments, pp. 388-9,463-4; Sierra Leone Gazette, 1 March, 15 Aug 1808; African Herald, 21 Jan., 25 Feb. 1809. In these months the Saints were also deeply involved in 'improving' ventures in other British possessions: e.g. J. Fisch, 'A Pamphlet War on Christian Missions in India, 1807-9', Journal of Asian History, xix (1985), 22-70.
43. 2» J- Markham, Nineteenth-Century Parliamentary Elections in East Yorkshire (Beverlcy, 1982), pp. 7,13,18,24. There is also card-indexed biographical material and a collection of Thomas Thompson's writings in the local history department, Hull Central Library.
44. See Thompson's 'A Narrative of Facts connected with the Colony of Sierra Leone, addressed to the Friends of the Abolition of the Slave Trade and to the West Indian Planters' (1811), preface: TP DTH 1/102 (also available on microfilm M/i-100 [1959]).
45. Substance of the Report delivered by the Court of Directors of the Sierra Leone Company, to the General Court of Proprietors, on Thursday 24 March 1808 (London, 1808), p. 7.
46. Castlereagh to T. P. Thompson, 11 April 1808: TP DTH 1/19. Castlereagh's tenure as Secretary for War and the Colonies is discussed in J. W. Derry, Castlereagh (London, 1976), ch. 3.
47. TP DTH 4/1 (p. 349). See also DTH 4/22, parts 1 and 2, and 4/26, and privately-held family letters of 1808-9, cited in Robinson, Counting House, pp. 29-31; also Thompson's 'Narrative of Facts', pp. 4-5, for further remarks about Macaulay. Some of the contemporary justifications for a half-way stage between slavery and freedom are outlined in Kriegel, 'Convergence of Ethics', pp. 441,447; Hind, 'Wilberforce and the British People', p. 334; Drescher, "People and Parliament', pp. 577-8; The Wages of Slavery: From Chattel Slavery to Wage Labour in Africa, the Caribbean and England, ed. M. Twaddle (London, 1993); W. L. Burn, Emancipation and Apprenticeship in the British West Indies (1937; reprinted London, 1970); The End of Slavery in Africa, ed. S. Miers and R. Roberts (Madison, WI, 1989); Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, ch. 11; M. Craton, 'The Transition from Slavery to Free Wage Labour in the Caribbean, 1790-1890: A Survey with Particular Reference to Recent Scholarship', Slavery and Abolition, xiii (1992), 37-67.
48. A full account of Thompson's thoughts and experiences can be found in his 'Narrative of Facts'. (There are draft extracts scattered among Thompson's papers, e.g. DTH 1/21.) The brief account of Thompson's governorship in Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, ch. 5, is uncharitable and accepts the assertions of his enemies and successors too uncritically. It is hoped that what follows will help to redress the balance.
49. TP DTH 4/1 (pp. 976-93).
50. Sierra Leone Gazette, i Aug. 1808.
51. 6; R- Hofstadter, America at 17)0. A Social Portrait (New York, 1973), pp.67-88. The USA's demand for African slaves was still high in the early nineteenth century, even though many state legislatures had stopped their slave trades. About 40,000 Africans were brought to Charleston, SC, between 1803-7: W. W. Freehling, Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, 1816-36 (New York, 1968), p. 11.
52. TPDTH 1/23,4/1 (pp. 483-5,525-52,753-90). The fact that some'apprentices'ran away, and the responses of those who were freed by Thompson, suggest that the native Africans did not want to be bound in any form. This contradicts the arguments continually used in British West Africa to justify coerced labour: G. M. McSheffrey, 'Slavery, Indentured Servitude, Legitimate Trade and the Impact of Abolition in the Gold Coast, 1874-1901: A Reappraisal', Journal of African History, xxiv (1983), 349-68; W. McGowan, 'African Resistance to the Atlantic Slave Trade in West Africa', Slavery and Abolition, xi (1990), $-29-
53. TPDTH 1/23,4/1 (PP- 5*5-5*.
54. See Thompson's draft statements, undated but evidently written within two months of his arrival in Sierra Leone, in TP DTH 1/23.
55. Thompson discovered the papers quite by chance. Ludlam had not told him of their existence nor made them available for his information: TP DTH 4/1, journal entry for 7 Sept. 1808 (pp. 613-14).
56. Dawes was appointed to this post by Ludlam just before Thompson took over the administration, and was able to go on drawing a salary because the Transfer Act arranged for servants of the Sierra Leone Company to stay in office under the new administration if they chose. Both Ludlam and Dawes continued to benefit from the Saints' patronage. They were named among the government-appointed commissioners who were to visit and report on conditions in Britain's West African possessions. This Commission of African Inquiry presented a report in 1811: Harlow and Madden, Colonial Developments, pp. 157-8.
57. T. P. Thompson to Wilberforce, 23 Aug. i8o8:TPDTH i/6i;seealsoThompson's notes of July 1808 in DTH 4/1 (pp. 509-24).
58. For the draft see TP DTH 1/70, 4/1 (pp. 486-99, 107). The official declaration is in Sierra Leone Gazette, 1 Aug. 1808.
59. Sierra Leone Gazette, 15, 20, 27 Aug., 3 Sept., 8 Oct., 19 Nov. 1808.
60. TP DTH 4/1 (pp. 953-9).
61. See TP DTH i/6; for a thick bundle of affidavits dated 29 Aug. 1808 - 25 Jan. 1809; 1/10 for a permit of 13 Feb. 1808, signed by Thomas Ludlam, allowing a Mr Warwick Francis of Freetown to keep a native woman, 'Betsey', as household servant for a period of seven years. The Macaulay-Ludlam correspondence can be followed in DTH 1/1,2. Some of these items have Thompson's hostile remarks in the margins. The whole matter of the Derwent slaves is documented in DTH 1/1 j,51-56: receipts, a certificate of ownership, the names of recovered slaves and the persons in whose service they were placed, and records of a bounty payment to Captain Parker of the Derwent. See also Sierra Leone Gazette, March, Aug. 1808.
62. Macaulay to Ludlam, 1 May, 4 Nov. 1807, TP DTH 1/2.
63. e also DTH 4/1 (pp. 486-99); Sierra Leone Gazette, 17 Dec. 1808.
64. Apprenticeships of up to fourteen years' duration were permitted by the 1807 Abolition Act, provided that slaves were legally condemned as prize.
65. Wilberforce to T. P. Thompson, i^Oct. i8o8:TPDTH 1/61. Wilberforce had previously written in his A Letter on the Abolition of the Slave Trade (1807) that, though Negro slaves deserved freedom, they were not yet ready for it. 'A certain previous course of discipline is necessary. They must be trained and educated for this most perfect state of manly maturity': Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 284-7.
66. Thornton to T. P. Thompson, 20, 22 Oct. i8o8:TPDTH 1/61. See also African Herald, 25 Feb. 1809.
67. The same thing was to be said in the 1850s about 'pawning' in the Gold Coast: McSheffrey, 'Slavery, Indentured Servitude, Legitimate Trade and Abolition', p. 362, n. 74.
68. See Thompson's draft dated Aug. 1808, T. P. Thompson to Cooke, 1 Nov. 1808, and to Castlereagh, 2 Nov. 1808, in TP DTH 1/23,26, 4/1 (pp. 753-94).
69. On 28 March 1809 Thompson qualified as a hereditary governor of the African Institution with a donation of £100. He had attended one of its meetings before leaving England, at which he spoke with Lord Valentia about cultivation in Africa: TP DTH 4/26,5/37. It is likely that he upgraded his status from ordinary member to hereditary governor in order to gain more authority and attention for his reports to the institution.
70. T. P. Thompson to the Secretary of the African Institution, 2 Nov. 1808: TP DTH 1/17,4/1 (pp. 691-752). Throughout these months Macaulay was advising Cooke, under-secretary of state, about policy on Sierra Leone: e.g. Macaulay to Cooke, 6, 10 Sept. 1808, and minutes of conversations Aug.-Sept. 1808, in DTH 1 /y6. These communications followed earlier meetings with Castlereagh, for whom Macaulay wrote long memoranda about Sierra Leone and the 'African Question': e.g. Macaulay to Castlereagh, 8-May 1807, in DTH 1/2. Macaulay was also in touch with other ministers at this time: e.g. Macaulay to Lord Mulgrave (First Lord of the Admiralty), 17 Sept. 1807, in DTH 1/2. Clearly Macaulay, Wilberforce, Thornton and their friends had direct access to the top level of policy-makers in the British government, and continued to shape events even though Sierra Leone had been transferred to the Crown.
71. Macaulay to T. P. Thompson, 10 Nov. 1808: TP DTH 1/36.
72. 'Annual Report of Natives of Africa received, enlisted, entered, apprenticed or otherwise disposed of by the Governor of His Majesty's Colony of Sierra Leone, with observations thereupon', 31 Dec. 1808: TP DTH 1/23.
73. Castlereagh to T. P. Thompson, April t8c>9: TP DTH 1/19, 4/1 (pp. 1057-8).
74. Wilberforce to T. P. Thompson, 7 Nov., 11 Dec. 1808: TP DTH 1/61, 4/1 (pp. 795-814).
75. }. Columbine's arrival was delayed because he participated in the British assault on Senegal in April 1809. His ship was lost and he had been forced to return to Britain: Lt. Col. C. W. Maxwell to T. P. Thompson, 6 April 1809, and Maxwell to Castlereagh, 18 July 1809, in TP DTH 1/67, 68, 4/1 (pp. 1057-8).
76. 2^- Cooke had informed Ludlam of future arrangements for a Court of Vice-Admiralty in Sierra Leone in a letter dated i9May 1808,in DTH t/t9.Thompson'sactivitieswere publicized in the colony's newspaper, The African Herald, which began to appear in January 1809: e.g. African Herald, 15 April, 26 Aug., 18,25 Nov., 2 Dec. 1809. The governor seems to have chosen this new name for the paper (formerly called the Sierra Leone Gazette) in order to emphasize the beginning of a new stage in the colony's development and to distance his regime from previous administrations.
77. T. P.Thompson to Castlereagh, 15 June 1809, and to Cooke, 15 Aug. i8o9:TPDTH 1/23,26,4/1 (pp. 994-1028, 1059-70).
78. T. P. Thompson to Revd. Isaac Milner, 15 June 1809: TP DTH 4/1 (pp. 976-93).
79. T. P. Thompson to Thomas Thompson, 7 March 1809: TP DTH 4/1 (pp. 953-9). On the Smiths see J. Leighton-Boyce, Smiths the Bankers (London, 1958); Thorne, House of Commons, v.190, 192, 195,199-201, 204-5; Burke's Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage, ed. L. G. Pine (102nd edn., London, '959). PP-409-10-
80. Macaulay to G. Caulker, 28 June 1809: TP DTH 1/2.
81. [. This is also demonstrated by the comments Thompson made in the margins of Macaulay*s previous correspondence with Ludlam, especially the aforementioned letters of 1 May and 4 November 1807 (see TP DTH 1/2 and n. 63 above), in which Macaulay encouraged Ludlam to be selective about what he put in his reports back to England, and told him that some form of bonded labour was necessary in Africa. Thompson was now attaching a far more sinister meaning to such comments than he had done previously.
82. The letter, dated 3 Aug. 1809, is in TP DTH 1/41. Unfortunately the name of the ship's master is not given. Thompson became more anxious to enlist the help of potential allies when he discovered that Macaulay had not been presenting his communications to the general members of the African Institution. He wrote the secretary an indignant letter about this on 15 Aug. 1809 (see DTH 1/27). It may or may not be significant that Macaulay and his relatives had a considerable stake in Sierra Leone during this period. Zachary, his brother Alexander and cousins Kenneth and George Macaulay, and later his own son Henry, were all closely involved with the colony in official and commercial capacities. According to Kup, Sierra Leone, p. 167, n. 29, Zachary Macaulay made £100,000 in Sierra Leone trade before going bankrupt in 1826.
83. T. P. Thompson to Castlereagh, 2 Oct. 1809,4 Feb. I 8 I O: T P D T H 1/23. In fact Castlereagh was no longer Secretary for War and the Colonies. After the disastrous Walcheren expedition, and during the ministerial changes attendant on the formation of the Perceval government in October 1809, Castlereagh was replaced by Lord Liverpool. For a brief account see J. W. Derry, Politics in the Age of Fox, Pitt and Liverpool (London, 1990), pp. 144-6. Liverpool's period as Secretary for War and the Colonies is covered in N. Gash, Lord Liverpool (London, 1984), ch. 5.
84. General Orders, 11 Feb. 1810, in TP DTH 1/47.
85. Sierra Leone Gazette, new series, vol. 1, Feb. 1810.
86. T. P. Thompson to the British commercial residents on Rio Pongo, j March 1810: TP DTH 1/30.
87. Wilberforce to T. P. Thompson, 12 May I 8 I O: T P D T H 1/61,4/1 (pp. 1199-1203).
88. Lord Liverpool to T. P. Thompson, 31 May 1810, and Wilberforce to T. P. Thompson, 5 June 1810: TP DTH I / 6 I, 95, 4/2 (B).
89. T. P. Thompson to Nancy Barker, 13 June 1810: TP DTH 4/2 (pp. 1206-1j).
90. E.g. H. Odium to T. P. Thompson, 13 June 1810, J.Thorpe to T. P. Thompson, 21 July I8IO:TP DTH 1/95.
91. E.g. African Herald, 26 Aug., 11, 18, 25 Nov., 2 Dec. 1809.
92. T. P. Thompson to Thomas Thompson, 16 July 1810; T. Allan to T. P. Thompson, 27 July, 10 Aug. 1810; Macaulay to Allan, 10 Aug. 1810; and Thompson's memoranda; all inTPDTH 1/1,12,95, 96, 4/2 (1216-23).
93. T. P. Thompson to Thomas Thompson, 26 July 1810: TP DTH 1/96.
94. Wilberforce to Thomas Thompson, 28 Aug. 1810: TP DTH 4/2 (pp. 1224-7); Robinson, Counting House, pp. 34, 61.
95. TP DTH 4/1 (pp. 1204-5).
96. I239~42). Peel's brief tenure as Liverpool's undcr-sccretary is covered in N. Gash, Mr Secretary Peel (London, 1961), pp. 74-85.
97. SeeT. P.Thompson to his cousin E. P. Sells, 13 Jan. I 8 I I: T P D T H 4/2 (pp. 1243-50).
98. TP DTH 4/2 (B).
99. T. P. Thompson to G. Pryme, 22 March 1811: TP DTH 4/2 (pp. 1256-9).
100. Thome, House of Commons, iii.j 86-90.
101. See Part. Debates, xix, 1811, 739-42. During this debate, which concerned a grant to cover the expenses of the civil establishment of Sierra Leone for 1811, Stephen and Wilberforce defended the Sierra Leone Company and enthused over the ways in which the colony would benefit Africa.
102. Part. Debates, xix, 1811, 739-42 (8 April 1811). The delay seems to have been caused by the reluctance of Eldon, Lord Chancellor, to approve Thorpe's appointment: Fyfe, History ofSierra Leone, p. 116.
103. E.g. R. Thorpe, A Letter to William Wilberforce Esq. (London, 1S1;).
104. TP DTH 4/26.
105. A Letter to HRH the Duke of Gloucester, President of the African Institution, from Zachary Macaulay Esq., occasioned by a pamphlet lately published by Dr Thorpe, late Judge of the Colony of Sierra Leone, entitled 'A Letter to William Wilberforce Esq.' (London, 1815), p.47.
106. Thorpe, A Reply, Point by Point (London, 1815) and Postscript to the Reply (London, i8i5).See also Colquhoun, Wilberforce. His Friends and Times, p.*248.
107. Burn, Emancipation and Apprenticeship, pp. 77-8; Stephen, Antislavery Recollections, letter II; Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 291-2; Blackburn, Overthrow of Slavery, pp. 323-6.
108. Negro Emancipation Made Easy: with Reflections on the African Institution and Slave Registry Bill. By a British Planter (London, 1816), p. 74.
109. E.g. J. McQueen, The Colonial Controversy (Glasgow, 1821).
110. Craton, Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation, pp. 313-15.
111. E.g. by Joseph Marryat, MP for Sandwich: Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 122-3.
112. 299; Hind, 'Wilberforce and the British People', p. 333.
113. Clarkson described one of the villages established in Sierra Leone by liberated slaves as 'a pattern for industry and good example'. See account in Clarkson, Thoughts on the Necessity of Improving the Condition of Slaves in the British Colonies with a view to their ultimate Emancipation; and on the Practicability, the Safety and the Advantages of the latter measure (4th edn., London, 1824), pp. 15-17, also Griggs, Thomas Clarkson, p. 134. Both Wilberforce's Appeal and Clarkson's Thoughts are included in the bound Tracts of the Anti-Slavery Society, BJL.
114. J. J. Gurney, Substance of a Speech Delivered at a Public Meeting on the Subject of British ColonialSlavery (London, 1824), p. 21; K. Macaulay, The Colony of Sierra Leone Vindicated (London, .827).
115. R. I. and S. Wilberforce, Life, i.308.
116. Morrison, 'Thomas Perronet Thompson', pp. 114-17; Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 121-4; Pollock, Wilberforce, pp. 227-8, 241; Coupland, Wilberforce, pp.331, 373- Despite an arrangement for Anglo-American co-operation in the Treaty of Ghent, 1814, there was continuing friction between Britain and the USA on the issue of stopping the slave traffic: S. E. Morrison, H. S. Commager, W. E. Leuchtenberg, A Concise History of the American Republic (Oxford, 1983), pp. 178-9; G. B. Tindall, America: A Narrative History (London, 1988), pp. 327-30, 534-5.
117. Pollock, Wilberforce, p. 252.
118. S. L. Engerman and D. Eltis, 'Economic Aspects of the Abolition Debate', in Antislavery, Religion and Reform, ed. C. Bolt and S. Drescher (Folkstone, 1980), p. 285, n. 37.
119. Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 121-4; Morrison, 'Thomas Perronet Thompson', pp. 114-17; Burn, Emancipation and Apprenticeship, p. 84; Stephen, Antislavery Recollections, pp. 74-6.
120. Coupland, Wilberforce, p. 373; Green, 'Emancipation to Indenture', pp. 110-11.
121. Newbury, British Policy, pp. 17, 29, 89-94, 41 j-20, 460-1, 481-5, 489-91, 493-500, 510-20, 529-32,539-41, 614-16; G. R. Mellor, 'British Policy in Relation to Sierra Leone 1808-52', (Univ. of London, M.A. thesis, 1935); Martin, British West Africa, ch. 10; Fage, West Africa, ch. 9.
122. E.g. Part Debates, xxxiii, 1816,305-74: Lords debate on military estimates, 15 March 1816. Sierra Leone is mentioned in col. 322.
123. Porter, 'Commerce and Christianity'; J. Walvin, "Freedom and Slavery and the Shaping of Victorian Britain', Slavery and Abolition, xv (1994), 246-59. Walvin relies heavily on Colley, Britons, pp. 350-60.
124. Harlow and Madden, Colonial Developments, pp. 464-6.
125. On the adjudication role, D. Eltis, 'The Impact of Abolition on the Atlantic Slave Trade', and P. C. Emmer, 'Abolition of the Abolished: The Illegal Dutch Slave Trade and the Mixed Courts', in The Abolition of the Atlantic Slave Trade. Origins and Effects in Europe, Africa and the Americas, ed. D. Eltis andj. Walvin (London, 1981), pp. 155-75, 177-92. On the liberated Africans in Sierra Leone, A. Jones, 'Recaptive Nations: Evidence Concerning the Demographic Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade in West Africa', Slavery and Abolition, xl (1990), 42-57; Kup, Sierra Leone, p. 156; Newbury, British Policy, pp. 181, 185-8; Hair, 'History of Sierra Leone', pp. 287-94; C. R. Decorse, 'West African Archaeology and the Atlantic Slave Trade', Slavery and Abolition, xii (1991), 92-6. The general expansion of British activity in West Africa is examined in M. Lynn, 'The Imperialism of Free Trade and the Case of West Africa, 1830-70', Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, xv (1986), 22-40, which emphasizes the factors limiting British influence in the region.
126. j . Mellor, Imperial Trusteeship, pp. 191-3, 210-13; Green, 'Emancipation to Indenture'; S. L. Engerman, 'Economic Change and Contract Labour in the British Caribbean: the End of Slavery and the Adjustment to Emancipation', Explorations in Economic History, xxi (1984), 133-50.
127. Peterson, Province of Freedom, p. 54; Morrison,'Thomas Perronet Thompson', pp. 98-100; Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 152-3; Newbury, British Policy, pp. 180-81.
128. Kup, Sierra Leone, pp. 1 jo (n. 115), 168; Newbury, British Policy, pp. 15, 18-19, 242-3. Sierra Leone's commerce picked up considerably after 1815, with timber as a leading export: Fyfe, History of Sierra Leone, pp. 125-6. This was part of a wider picture, for the whole West African economy was adjusting itself in accordance with new commercial conditions: J. F. Searing, West African Slavery and Atlantic Commerce. The Senegal River Valley (Cambridge, 1993); Eltis and Walvin, Abolition of the Atlantic Slave Trade pp. 83-151; The Atlantic Slave Trade: Effects on Economies, Societies and Peoples in Africa, the Americas and Europe, ed. S. L. Engerman and J. E. Inikori (Durham, NC, 1992).
129. McSheffrey, 'Slavery, Indentured Servitude, Legitimate Trade and Abolition', p. 3 52, n. 15; Miers and Roberts, End of Slavery in Africa; P. Manning, Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Orientaland African Slave Trades (Cambridge, 1990); A. Philips, The Enigma of Colonialism: British Policy in West Africa (London, 1989); Knox, 'Queen's Letter'; M. A. Klein, 'Slavery, the International Labour Market and the Emancipation of Slaves in the Nineteenth Century', Slavery and Abolition, xv (1994), 197-220.