Bristol Slave Trade Formerly — William of Malmsbury, Book II. Ch. 20 — Life of St. Wolstan, Bishop of Worcester
Directly opposite the Irish coast there is a seaport town called Bristol, the inhabitants of which, as well as others of the English, frequently sail into Ireland on trading speculations. St. Wolstan put an end to a very ancient custom of theirs, in which they had become so hardened, that neither the love of God, nor that of the king (William the Conqueror) had been able to abolish it. For they sold into Ireland, at a profit, people whom they had bought up throughout all England, and they exposed to sale maidens in a state of pregnancy, with whom they made a sort of mock marriages. There you might see with grief, fastened together by ropes, whole rows of wretched beings of both sexes, of elegant forms and in the very bloom of youth, a sight sufficient to excite pity even in Barbarians, daily offered for sale to the first purchaser. Accursed deed! infamous disgrace! that men, acting in a manner which brutal instinct alone would have forbidden, should sell into slavery their relations, nay, even their own offspring; yet, St. Wolstan destroyed at length this inveterate and hereditary custom. The historian goes on to state, that from the effect of religious instruction, the people of Bristol not only renounced this vicious practice themselves, but afforded an example of reform to the rest of England; harsh methods however were resorted to where persuasion was in vain; for one of the inhabitants of Bristol who resisted the good bishop’s reform with peculiar obstinacy, was expelled from the city, and had his eyes put out.
In 1171, on the invasion and conquest of Ireland by Henry II. it was the unanimous judgment of a great ecclesiastical council, called at Armagh, that the event was to be regarded as a providential visitation for their guilt in making Slaves of the English, whether obtained from merchants, robbers, or pirates; and this opinion was regarded as the more probable, because England herself, the natives of which, by a vice common to that nation, had been used to sell their children and nearest relatives, even when not under the pressure of famine or other necessity, had formerly expiated a similar crime by a similar punishment (alluding to the Norman Conquest.) To the honour of the Irish, a resolution was then passed, that throughout the kingdom the English Slaves should be immediately emancipated. I trust their Hibernian descendants, in our day, will shew themselves actuated by a like humane spirit, and that the English will no longer continue subject to that foul stain with which, even in these early days, she was contaminated.
The city of Bristol is once more exempt from the disgrace of being concerned in the traffic of human beings.
FINIS
Footnotes were re-indexed using numbers and collected together at the end of the last chapter.
Notes
1. The Report of the Privy Council to the King in 1788, and still more the Reports of the Committee of the House of Commons, to which had been referred the various petitions for and against the abolition, and in the Appendixes to which is contained the Evidence at length of the Witnesses who were examined on that occasion. For the convenience of those who might not have leisure to peruse so voluminous a mass of evidence, an abridged abstract of it was made. This occupies two small octavo volumes, and is entitled “An Abridgement of the Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade. 1790.” It is to be purchased at Phillips’s, George-yard, Lombard-street.—Various Papers and Accounts, tending to give useful information, have also been laid before the House of Commons from time to time. The titles of these will be found in the House of Commons Journals. See especially a voluminous mass of Papers respecting the Slave Trade, ordered to be printed 8th June 1804; and another very important set of Communications from the West Indies, ordered for printing 25th February 1805. See also two very interesting Reports of the House of Assembly of Jamaica.
2. Vide, especially, an Abstract of the Debate on Mr. Wilberforce’s Motion for the Abolition of the Slave Trade in 1791, and of the Debate on a similar Motion in 1792; both printed for Phillips, George-yard, Lombard-street.
3. Mr. Clarkson’s publications well deserve this epithet, particularly his “Essay on the Impolicy of the African Slave Trade.” See also Remarks on the Decision of the House of Commons concerning the Slave Trade, on April 2d, 1792, by the Rev. J. Gisborne.—Much valuable information likewise concerning Africa is contained in Lord Muncaster’s Historical Sketches of the Slave Trade. Again, almost all the principal arguments involved in the discussion concerning the abolition are to be found in Mr. Brougham’s Colonial Policy, stated with that author’s usual ability.—Once more, a valuable Summary of the Arguments in favour of Abolition, and of the answers to the chief allegations of its Opponents (by a writer, whose name, if subjoined to it, would have added great weight to the publication) was published two years ago, printed for Hatchard, and Longman and Rees, entitled, a “Concise Statement of the Question, regarding the Abolition of the Slave Trade.” An Appendix, containing much valuable matter, soon after followed. A valuable publication appeared also some years ago, by a Member of the University of Oxford, now become a dignitary of the church. I might specify several others on particular parts of the case. In short, were it as easy to prevail on mankind to read publications which have been some time before the world, as to peruse a new one, my present task might well be spared.
4. In reading accounts of African wars, the attentive reader will continually meet with expressions such as those here used; which incidentally and undesignedly, and therefore the more strongly prove, that the persons of the natives are regarded as the great booty; and we may therefore not unreasonably infer, that they often constitute the chief inducement for commencing hostilities.
5. Vide evidence of Naval Officers, &c. taken before the House of Commons.—Smith also, who visited the coast in the service of the African Company in 1726, says “The Natives who came off to trade with us were mighty timorous of coming aboard, for fear of being panyard.”
6. Vide Nyendael and Artus of Dantzic, in De Bry’s India Orientalis, &c.—Bosman,—Barbot.
7. Moore, many years factor to the African Company, about 1730, says, ‘Since this trade has been used, all punishments are changed into slavery, there being an advantage in such condemnations. They strain for crimes very hard, in order to get the benefit of selling the criminal. Not only murder, theft, and adultery, but every trifling crime is punished by selling the criminal for a Slave.’
8. Vide Smith’s Voyage to Guinea, p. 266.
9. Surely Mr. Parke, when he suggested this, forgot that experience as well as reason teach us, that we must first abolish the Slave Trade before we attempt to diffuse among the Africans the lessons of peace and love; lest we are asked the same well-known question, and receive the same reply, as the Spanish priest from the poor dying Peruvian, when the Spaniards in America were acting on the plan which is here advised, of at once ravaging and converting: “Are there to be any Europeans in this Heaven, where you wish me to secure a place?” Being told yes, “Then it is no place for Peruvians.”
10. This is the more astonishing, because it is mentioned by the older writers as well as by more recent travellers, as Captain Sir G. Young and Sir T. B. Thompson, as a term of which the meaning is clear, and the use perfectly familiar. Thus, as a single instance, Smith, after saying “the natives were afraid of being panyard,” (p. 104.) subjoins the meaning in a note,—“To panyar is to kidnap or steal men. It is a word used all over the Coast of Guinea.”
11. The account given of this Slave trade by an almost contemporary historian, will be found in the Appendix.
12. Atkins was a surgeon in the Royal Navy, who visited all the British Settlements in Africa, with the Swallow and Weymouth men of war, in 1721; and whose account is the more to be credited, from his being a disinterested witness, whose testimony also was given before the justice or humanity of the Slave Trade had been called in question.
13. See Parke, p. 26. 290. 356.—So Lieutenant Matthews (an Opponents’ witness, Privy Council Report p. 27.) says, “The Slaves that are purchased before the rainy season commences are employed upon their plantations, and are sold to the Europeans, and sometimes among themselves, from one master to another, after the rice is planted.”
14. Vide Report of the Committee of the House of Assembly of Jamaica, in the Privy Council Report.—Vide also Long’s History of Jamaica.
15. Vide evidence of Mr. Newton, Mr. Claxton, and others.
16. I cannot vouch for the following fact, but it was related at the time with every appearance of authenticity. A few years ago the male convicts suffered very severely during their passage to New South Wales, and if I mistake not, for I speak from memory, several of them at length died from the hardships which they endured. On inquiring into the cause, it was stated to be, that the person whose province it was to provide necessaries for the voyage, had, by mistake, purchased such fetters as were used on board Slave ships, instead of the common fetters for convicts.
17. Vide evidence taken before the House of Commons.
18. Vide the late Publication of a professional Planter.
19. Vide Practical Rules for the Management of Negro Slaves, by a professional Planter. “New Negroes says he, court the warmest situations they can find, nothing less intense than actual fire being too hot for them. Hence we see that when they turn out in the morning, even in the low lands in the West Indies, they embrace their bodies closely with their wrappers to defend them from the cold.”
20. Vide the evidence of —— Botham, Esq. in the Minutes of Evidence taken before the Privy Council.
21. Vide Hume’s Essays, vol. i. page 407. Edinb. 1777. Cadell.
22. The professional Planter’s own words well deserve to be inserted: “For I aver it boldly, melancholy experience having given me occasion to make the remark, that a great number of Negroes have perished annually by diseases produced by inanition. To be convinced of this truth, let us trace the effect of that system, which assigned, for a Negro’s weekly allowance, six or seven pints of flour, or grain, with as many salt herrings; and it is in vain to conceal what we all know to be true, that in many of the islands they did not give more. With so scanty a pittance, It is indeed possible for the soul and body to be held together a considerable portion of time, provided a man’s only business be to live, and his spirits be husbanded with a frugal hand; but if motion short of labour, much more labour itself, and that too intense, be exacted from him, how is the body to support itself.”—“Their attempts to wield the hoe prove abortive, they shrink from their toil, and, being urged to perseverance by stripes, you are soon obliged to receive them into the hospital, whence, unless your plan be speedily corrected, they depart but to the grave. It may possibly be urged in palliation of this practice, that in cases of such short allowance as I have mentioned above, Negroes do not depend upon that solely for their subsistence, but that they derive considerable aid from little vacant spots on the estate, which they are allowed to cultivate on their own account. Though frequently otherwise, this may sometimes be the case; yet even there it is to be observed, that such spots, in the low-land plantations, are capable of producing only for a part of the year, either through the drought of the season or the sterility of the soil, and when that happens, the Negro is again at his short allowance; and having no honest means of eking it out, to make it square with the demands of nature, he is compelled to pilfer.”—The writer goes on to state, that the delinquent, extending his thefts, is detected and apprehended, is severely whipped and chained, and confined; but as neither chains nor stripes, nor confinement, can extinguish hunger, he returns, when released, to the same practices, till, partly from the discipline, partly from scanty nourishment, and colds from exposure during his desertion, he, ten to one, falls into a distempered habit, which soon hurries him out of the world. The close is very remarkable, “Now this was set down as a vicious incorrigible subject, and his death is deemed a beneficial release to the estate.”
23. Vide Privy Council Report—head, Antigua and Barbados—and some following articles.
24. Vide Captain Wilson’s evidence.
25. Vide a late publication on the beneficial effects of Christianity, by the venerable Bishop of London, a prelate in whom, whether in the closet, the pulpit, or the senate, the poor and the oppressed have ever found a zealous, and eloquent advocate.
26. “Are they Slaves? No, they are men; they are comrades; they are humble friends. Are they Slaves? Nay, rather fellow servants; if you reflect on the equal power of fortune over both you and them.”
“Were you to consider, that he, whom you call your Slave, is sprung from the same origin, enjoys the same climate, breathes the same air, and is subject to the same condition of life and death, you might as well think it possible for you to see him a Gentleman, as he to see you a Slave. In the fall of Varus, how many born of the most splendid parentage, and not unjustly expecting, for their exploits in war, a senatorial degree, hath fortune cast down! She hath made of one a shepherd, of another a cottager. And can you now despise the man, whose fortune is such, into which, while you despise it, you may chance to fall?”—Seneca, Epistle 47, p. 158.
27. Edwards’s History of the West Indies, 4to. vol. ii. page 124.
28. Dr. Pinckard’s Notes on the West Indies, printed for Longman. It ought, perhaps, in fairness to be mentioned, that the Author appears originally to have had no prejudices against the West Indian system.
29. Even before Mr. Long wrote, between thirty and forty years ago, this was a great evil. “And it is inconceivable,” says Mr. Long, “what numbers have perished in consequence of the law for recovery of debts, which permits Negroes to be levied on and sold at vendue. By this means they are frequently torn from their native spot, their dearest connections, and transferred into a situation unadapted to their health, labouring under discontent, which co-operates with change of place and circumstance to shorten their lives.” Long’s Jamaica, vol. ii. p. 435.
30. But a nearer, and more particular view of the manner of working may be necessary to those who have never seen a gang of Negroes at their work:
“When employed in the labour of the field, as for example, in holeing a cane piece, i. e. in turning up the ground with hoes into parallel trenches, for the reception of the cane plants, the Slaves of both sexes, from twenty perhaps to four score in number, are drawn out in a line, like troops on a parade, each with a hoe in his hand; and close to them in the rear is stationed a driver, or several drivers, in numbers duly proportioned to that of the gang. Each of these drivers, who are always the most active and vigorous Negroes on the estate, has in his hand, or coiled round his neck, from which by extending the handle it can be disengaged in a moment, a long, thick, and strongly platted whip, called a cart-whip, the report of which is as loud, and the lash as severe, as those of the whips in common use with our waggoners, and which he has authority to apply, at the instant when his eye perceives an occasion, without any previous warning. Thus disposed, their work begins, and continues without interruption for a certain number of hours, during which, at the peril of the drivers, an adequate portion of land must be holed.
“As the trenches (continues our Author) are generally rectilinear, and the whole line of holers advance together, it is necessary that every hole or section of the trench should be finished in equal time with the rest; and if any one or more Negroes were allowed to throw in the hoe with less rapidity or energy than their companions in other parts of the line, it is obvious that the work of the latter must be suspended; or else, such part of the trench as is passed over by the former, will be more imperfectly formed than the rest. It is therefore the business of the drivers not only to urge forward the whole gang with sufficient speed, but sedulously to watch that all in the line, whether male or female, old or young, strong or feeble, work as nearly as possible in equal time, and with equal effect. The tardy stroke must be quickened, and the languid invigorated, and the whole line made to dress, in the military phrase, as it advances. No breathing time, no resting on the hoe, no pause of languor, to be repaid by brisker exertion on return to work, can be allowed to individuals: all artist work, or pause together.”
31. Vide Evidence taken before the Committee of the House of Commons.
32. Dr. Pinckard’s late publication adds some painful instances of this sort to others contained in the evidence of very respectable men.
33. Vide House of Commons papers.
34. The very words which I am now writing suggest to my mind another possible explanation of the conduct of the Assembly of Barbadoes. Possibly the majority, in rejecting the Governor’s proposition, acted not so much from their own judgment and feelings, as from deference to those of the bulk of the community. Considering that, as is stated above, it must be regarded as a part of their duty to set the tone of public judgment and feelings, this would not be a very creditable plea; nor have I found any hint of it in the papers laid before the House of Commons; but, on the contrary, an expression of resentment against the Governor, with an intimation of the danger of interfering between Master and Slave. But as the idea in question has occurred to me, I think I should scarcely be acting candidly in suppressing it.
35. Long’s History of Jamaica, vol. ii. page 406.
36. The passage to which I allude, contains such important truths, and bears so strongly on the point now under discussion, that I shall take the liberty of inserting a large part of it. I should place it in the Appendix, but that, for various reasons, I wish not to introduce in the Appendix any article respecting the West Indian branch of the subject.
“To superior morality I lay no claim; but I understood my interest, and happily, interest and morality were not in that case, as in many others, at variance. I lost very few Negroes in comparison with other gentlemen, even of such as were purchased out of Guinea yards, and surprisingly few of the infants born on the estate.
“It may be urged, as an objection to this system of management, that the expence attending it would be too great to be defrayed with such a portion of the produce of the estate as it is consistent with prudence to apply to that object alone. That the expences of estates will be considerably larger than at present I admit, because it is proposed that the Negroes should be fed and clothed more liberally than they now are, and be more indulged during their indisposition; whence an excess of expence, and an apparent decrease of income: But let it be remembered at the same time, that an expenditure, when judiciously applied, is not a waste, but the investment of a capital with a view to productive return. It will be found so in this case; for, when Negroes are so treated, there will be fewer sick than in the common mode of management, and they will certainly be enabled to make much more vigorous efforts when engaged at their labour; for they will be more robust of body, more alert and contented in mind, so that, performing more work, the gross income of the estate, far from being reduced, will necessarily experience a considerable increase. But not only the gross income will be greater, but it may be presumed that fewer Negroes will die, and that more will be born, so as to afford a reasonable hope that your number may be kept entire without any foreign recruits; whence a saving in itself, probably equivalent to the extraordinaries incurred by the proposed melioration of their treatment; and the balance at the end of the year, so far from being against the planter, will probably be in his favour. Were it, however, otherwise, who would not submit to a small pecuniary loss, for the inappreciable advantage resulting from a mind contented with itself, and conscious of no neglect of duty? As to those who are unfortunately in such a situation, with respect to incumbrance and credit, as to be disabled from supplying their Negroes as they ought, it behoves them to consider whether by the utmost their undue savings can effect, they can possibly be retrieved from their embarrassments, and if they can, they ought seriously to ponder on the consequence by which their relief is to be obtained; that it must be by the blood of their own species—a horrid thought; and if they cannot, how much better would it be for them to surrender at once their property to their creditors, and to repose in the humble, though exquisite enjoyment of ease of mind, and a fair name, and to trust to recommendations for a future subsistence, which, in the West Indies, is never denied to the industrious, while it is frequently conferred on the undeserving.”
37. Vide Privy Council Report, Part III. Jamaica, A. No. 5.
38. Edwards’s History of the West Indies, vol. ii. p. 20.
39. Edwards’s History of the West Indies, vol. ii. p. 18.
40. It is a mistake however to suppose, that, from any natural or moral infirmity, the Negroes are not as willing as the people of other countries to perform ordinary out-of-doors work for hire, as free labourers. This was decisively proved both in the Sierra Leone and Bulam Colonies. Vide Sierra Leone Company’s Report; and Beaver’s African Memoranda. This fact, through inadvertency, was not inserted in its proper place; but it ought not to be left unnoticed, because several authors have confidently stated the contrary as an undoubted fact. Their works were in general, I believe, written before the publication of the intelligence from Sierra Leone and Bulam.
41. Vide Privy Council Report, Nov. 12th 1788; 2d Report of the House of Assembly of Jamaica.
42. Institute schools for their children.
43. Why should not a right of giving evidence, with perhaps some other civil distinctions, be granted to any Slaves who have lived creditably in the marriage state, for three or five years. They might think little of these distinctions at first; but accompany them with some outward mark, and they will produce their effect. No distinctions are more impressive, than those which are arbitrary, and the essential nature of which is little understood.
44. See the publication of Mr. Canes, a most experienced and benevolent West Indian proprietor.
45. Vide Report of the Committee of the House of Assembly of Jamaica, in the Papers presented to the House of Commons.
46. See evidence taken before the House of Commons.
47. This is fully confirmed by the Assembly of Jamaica. See Privy Council Report.
48. These expectations have been just now confirmed by the welcome tidings, that, on the recommendation of the President of the United States, Congress are passing an act for abolishing the Slave Trade on January 1st 1808.
49. Vol. ii. p. 442–3.
50. Ibid. p. 444.
51. Vol. ii. p. 442.
52. Nothing can shew more clearly the degree of this security, than that the Jamaica newspapers have been allowed to print, not only the detailed account of all our parliamentary debates about the abolition of the Slave Trade, but even the particulars of the St. Domingo transactions.—Surely the West Indian Petitioners to the House of Lords were ignorant of these facts, or rather perhaps they thought the Abolitionists were ignorant of them, when the mere discussion of the question here was stated to be so alarming.
53. See Dr. Pinckard’s late work; Notes on the West Indies.
54. The petition of the Assembly of Jamaica, in 1775, plainly recognizes the source of danger here alluded to. “Weak and feeble (says the Assembly) as this colony is, from its very small number of white inhabitants, and its peculiar situation, from the incumbrance of more than 200,000 Slaves,” &c. &c.
55. For the illustration of this part of the subject, and of many other topics which I have slightly touched, I must refer my readers to Mr. Brougham’s Colonial Policy; a work from some parts of which I must express my decided dissent, but which contains a most valuable fund of commercial and financial, political and moral facts, and suggestions on all the various subjects connected with colonial interests and affairs.
56. See Mr. Parke’s account of his journey to the coast from the interior.
57. Let it be considered what immense numbers of Negroes have of late years been removed from our older islands to Trinidad, or to Guiana.
58. Compare this with Captain Hill’s and Wilson’s, and especially with Mr. Wadstrom’s evidence.
59. Compare this with Mr. Howe’s evidence.
60. Compare this with the absolute denial of such practices, or of any term for them, by Opponents’ witnesses.
61. Page 42.
62. Vol. ii. 237. English translation by Blagdon.
63. Vol. ii. 340–1.
64. House of Commons Evidence, p. 4, 5.
65. Ditto, p. 81–2.
66. House of Commons Evidence, p. 40.