Great movements are too often connected with the names of one or two prominent men, to the neglect of others whose services are highly meritorious. Laziness rather than unfairness may be assigned as the cause of this mistake. The popular consciousness, unable to hold together names, according to gradation of merit, settles on one or two as convenient pegs for the memory, and discards the remainder. Hence it comes about that commanders acquire undying fame which may be due to their chiefs of staff; and statesmen are reputed the authors of measures which they accepted doubtfully from their permanent officials.

It is by some such process of hasty labelling that the name of Wilberforce is often affixed alone to the movement for the liberation of the slaves. True, he deserves to hold a very high place in the roll-call of the champions of philanthropy. But the following short summary will suffice to suggest that many other names, now wellnigh forgotten, deserve to be held in equal honour. Of those who helped to arouse public opinion on this question George Fox and William Edmundson come first in point of time. They lifted up their voice in and after the year 1671 against the cruelties inflicted on negro slaves in Barbadoes and elsewhere; but we do not find that their views on slavery affected a large number of their co-religionists until the year 1727, when the Society of Friends in their annual meeting at London passed a resolution condemning both the slave trade and the owning of slaves.730 This conviction spread to the Quakers of Pennsylvania (the “Quaker State”) where worthy members of the Society succeeded in arousing public opinion even against the institution of slavery.

Reverting to England, with which alone we are concerned, we find the Quakers striving to stop the worst abuses of the Slave Trade. The Treaty of Utrecht (1713) had handed over to England a great part of that traffic; and Chatham himself boasted that his conquests in Africa during the Seven Years’ War had placed almost the whole of it in British hands. When a man of his elevation of thought held this language, we can imagine that the many looked on the trade as a pillar of the Empire, and derided its few opponents as lunatics.

Not that public opinion was wholly blind to its evils. In the year 1750 Parliament had passed an Act forbidding the kidnapping of negroes; but it proved wholly ineffective; and, as the horrors connected with the Slave Trade became better known, the Society of Friends warned all its members to abstain from any connection whatever with so unholy a traffic (1758). Three years later it resolved to disown any who should disregard this warning.731 Thus, to the religious zeal and consistency of the Friends we are indebted for the first attempts to abolish this traffic. No small community has ever rendered a greater service to the cause of religion and humanity.

It should be noted in passing that their action and that of later abolitionists helped to link together these two ideals in a manner which was to be infinitely fruitful. In this connection Granville Sharp, John Wesley, Clarkson, Paley, Wilberforce, Buxton, Zachary Macaulay, and many others may be named as proving the close union that subsisted between religious conviction and the philanthropic movement. The power of religion to impel to good works shone forth in all of them. Wilberforce gave scarcely a thought to the slaves until the work of grace began in his own heart. In 1774 Wesley published his work, “Thoughts upon Slavery,” which greatly furthered the cause. Indeed, it should be noticed as one of the influences marking off the philanthropic movement in England from that of France that here for the most part it was an offshoot of the Evangelical Revival, whereas in France the efforts of Voltaire and the Encyclopaedists imparted to similar efforts a strongly anti-Catholic bias. These facts were destined to mould the future of religion and politics in the two lands. Here philanthropists and statesmen were the mainstay of religion. There the slow cessation of persecution and the reluctant abandonment of privileges by the Roman Church ranged social reformers against her, with results that were to appear in the Revolution.

Fortunately, in England law reinforced the efforts of philanthropists. In 1772, Chief Justice Mansfield gave a decision that a slave who landed on English soil became a free man. The case arose out of the conduct of a West India merchant settled in London, who by sheer brutality had rendered a slave useless for work, had turned him adrift, but again claimed him when healed by a kind-hearted physician. Granville Sharp thenceforth made it the business of his life to see justice done to the negro race, and was chiefly instrumental in bringing the whole question to a practical issue by founding in 1787 the first Abolitionist Society.

Before adverting to its labours, with which Pitt so deeply sympathized, we may notice a few facts connected with the traffic in human flesh. The evidence of Robert Norris, of Liverpool, before a Parliamentary Commission in the year 1775 showed that of the 74,000 negroes believed to be taken annually from Africa to the New World, British ships carried about 38,000; French, 20,000; Portuguese, 10,000; Dutch, 4,000; Danish, 2,000. The greater part came from Bonny, New Calabar, the Gold Coast, and Loango. Gambia is credited with exporting only 700, a suspiciously low estimate. The same witness asserted that only one slave in twenty-seven died on the voyage, while one seaman in sixteen succumbed.732 Estimates, however, varied very greatly. Macpherson gave 97,000 as the number of slaves imported into the New World from Africa in the year 1768.733 Efforts were made by merchants to depict the passage on the ocean as pleasant, amusements being provided on the way. But it soon transpired that the chief amusement was compulsory singing, while the “dancing” proved to be jumping in chains at the sound of the lash. It was also known that very many negroes died soon after landing during the process known as seasoning to the climate and work; that the whip was freely used in the plantations; and that the mortality among the slaves was extremely heavy. In this connection the name of Burke deserves to be held in honour; for he proposed that the Attorney-General in each colony should be empowered to act as Protector of the negroes.

Thus, even before the Abolitionist Society began its labours, public opinion was beginning to brand the traffic with infamy. The year 1783 saw efforts made in Parliament to repress some of its worst abuses; and the Society of Friends then sent up the first petition for the total abrogation of the traffic in British vessels.734 The year 1785 witnessed the publication of Clarkson’s Latin essay on the subject; and a twelvemonth later it came out in English. In 1783 also the efforts of the Rev. James Ramsay, Rector of Teston, Kent, who had seen the evils of slavery during his residence at St. Kitt’s, brought the subject home to the mind of his neighbour, Lady Middleton; and she in her turn impressed it as a Christian duty on Wilberforce to bring forward a motion in Parliament. As this appeal harmonized with the strong religious convictions now swaying the nature of the young member for Yorkshire, he felt strongly moved to take up the cause of the negroes. In the year 1786 he made many inquiries among African and West India merchants, and found much error in their information. After probing the matter, he resolved to consult Pitt as to his making this question the chief object of his life.

The conversation took place under an old oak-tree in Pitt’s grounds at Holwood, above the steep descent into Keston vale. The opinions of the two friends, as we have seen, had somewhat diverged. Pitt did not sympathize with the pietism which now dominated the life of Wilberforce; but his religion was of a working type, and he may have welcomed the growth of convictions of a more practical kind, which would wean his friend from excessive introspection. Certain it is that he urged him to take up the cause of the slaves as one well suited to his character and talents. Wilberforce therefore resolved to give notice of his intention to bring the subject before Parliament. Would that we knew the details of that conversation illustrative of the character of two of the most interesting men of the age. Even so, the resolve there formed renders illustrious the tree under which it was formed, fitly called “Wilberforce’s oak.”735

The three strands of effort which we have traced from their feeble beginnings, viz., those originating with the Quakers, Granville Sharp, and Ramsay, were now to combine. In 1787, as we have seen, Granville Sharp, in connection with London Friends, formed a “Committee for procuring Evidence on the Slave Trade,” which was to become the famous Abolitionist Society. At the first meeting on 22nd May 1787, only ten were present. Their names deserve to be recorded. Granville Sharp (Chairman), J. Barton, Thomas Clarkson, W. Dillwyn, S. Hoare (junr.), J. Hooper, J. Lloyd, R. Phillips, P. Sanson, J. Woods. All but two were Quakers, and the minutes and letters abound in “thous” and “thees.” One of the aims of the Committee was to distribute Clarkson’s and other pamphlets on the subject. In October 1787 the Committee received a letter from Brissot and Clavière, the future leaders of the French Girondins, expressing the wish to promote their views in France, where, as is well known, the abolitionists achieved a speedy but illusory triumph in 1790.

As there has been some controversy respecting the initiation of this movement, it is well to note that not until 30th October 1787 did the Committee receive a letter from Wilberforce. He then asked for information as speedily as possible. The Minutes of the Committee show that he was not a member until the year 1794, and it is an exaggeration to say that “he directed their endeavours.”736 Their aim was to stir up the great towns to petition to Parliament. In this they achieved a marked success. Indeed, it was rather the formation of a strong public opinion by the labours of the Committee, than the many motions in Parliament, which at last brought triumph to the cause. Manchester and Birmingham soon displayed great interest in the subject. A kindred society was formed at the latter town. That at London grew in importance, and funds came in rapidly. Wilberforce wrote to Eden on 18th January 1788: “The fire is kindled in various parts of the Kingdom and the flame spreads wider and wider.”737 One of the petitions resulting from the labours of the parent committee deserves mention here. It came from 769 freemen cutlers of Sheffield, was dated 24th April 1789, and stated that, though the exports of petitioners to the African coast might fall off if the Slave Trade were abolished, yet they were so convinced of its inhumanity that they begged Parliament to sweep it away.738

Petitions of the same tenour had long been coming in, and Pitt therefore instituted an inquiry by the Privy Council respecting the whole question, including the condition of the slaves in the colonies.739 One of the replies, that from Bermuda, of 10th June 1788, is typically optimistic. Governor Browne affirmed that the slaves in those islands were exceedingly well treated. Out of 4,900 slaves not more than five a year deserted. During the late war many had served on privateers and, when captured and taken to the United States, nearly all managed to make their way back to their masters. This report is a specimen of the arguments which compelled Ministers to some measure of caution.740

There is, however, abundant proof that Pitt, though a recent recruit to the movement, espoused it with enthusiasm. During the difficult negotiations with France in the autumn of 1787, we find Wilberforce informing Eden, our envoy at Paris, of Pitt’s interest in the endeavour to stop the Slave Trade, a matter which would be greatly facilitated if France would agree to take the same step.741 On 2nd November Pitt followed up his friend’s letter by another appeal to Eden to induce the French Government “to discontinue the villainous traffic now carried on in Africa.”742 The following letter, hitherto unpublished, from Pitt to Eden, further shows his hope that Eden, who was soon to take the embassy at Madrid, would be able to influence that Court also:

The reply of the French Government in January 1788 was discouraging. Montmorin and his colleagues avowed their sympathy with the cause, but, fearing that it would not succeed in England, refused to commit themselves.744 The advent of Necker to power in August aroused Pitt’s hopes;745 but he too temporized, thereby prejudicing the success of the cause in these islands. Spain refused to stir in the matter.

Meanwhile Wilberforce had given notice of a motion on the subject, but a severe illness in February and March 1788 left him in a state of weakness which precluded the least effort. Before leaving for Bath, he begged Pitt to bring forward the motion for him. The Prime Minister consented, says Wilberforce, “with a warmth of principle and friendship that have made me love him better than I ever did before.” Nevertheless he acted with caution. Up to the beginning of the year 1788, at least, he had not brought the matter before the Cabinet, probably because he knew that most of its members would oppose him. In the country also a formidable opposition was arising, and, as usually happens in such cases, enthusiasts clamoured at delay as treason to the cause.746 Perhaps it was this which led him to request a conference with Sharp. It took place on 21st April, and is thus reported in the Minutes of the Committee:

On 9th May Pitt brought his motion before the House, but pending the conclusion of the official inquiry, he offered no opinion on the subject, for which he was sharply twitted by Fox and Burke. His conduct was far from pleasing to the more ardent spirits. One of them, the venerable Sir William Dolben, member for the University of Oxford, after inspecting a slave-ship in the Thames, determined to lose no time in alleviating the misery of the many living cargoes that crossed the ocean. He therefore brought in a Bill for temporarily regulating the transport of slaves in British ships. In the course of the discussions Pitt declared that, even though the proposed regulations involved the trade in ruin, as was maintained, he would nevertheless vote for them; and if the trade could not be regulated, he would vote for its abolition as “shocking to humanity, abominable to be carried on by any country, and which reflected the greatest dishonour on the British Senate and the British nation.” He further startled the House by proposing that the regulations should become operative from that day—10th June. The hold which he had on members was shown by the division, fifty-six voting for the measure and only five against it. In the Upper House no minister save the Duke of Richmond ventured to defend this unusual enactment; and the Chancellor, Thurlow, spoke strongly against it. Sydney also opposed it, though with moderation (25th June). Pitt’s feelings when he heard of their action are shown in a phrase of his letter to Grenville, dated Cambridge, 29th June, that if the Bill failed he and the opposers would not remain members of the same Cabinet. This declaration does honour to his heart and his judgement. It proves the warmth of his feelings on the subject and his sense of the need of discipline in the Cabinet. Had the measure failed to pass the Lords, a Cabinet crisis of the gravest kind would have arisen. As it was, however, the great efforts put forth by Pitt among his friends sufficed to carry the day against Thurlow by a majority of two. We catch a glimpse of what an average man thought of this incident in the pages of Wraxall. After adverting to the nobility of Pitt’s motives and the strength of Thurlow’s arguments against the retrospective action of the Bill, the chronicler thus passes judgement: “Thurlow argued as a statesman, Pitt acted as a moralist.” We also have the warrant of Wraxall for stating that, not until George III gave his assent to the measure, did Pitt “allow” him to prorogue Parliament.748

Ship-owners and slave-owners had, however, been driven only from the first outwork of their citadel, and had time to strengthen their defences before the matter came up again in 1789. After a delay, caused by the King’s malady and by the length of the inquiry into the Slave Trade by a committee of the Privy Council, Wilberforce brought the question before the House on 12th May in one of the ablest and most eloquent speeches of that age. For three and a half hours he held the attention of the House as he recounted the horrors which slave-hunting spread through Africa, and the hell of suffering of the middle passage. He showed how legitimate trade would increase with the growth of confidence between man and man in that Continent, and he asserted that the sympathies of King Louis XVI, Necker, and the French nation would probably lead that country to follow our example in abolishing a traffic degrading to all concerned in it. He then proved from official information concerning the slaves in our West India islands, that wise treatment of them and suppression of vice would ensure a sufficient increase of population to meet the needs of the planters. He concluded by moving twelve resolutions setting forth the facts of the case as detailed in the Report of the Privy Council. This mode of procedure earned general approval. Burke bestowed his blessing on the proposal (for such it was in effect) to abolish so hateful a traffic. Pitt gave the measure his warm approval, but stated that he was prepared to give a hearing to all objections. One such he noticed, namely, that foreign nations would step in and secretly supply our West India islands with slaves. He declared that Great Britain was strong enough to prevent so insidious a device; but he hoped, rather, that other peoples would desire to share in the honour of abolishing the trade; and we might confidently negotiate with them to that end, or wait for the effect which our example would produce. Fox followed in the same strain, and prophesied that France would soon “catch a spark from our fire and run a race with us in promoting the ends of humanity.”749

But these unanswerable arguments were of no avail against shippers, slave-owners, and colonial traders. In vain did Wilberforce point out that the prosperity of Liverpool did not depend upon the Slave Trade; for the tonnage of the slave-ships was only one-fifteenth of that of the whole port. Liverpool saw nothing but ruin ahead; and it must be admitted that that class of traffic was then by far the most lucrative to the growing city on the Mersey. It has been computed that in the decade 1783–93, Liverpool slave-ships made 878 “round voyages” (i.e. from Liverpool to the Guinea Coast, thence to the West Indies, and back to the Mersey), carried 303,737 slaves and sold them for £15,186,850.750 It is not surprising, then, that Clarkson was mobbed when he went there to collect evidence as to the terrible mortality of our seamen engaged in the trade,751 and was known to be purchasing “mouth-openers,” those ingenious devices by which slavers forced open the mouths of those of their victims who sought release by voluntary starvation. Bristol, though it had only eighteen ships in the trade, was also up in arms; for it depended largely on the refining of sugar and the manufacture of rum. Even the veteran reformer, Alderman Sawbridge, foresaw ruin for his constituency, the City of London, if the trade were further interfered with. Persons of a rhetorical turn depicted in lurid colours the decay of Britain’s mercantile marine, the decline of her wealth, and the miseries of a sugar famine. Others sought to frighten the timid by declaring that, as shippers and planters had embarked large sums of money in the trade in reliance on Parliament, they were entitled to absolutely full compensation for the heavy losses which must result from its abolition or further curtailment.752 In short, all the menaces, based on assumed legal rights, were set forth with vehemence and pertinacity.

The result was seen in the increasing acrimony of the opponents of abolition in Parliament. They poured scorn on the evidence adduced before the Privy Council in a way which brought from Pitt a sharp retort, but they insisted, and with success, on the hearing of evidence at the bar of the House. These dilatory tactics protracted the discussion until it was necessary to postpone it to the next year.

Before the end of the session of 1789 an important change came about in the Cabinet. Sydney had long disagreed with Pitt respecting the Slave Trade, and therefore, early in June, offered his resignation. There could be but one opinion as to his successor. William Wyndham Grenville had long shown high capacity both in diplomatic affairs and more recently in his conduct of the Speakership of the House. His speech on the trade marked him out as a strong supporter of Pitt; and on 5th June he became Secretary of State for Home Affairs with a seat in the Cabinet. His accession was a gain for the Administration and a further source of strength for Pitt, who had long felt great confidence in his judgement and tact.753 Henry Addington, son of the physician who long attended the first Earl of Chatham, was chosen Speaker of the House of Commons by a large majority over the Whig nominee, Sir Gilbert Elliot.

One other change ought to have taken place. The language used by Lord Thurlow against Pitt had long been petulant, and his irritation against the abolitionists led him to strange lengths in the summer of 1789.754 Their differences caused an almost complete rupture. But, for the present, Pitt could not insist on his resignation. On the question now at issue George III agreed with Thurlow.755 He also seems to have been quite unaware of the shifty course adopted by the Chancellor at the beginning of his late malady and believed him to be thoroughly devoted to his person. It argues no small amount of self-restraint and honourable reticence in Pitt that he should have taken no steps to inform the King of the meditated defection of Thurlow. George III therefore continued to believe in the whole hearted devotion of the Lord Chancellor; and on two occasions during the year 1789 he wrote to Pitt expressing his desire that the two Ministers should endeavour to work together cordially for the good of the realm.756 It is consonant with what we know of Thurlow’s character that he presumed on the King’s partiality towards him, and played the part of the one necessary man in a way highly exasperating to Pitt. But the precarious state of the King’s health and his known dislike of dismissing old servants availed to postpone the inevitable rupture until the year 1792. The retention of Thurlow may be considered one of the causes of the failure of the abolitionists at this time.

In the spring of the year 1790 the champions of the Slave Trade believed that they saw signs of waning enthusiasm on the part of the public, and on 23rd April sought to stop the further examination of witnesses at the bar of the House. Wilberforce, Fox, and Pitt protested against these tactics, but Pitt intimated that he did not consider the question one which Ministers were pledged to support. The case for a free and full inquiry was overwhelming, and it was continued. That Pitt acted in close connection with Fox on this whole question appears by his letter to Wilberforce on 22nd April, which further shows that he also considered the evidence so voluminous and important as to afford little hope of the question being disposed of in that session.757

This was most unfortunate. The friends of abolition never had a better opportunity than in the early part of 1790. Later on in that year the risk of war with Spain (see Chapter XXIV) and the prospect of a revolt of the slaves in the French West Indies began to turn Britons against a measure which, they were told, would weaken the mercantile marine and lead to the loss of the West Indies. In this case, as in many others, the influence of the French Revolution militated against the cause of steady reform in England. The National Assembly had early declared the principle of freedom of the slaves in the French colonies; but owing to the violent opposition of the planters and merchants, the decree remained a dead letter. In the spring of 1790 the question came up once more; but again the majority sought to shelve the question. Lord Robert Stephen Fitzgerald, the British envoy at Paris, commended the prudence and self-restraint of the Assembly “in not agitating the two great questions concerning the emancipation of the negroes and the abolition of the Slave Trade, which had at the first setting out raised so violent a spirit of party.”758 The planters and West India merchants still threatened that the Colonial Assemblies (established in the year 1787) would declare their independence if those decrees were passed, on the ground that they were not bound by the acts of the French Assembly. Mirabeau, along with all practical statesmen, forebore from pressing the point; and it is highly probable that the politic caution of the French reformers, despite their sensibility and enthusiasm, told upon public opinion in England.

Such were the discouraging conditions amidst which a General Election was held in the summer of 1790. It increased Pitt’s hold on the House of Commons; but, as he had refrained from making the Slave Trade a ministerial question, the result did not imply the victory of abolition. In the month of November he took a step which furthered the prospects of the cause. He recommended Grenville for the peerage as Baron Grenville, partly in recognition of his services, but mainly because he needed a trusty friend and capable debater in the Upper House as a check on Thurlow. He assured Wilberforce that distrust of the Lord Chancellor was the true reason that prompted the transfer of Grenville to the Lords.759 We find Pitt writing on 24th November 1790 to his mother in high spirits. He hoped for great things from Grenville in the Upper House. As for “prophets of schisms,” they would be refuted. The opening of the new Parliament would find the Ministry in “more strength than has belonged to us since the beginning of the Government.”760

The question came before Parliament on 18th and 19th April 1791, when Wilberforce in a masterly way summarized the official evidence and moved for leave to bring in a Bill abolishing the Slave Trade. Some of the arguments on the other side were curious. Grosvenor admitted that the trade was an “unamiable” one, but he declined to “gratify his humanity at the expense of the interests of his country, and thought we should not too curiously inquire into the unpleasant circumstances with which it was perhaps attended.” Less finnikin was the objection raised by Lord John Russell and others, that, if we suppressed the trade, France, Spain, and Holland would step in to take it up. This and the question of vested interests formed the only reply to Wilberforce, Fox, and Pitt. The Prime Minister declared that he had never been more interested in the fate of any proposal than the present one. He brushed aside the pleas of opponents, as wholly untenable, “unless gentlemen will in the first place prove to me that there are no laws of morality binding upon nations, and that it is no duty of a Legislature to restrain its subjects from invading the happiness of other countries and from violating the fundamental principles of justice.” He then proved from the statistics then available that the numbers of the slaves in the West Indies would under proper treatment increase in such a degree as to supply the labour needed for the plantations, without bringing ruin upon Africa. But argument and reasoning were useless. Mammon carried the day by 163 to 88.761

The events of the year 1791 further depressed the hopes of philanthropists. After much wobbling on the subject the National Assembly of France passed a decree liberating the slaves in French colonies, and granting to them the full rights of citizenship (15th May). The results were disastrous. Already there had been serious trouble in the French West Indies, owing to the progress of democratic ideas among the mulattos and slaves; and the news that they were thenceforth politically the equals of planters and merchants, who had ever resisted their claims, led to terrible risings of the slaves, especially in the west of St. Domingo, where plantations and cities felt the blind fury of their revenge. By the end of the year the most flourishing colony of France was a wreck.762

The heedless haste of French reformers worked ruin far and wide. Extremes are fatal to the happy mean; for the populace rarely takes the trouble to distinguish between reckless innovation and the healing of a palpable grievance. Among the unfortunate results of the French Revolution not the least was the tendency to extremes of feeling produced by it in France and all neighbouring peoples. Those who approved its doctrines generally became giddy with enthusiasm; those who disapproved turned livid with hatred. Burke in his “Reflections on the French Revolution” had lately set the example of treating the whole subject in a crusading spirit. The flood of sentimentality, unloosed by that attractive work, was now near high-water mark; and for a space the age of chivalry seemed about to return.

The news of the horrors at St. Domingo came opportunely to double the force of his prophecies. The cause of the slaves suffered untold harm.763 Any change in existing customs was dubbed treason to the Commonwealth. Men did not stop to contrast the rash methods of the Amis des Noirs with those advocated by Pitt. Still less did they ask how the stoppage of the importation of infuriated negroes into the West Indian colonies, and the more humane treatment of those who were there, could lead to a servile revolt. Wilberforce was fain to exclaim that nothing was so cruel as sensibility. His campaign against the Slave Trade made little or no progress in the early part of 1792. “People here,” he wrote, “are all panic-struck with the transactions in St. Domingo and the apprehension, or pretended apprehension, of the like in Jamaica.” Many friends advised him to postpone all further action for a year until the panic was over. Among these was Pitt, so we may judge from the curt reference of Wilberforce to what went on at an informal committee meeting on the subject: “Pitt threw out against Slave motion, on St. Domingo account.” He also speaks of a slackening of their cordiality.

The folly of Clarkson in advocating Jacobinical ideas at a meeting held at the Crown and Anchor in the Strand further damaged the cause. Nevertheless, detestation of the Slave Trade was still very keen. Friends of the slaves began to forswear sugar and take to honey. Petitions against the traffic in human flesh poured in at St. Stephen’s; and those who spoke of delay were held to be backsliders. This is the sense which we must attach to a phrase in a letter sent to Wilberforce: “From London to Inverness Mr. Pitt’s sincerity is questioned, and unless he can convince the nation of his cordiality in our cause, his popularity must suffer greatly.”764 The questioning was needless. Pitt considered the time inopportune for bringing the motion before a Parliament which had already rejected it. When, however, Wilberforce persisted, he gave him his enthusiastic support.

The debate of 2nd April 1792 was remarkable in more ways than one. The opponents of the measure now began to shift their ground. Colonel Tarleton, member for Liverpool, continued to harp on the ruin that must befall his town; but others, notably Dundas, and the Speaker (Addington) admitted the evils of the trade, and the probability that in a few years the needs of the planters might be met from the negro population already in the islands. Dundas therefore moved an amendment in favour of a “moderate” reform, or a “gradual” reform. Fox manfully castigated this proposal, which assumed that there might be moderation in murder. Nevertheless Jenkinson (the future Earl of Liverpool) made a trimming speech in favour of regulating, not abolishing, the trade.

Pitt then arose. The rays of dawn were already lighting up the windows on the east when he began his memorable speech. First, he expressed his satisfaction that members were generally agreed as to the abolition of the traffic being only a question of time. Mankind would therefore before long be delivered “from the severest and most extensive calamity recorded in the history of the world.” Grappling with the arguments of Jenkinson and Dundas, he proceeded to show that the immediate abolition of the Slave Trade would in many ways be an advantage to the West Indies, as it would restrict the often excessive outlay of the planters and deliver our colonies from the fear of servile insurrections like that of St. Domingo. Planters must rely upon the natural increase of the black population which would accelerate under good treatment. If, said he, that population decreases, it can be only from ill treatment. If it is increasing, there is no need for a trade which involves a frightful loss of life both on sea and in the process of “seasoning” the human freitage in the West Indies.

Adverting to the Act of 1750, which was claimed as authorizing the trade, Pitt proved from its wording that the supply of negroes for our colonies was then deemed to be essential, and that a clause of it, which was continually violated, expressly forbade the use of fraud or violence in the procuring of the cargo. But, even if that law rendered the trade legal, had any Legislature a right to sanction fraud and violence? As well might a man think himself bound by a promise to commit murder. He next scouted the argument that, if we gave up the trade, other peoples would rush in and take our place. Would France, now that she had abolished slavery? Would Denmark, seeing that she had resolved gradually to abolish the trade? As to other lands, it was more probable that they would follow the example soon to be set by this land.

Having traversed the statements of opponents, Pitt raised the whole question to a higher level by reminding the House of the export of slaves from Britain to Rome, and by reconstructing with mordant irony the arguments of Roman senators on its behalf, as a legitimate and useful device for using the surplus population of a hopelessly barbarous people. Warming to his theme, he thrilled his hearers by contrasting the state of these islands, had they continued to supply the Roman slave-mart, with the freedom, happiness, and civilization that now were their lot. He besought members, as they valued these blessings, to see to it that they were extended to Africa; and, catching inspiration from the rays of the sun which now lit up the Hall, he pictured the natives of Africa in some not distant future “engaged in the calm occupations of industry, in the pursuits of a just and legitimate commerce. We may behold the beams of science and philosophy breaking in upon their land, which, at some happy period in still later times may blaze with full lustre; and, joining their influence to that of pure religion, may illuminate and invigorate the most distant extremities of that immense Continent. Then may we hope that even Africa, though last of all the quarters of the globe, shall enjoy at length in the evening of her days, those blessings which have descended so plentifully upon us in a much earlier period of the world. Then also will Europe, participating in her improvement and prosperity, receive an ample recompense for the tardy kindness (if kindness it can be called) of no longer hindering that Continent from extricating herself out of the darkness, which, in other more fortunate regions, has been so much more speedily dispelled:

Continuing in this lofty strain, in which enthusiasm and learning, reason and art, voice and gestures, enforced the pleadings of a noble nature, he avowed his faith in the cause of immediate abolition of the Slave Trade. The House thought otherwise. By 192 votes to 125 it accepted Dundas’s amendment in favour of gradual abolition.766 So far do the dictates of self-interest outweigh with many men those of righteousness and mercy, even when these are reinforced by the most moving appeals. Fox, Grey, and Windham agreed that Pitt’s speech was one of the most extraordinary displays of eloquence ever heard. If such was the opinion of opponents, we may imagine the impression produced on friends. Wilberforce declared that the speaker was as if inspired when he spoke of the hope of civilizing Africa—a topic which he (Wilberforce) had suggested to him on the previous morning.767

The outcome was not wholly disappointing. Three weeks later Dundas brought forward his resolutions for a gradual abolition of the trade. Wilberforce and Pitt failed to induce the House to fix 1st January 1795; but they carried it with them for 1st January 1796, though Dundas proposed a date four years later. The House of Lords, however, in deference to the speeches of the Duke of Clarence, and Lords Hawkesbury and Thurlow, proceeded to involve the whole question in uncertainty by deciding to hear the evidence on it at their own bar (8th May, 1792). Some votes were decided by Thurlow’s asseveration that this would not involve delay. The Archbishop of Canterbury soon came to see his mistake; and after a sleepless night he wrote on 9th May to Pitt that he was tortured by doubts as to the outcome of the affair. “My vote was given under a strong impression from the Chancellor’s solemn statement that an examination before a committee of the whole House would not be a cause of delay.... My conviction of the necessity of the abolition of the horrid trade is firm and unshaken.” He adds that he will explain his vote on the first possible occasion, and hopes that Pitt will show this letter to Grenville and Wilberforce.768

The Archbishop ought to have known that, with Thurlow, solemnity was often the cloak of maliciousness. It was so now. The examination of witnesses proceeded very slowly. On 5th June, after hearing only five of them, the Lords decided to postpone the hearing of others until the following year.769 The dismissal of Thurlow, which (as we see in a later chapter) followed on 15th June 1792, was due in the last instance to his pert censures of Pitt’s finance; but it may be ascribed also to his acrimonious opposition to Pitt on the question of abolition, and to his underhand means of defeating him in the House of Lords.

Other events also seemed to tell against the philanthropists. The connection of some of them with the Radical clubs, and their use of addresses and petitions to overbear the opposition in Parliament clearly made a bad impression on Pitt. After issuing the royal proclamation against seditious writings in May 1792 he showed his disapproval of their methods; and during the subsequent negotiations for a union with the moderate Whigs, in order to form a truly national administration, he confessed to Loughborough that he must make some concession to the Whig Houses on the question of abolition.770 This is the first clear sign of his intention to shelve the measure until the return of more settled times.

They were not to come for wellnigh a decade. The declaration of war by the French Republic on 1st February 1793 turned men’s minds away from philanthropy to destruction. The results were soon visible. A measure proposed by Wilberforce, to prohibit the supply to foreigners of slaves in British ships, failed to pass the Commons, despite the able speeches of Pitt, Fox, and Francis in its favour (5th June 1793). In the Lords meanwhile the Duke of Clarence (the future William IV) spoke against the original proposal with great bitterness, denouncing the abolitionists as fanatics and hypocrites, and expressly naming Wilberforce among them. This insolence was far from meeting with the chastisement that it deserved; but his words were taken as a sign that the royal family was pledged to the support of the odious traffic.

It may be well to notice here a remarkable effort of the chief abolitionists, and to add a few words about the men themselves. Early in the year 1791 some of them sought to show that under favourable conditions negroes were capable of self-government. Accordingly they formed a Sierra Leone Committee for the purpose of settling liberated slaves on that part of the coast of West Africa. In the Pitt Papers is a letter of 18th April 1791, from the first overseer, Falconbridge, to Granville Sharp, which the latter forwarded to Pitt, giving a heartrending account of the state of the thirty-six men and twenty women who formed the settlement. Fevers and ulcers were rife. Outrages by white men had made the tribes defiant, and a native chief hard by was far from friendly. Falconbridge adds: “That lump of deformity, the Slave Trade, has so debauched the minds of the natives that they are lost to every principle of honor and honesty. The scenes of iniquity and murder I daily hear of, occasioned by this damnable traffic, make my nature revolt.” He had named the bay and village Granville Bay and Town; but, as the latter was already overgrown with bushes, he was planting another at Fora Bay. He concludes—“For God’s sake send me a ship of force (warship).”771 Such were the feeble beginnings of a colony of which Zachary Macaulay was to be the first Governor.

Here, as in other parts of this philanthropic movement, Pitt displayed little or no initiative. To the cause of abolition he gave the support of his eloquence and his influence in Parliament; but he gave no decided lead in these and cognate efforts, a fact which somewhat detracts from his greatness as a statesman in this formative period. The merit of starting the movement and of utilizing new openings belongs to the Quakers, to Granville Sharp, Clarkson, Wilberforce and his friends. The member for Yorkshire had grouped around him at his abode, Broomfield, Clapham Common, or at his town house in Palace Yard, Westminster, a number of zealous workers, among whom Henry Thornton, James Stephen (his brother-in-law), Thomas Babington, and Zachary Macaulay were prominent. His chief correspondents were Dr. Milner (Dean of Carlisle), Lord Muncaster, Sir Charles Middleton, Rev. John Newton, and Hannah More. With these and other members of the Abolitionist Society he was in constant touch; and their zeal for social reform and for the evangelical creed (which led to his Clapham circle being styled the “Clapham Sect”) led to great results. In the religious sphere Wilberforce and his friends were largely instrumental in founding the Church Missionary Society (1798) and the Bible Society (1803). Their efforts on behalf of the poor and the mitigation of the barbarous penal code (a matter ever associated with the name of Romilly) were also to bear good fruit.

For the present all their efforts against the Slave Trade seemed to be in vain. It was pressed on feverishly in the year 1792. Between 5th January and 4th May of that year there sailed from London 8 slave ships, from Bristol 11, from Liverpool 39. The total tonnage was 11,195 tons. Another official return among the Pitt Papers (No. 310) gives the following numbers of slaves taken in British ships from West Africa to the West Indies in the years 1789 to 1795 (the figures for 1790 are wanting):

These figures suggest a reason for the falling off of interest in the question after 1792. The trade seemed to be falling off; and the mortality at sea declined as the cargo was less closely packed. This, however, was but a poor argument for not abolishing a trade which was inherently cruel and might revive with the return of peace. In 1794 the Commons seemed friendly to abolition. Pitt, Fox, Whitbread, and other friends of the cause pleaded successfully on behalf of Wilberforce’s Bill of the previous year. Once more, however, the influence of the Duke of Clarence, Thurlow, and Lord Abingdon availed to defeat the proposal. Grenville also voted against it as being premature. The Lords proceeded to illustrate the sincerity of their desire for further information on the topic by shelving the whole inquiry.

A sense of despair now began to creep over many friends of the movement. If abolitionist motions could only just pass the Commons, to be at once rejected by the Lords, what hope was there for the slaves? Their cause was further overclouded by the sharp disagreement of Wilberforce and Pitt respecting the war with France. As we shall see in a later chapter, Pitt and the majority of his supporters, together with the Old Whigs, believed that the war must go on until a solid peace could be obtained. Wilberforce and many of the abolitionists thought otherwise. During the latter part of the year 1794 and the first weeks of 1795 the two friends were scarcely on speaking terms; but even during that sad time Pitt wrote to Wilberforce (26th December 1794): “Nothing has happened to add either to my hopes or fears respecting the Slave Question with a view to the issue of it in the next session, but I think the turn things take in France may be favourable to the ultimate abolition.” Pitt spoke powerfully against Dundas’s amendment in favour of gradual abolition at some time after the conclusion of the war; but these procrastinating tactics carried the day by 78 to 61 (26th February 1795).

In the following year matters at first seemed more hopeful. Twice did Pitt and Wilberforce beat the supporters of the trade by fair majorities; but on the third reading of the Abolition Bill it was lost by four votes. Wilberforce noted indignantly that enough of its supporters were at the Opera to have turned the scale. The same apathy characterized the session of 1797, when the mutinies in the fleet and the sharp financial crisis told heavily against a measure certain to entail some losses in shipping and colonial circles. At this time Pitt seems to have lost heart in the matter. This appeared in his attitude towards a plausible but insidious proposal, that the Governors of Colonies should be directed to recommend the local Assemblies to adopt measures which would improve the lot of the negroes and thus prepare the way for the abolition of the Slave Trade. Than this nothing could be more futile; for the Governors and Assemblies were known to desire the continuance of the trade. Yet Pitt urged Wilberforce to accept the motion if it were modified; but, on Wilberforce refusing, he “stood stiffly by him.” They were beaten by a majority of thirty-six—a proof that the House wished to postpone abolition to the distant future.772

The negotiations for peace with France, which went on at Lille during the summer of that year, offered an opportunity for including a mutual guarantee of the two Powers that they would abolish the Slave Trade. Pitt seems to have disapproved of introducing this question into the discussions, either from a fear of complicating them, or from a belief that it would be treated better after the conclusion of peace.773 His reluctance was misconstrued by Wilberforce, who sent him the following letter: