Slave Ships and Slaving by George Francis Dow

Author:George Francis Dow [Dow, George Francis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Ethnic Studies, African American Studies
ISBN: 9780486143538
Google: TaWjAQAAQBAJ
Publisher: Courier Corporation
Published: 2013-01-17T03:22:48+00:00

CHAPTER X

CAPTAIN CROW, THE LAST SLAVER OUT OF LIVERPOOL

THE English slave trade was abolished by Act of Parliament on May 1, 1807. For many years Liverpool had been a great center for the African slave trade and when the end seemed in sight, Henry Clarke, the owner of the ship Kitty’s Amelia, of three hundred tons burden and mounting eighteen guns, cleared her for a last voyage just previous to the passing of the Abolition Bill. Her master was Capt. Hugh Crow, a Manxman, who had been in the Guinea trade for sixteen years and who, in after years, wrote that it had been his opinion “that the traffic in negroes was permitted by that Providence that rules over all, as a necessary evil, and that it ought not to have been done away with to humour the folly or the fancy of a set of people who knew little or nothing about the subject.” He believed that the pretended philanthropists, through the abolition of slavery, had become indirectly responsible for the death of thousands of slaves, because they had caused the trade to be transferred to the ships of other nations where cruelty and a disregard for human life was shown “to which Englishmen could never bring themselves to resort.”

The Kitty’s Amelia did not actually sail for the African coast until July 27th, but her technical clearance before May 1st protected her while outfitting was being completed and insurance effected with the underwriters at fifteen guineas per cent which was five per cent lower than the usual premium. Her crew was composed of nearly sixty men and while making a course down St. George’s Channel, four of the best of the crew, in spite of their protections, were impressed by H.M. frigate Princess Charlotte. The ship had been commissioned as a letter of marque and during the voyage several vessels were chased and boarded but no prizes were taken.

She arrived at Bonny after a passage of about seven weeks and was immediately boarded by King Holiday who anxiously inquired if it was true that the Kitty’s Amelia was to be the last ship that would come to Bonny for negroes. Captain Crow in his memoirs31 gives a curious account of what was said at that long palaver. The king’s sentiments on abolition were expressed as follows:

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