By Susan Kay Phillips
“Never believe that a few caring people can’t change the world. For, indeed, that’s all who ever have.” Margaret Mead
EVERYONE WILL BE FREE: Thomas Clarkson and the End of Slavery in the British Empire is the picture book I am featuring this month. This is an unpublished (as yet) manuscript that I have written.
Thomas Clarkson (1760-1846) was born in Wisbech, England, the eldest son of the Reverend John Clarkson and Anne Ward Clarkson. As a young man, Thomas attended Cambridge with the goal of becoming clergyman.
At that time, Cambridge held a very prestigious yearly essay contest. Thomas was a brilliant student and decided to enter the very competitive contest. The topic on which he was to write an essay (in Latin!) was, Is it lawful to make slaves of others against their will?
At this time in history, there was no slavery in England itself. Anyone who set foot on English soil was considered a free person. However, Great Britain had a huge and highly profitable African slave trade.
The slave trade operated on a triangular scheme. Goods were loaded onto ships known as “slavers” which sailed to the West Coast of Africa. There the English goods were traded for human beings. The enslaved African people were loaded onto the slaver ships and transported across the Atlantic Ocean to the Caribbean. There they were sold to plantation owners who forced them to work long hours in the blazing hot sugar cane and tobacco fields. The sugar and tobacco produced by the enslaved people were loaded onto the slaver ships and taken back to Great Britain, thus completing the often very profitable triangular journey.
The slave trade was widely considered to be one of the backbones of Great Britain’s economy. Most English people were aware of the trade, but really did not understand what was actually happening to the enslaved people. The public was told that the enslaved people in the Caribbean had modest little cottages where they lived comfortably and happily. A blatant lie.
Thomas did a great deal of research for his essay. He interviewed ship captains, ship surgeons, sailors, and merchants in the slave ports. The more he learned, the more horrified he became regarding the terrible abuse that was being inflicted on African people.
Thomas won the Cambridge essay contest. Because of all he had learned, Thomas decided to dedicate his life to abolishing the slave trade. With twelve other men, he formed the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. He and the Committee conducted a sixty-year campaign that ended both the slave trade and slavery in the entire British empire. Through the course of the campaign, Thomas and his friends invented almost all of the tools used today by social justice activists.
I was inspired to write this manuscript after hearing a talk by the Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield. Jack related the story of Thomas and his friends. At the end of the story, Jack told that when Thomas died at the age of 86, many people attended his funeral. Among them were Quaker men who had worked with Thomas. At the end of the service, these Quaker men did something that they never did for anyone, not even the King, they removed their hats for Thomas Clarkson. I hope you enjoy the story of a person who never gave up.
EVERYONE WILL BE FREE:
Thomas Clarkson and the End of Slavery in the British Empire
One day in the spring of 1785, twenty-five-year-old Thomas Clarkson made a life-changing decision. He decided to enter a writing contest to answer this question.
Is It Lawful To Make Slaves Of Others Against Their Will?
Enslaving of others is wrong, Thomas thought. He would write a winning essay. He would prove slavery was wrong.
Like most people in Great Britain, Thomas knew very little about the African slave trade or the lives of enslaved people. He needed facts.
Thomas gathered information about the slave trade. He learned that British ships called “slavers” sailed to Africa. There the ship’s captain bought men, women, and children from African slave traders.
The enslaved people were forced onto the slaver ships. Many died during the journey across the Atlantic Ocean to the Caribbean Islands.
The ship’s captain sold the enslaved people to owners of large farms called plantations. There the people worked long hours in the hot sun growing sugarcane and tobacco. Overseers watched carefully so they could not escape.
An enslaved person could be sold at any time. Parents and children, husbands and wives were often separated.
Thomas shuddered. His own father died when he was six. What if I also lost my mother, my brother, and my sister? he thought.
His heart ached for the enslaved people. He worked on his essay far into the night.
Thomas submitted his essay and waited. At last, he was called to his teacher’s office. Thomas took a deep breath and entered the room. HE WON!
Thomas read his winning essay to the teachers at his university. But riding home, Thomas did not think of his prize. He thought of the terrible suffering of the enslaved African people.
Finally, Thomas could ride no further. He dismounted and fell down beside the road. His heart felt deeply for the enslaved people. Suddenly a thought flashed into his mind.
If what I have written is true, someone must put an end to this horrible slave trade! Then another thought came, I should do this! Immediately, Thomas felt unsure.
Who will listen to me? he thought. I am only one young person. Thomas could not see how he could stop the slave trade but felt he must try. And he did.
In 1787, Thomas arranged a meeting of twelve people opposed to slavery. They became the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade.
The Committee needed to teach the public about slavery so Thomas volunteered to ride through Great Britain sharing what he had learned about the slave trade.
He started local anti-slavery committees.
He left posters and copies of his essay for the committees to use.
He wrote letters every day to anti-slavery campaigners, giving advice and encouragement.
The anti-slavery campaign needed the British government to pass laws to end the slave trade. Thomas became friends with a young member of the government, William Wilberforce. He sent William facts about the slave trade. William used the facts in his anti-slavery speeches.
But William could not convince the government to stop the slave trade. The slave traders were rich and powerful. They told the government that money from the slave trade was needed to keep Great Britain strong.
Thomas and the Committee kept working. Thomas filled a large wooden box with African cloth, carvings, tools, and seeds, to show that the enslaved people had a rich culture in their homeland. He also filled the box with handcuffs, leg irons, chains, and ropes used in the slave trade. During his speeches, he showed his audience these things to help them understand the horrors of slavery.
Wherever Thomas went, he convinced more and more people to oppose slavery. The slave traders became angry at Thomas. They hired a gang of sailors to throw him into the sea. But Thomas was tall and strong. He knocked the sailors aside and escaped!
Free African people in Great Britain also worked to end the slave trade. Olaudah Equiano had freed himself from slavery by earning money to buy his freedom. Olaudah wrote a book about his life as an enslaved person.
Thomas was deeply moved by Olaudah’s work. He helped Olaudah sell his book and speak to more audiences about his experience. Olaudah won many antislavery supporters.
Thomas kept sending William new facts. William kept arguing against slavery. Over and over, government leaders rejected anti-slavery ideas.
Thomas and the Committee and their African allies did not give up.
After years of meetings…
and thousands of letters…
and hundreds of petitions…
the antislavery forces finally won a victory in 1807! William convinced the government to pass the Slave Trade Act that put an end to the slave trade. Thomas was overjoyed!
But Thomas and the Committee wanted more. They wanted to end not just the slave trade but slavery itself.
In 1833 came the biggest victory. Thomas, the Committee, William, and their African allies convinced the government of Great Britain to pass the Slavery Abolition Act that ended all slavery in the British Empire. For all time. Over eight hundred thousand enslaved people became free!
Thomas was famous for all the work he had done. People wrote him letters of congratulation. They wanted his autograph. They even wanted locks of his hair. Thomas was in danger of becoming bald! He was too happy to say no. “Never mind,” he said, smiling. “Shear away!”
AUTHOR’S NOTE
In 1785 when Thomas Clarkson penned his winning essay, slavery was an accepted fact in the overseas colonies of Great Britain. The first meeting of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade in 1787 was a big moment in the history of human rights. The twelve committee members from diverse backgrounds, Quaker and Anglican, wanted to change the world.
The Committee based their work on a belief in the natural goodness of the British people. They believed if the people understood the abuses of slavery, they would turn against it.
Working to find ways to change public opinion, the committee developed tools that are used to this day by human rights activists. They established a nationwide network of local committees, published books and pamphlets, gave lectures, handed out posters, created a logo, wrote letters to government leaders, held meetings, signed petitions, supported boycotts, and put together displays such as Thomas’s box. All of these activities put pressure on the British government to bring slavery to an end.
What Thomas and the Committee did was pioneering and completely revolutionary in its day. The great historian Alexis de Tocqueville has written “If you pore over the histories of all peoples, I doubt that you will find anything more extraordinary”… than what Thomas and the Committee did.
Their unique efforts finally convinced Great Britain to end slavery in the British Empire in 1833 with the passage of the Slavery Abolition Act. Many people had a hand in the victory, but Thomas Clarkson was the driving force. He had devoted sixty years to the cause, working with both Black and white allies.
When Thomas Clarkson died in 1846, the Quaker men who attended his funeral did something they would never do for anyone even the King, they removed their hats for Thomas Clarkson.
Thanks for dropping by and reading!
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