YouTube Transcript:
1807 - The Year Britain Abolished Its Slave Trade (Part 1)
Skip watching entire videos - get the full transcript, search for keywords, and copy with one click.
Share:
Video Transcript
the Enlightenment was appeared in
history that transformed Western culture
the age of reason as it became known
occurring in the 17th and 18th century
saw long-established monarchies
religious institutions social systems
and hierarchies challenged from below
and a philosophical search for human
improvement ideas of Liberty and
religious tolerance traversed Europe
created social upheaval revolution and
change
but as the Enlightenment spread across
Europe Europe was spreading across the
world and this process was far from
peaceful while developments in industry
and politics may have encouraged
exploration and discovery
they also witnessed the rise of
imperialism and a vast and oppressive
institution that would transform the
lives of millions of people across the
globe this institution was slavery in
the early modern era native populations
in the new world had paid the ultimate
price as a result of European expansion
do you main lead to the introduction of
foreign and deadly diseases that they
have no immunity to roughly 80 million
Native Americans had died after European
contact this mass mortality was so
significant as to cause the Little Ice
Age a period of global cooling as a
result of reforestation colonists
seeking fortune seized land across the
new world and set about making it
provide profit African markets were
exploited an unprecedented quantities of
slave labour was used for cultivation
between 1500 and 1866 roughly 13 million
Africans were enslaved and transported
to the new world where a new profit
driven systematic and brutal plantation
system based on violence awaited them
and that was if they made it at least
one in ten of those transported did not
even survive the no tourists Middle
Passage
Britain claimed a significant stake in
the trade alongside other European
powers including the Dutch Portuguese
French and Spanish more than 3.2 million
slaves were transported from Africa on
British ships to the new world primarily
disembarking in the British Caribbean
colonies of Jamaica Barbados and Saint
Kitts to name but a few
roughly 500,000 slaves did not survive
the voyage
the transportation of slaves was
exercised on a massive scale it was part
of a wider triangular Atlantic commerce
slavery is absolutely central to the
British Empire from the 17th century all
the way through the 18th century and the
reason for that is that slavery is at
the center of a system of trade slaves
were purchased by British merchants on
the West African coast and they're
transported across the Atlantic on the
notorious Middle Passage to plantations
in the Americas primarily in the
Caribbean and their slaves are put to
work producing a variety of crops but
principally sugar that gets transported
back to Britain for British consumers
this was a modern commercial system
which created long range markets both
labor and consumer consumption none of
which would have been possible without
reason rationality or the Enlightenment
in fact many believe the Industrial
Revolution the hallmark of the
enlightened era actually began in the
Caribbean the slave trade became hugely
profitable to Britain through capital
flows investment and the establishment
of a market for manufactured goods some
have claimed that a stimulus was
provided for industrialization to occur
within the Metropole slavery in sugar
created huge individual fortunes and and
also benefited the British consumer in
the 17th century if you're gonna eat
sugar you have to have a lot of money
because it's incredibly rare but these
plantations that being planted in the
new world mean that this commodity is
being produced in far greater quantities
than ever it was before and so the price
goes down and so British consumers are
very hungry for this they like it and if
you think about our diet now cakes and
scones Jam all of these things depend
upon sugar even though the sugar that
British people who would have been using
to sweeten their tea in the 18th century
all of those things quite quickly become
central to the way that people lived
their lives britain's treasury also
gained immense wealth from the trade and
hence imperial defense was able to
receive substantial funding it could be
easily argued that the trade in Africans
lay at the foundation of Britain's
Empire so it actually goes quite quite a
long way beyond just people eating sugar
the money from sugar
transformed society create new wealthy
elite but it also enriches the extension
of the British state it's after roughly
two centuries of involvement in a trade
that generated vast amounts of wealth
and developed ports towns and cities and
had transformed the lifestyles of those
within the Metropole Britain decided to
abolish its slave trade on the 25th of
March 1807 but why was the abolition
bill ratified in an age where
politicians motivations rarely strayed
beyond the nation's security or economic
interest was the abolition act really
passed in philanthropic spirit as an act
of pure altruism or for the good of
humanity in this documentary I'll
attempt to answer this question I'll be
exploring the lead-up to abolition and
in particular the initial humanitarian
impulse and by figures such as William
Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson I will
also be exploring pro-slavery responses
both within the Metropole and across the
Atlantic to the fierce debate in Britain
in my journey to understand why
evolution occurred I will acknowledge
the challenges faced by the abolition
campaign and a change in political
strategy that along with favourable
external factors eventually led to the
abolition Act
you
[Music]
on the 22nd of May 1787 12 men 9 Quakers
and 3 Anglicans met here and what used
to be a printing shop in the City of
London
they met to coordinate a campaign which
had one sole purpose ending the human
traffic of Africans across the Atlantic
together they formed a Society for
effecting the abolition of the slave
trade the movement had emerged
universally amongst all of its
evangelical and Quaker founders from a
religious reaction against what they all
derided as nominal Christianity the
gospel however had been used for
centuries to endorse the commerce many
slave owners and merchants including the
highly regarded planter Edward long and
emphasized the compatibility of slavery
with the Christian scripture using
passages from the Bible to reinforce the
moral foundation of the institution
members of the abolition committee
represented a new form of Christianity
however a generation of Quakers and
evangelicals who viewed the slave trade
in a new enlightened era as a Commerce
which went against all of its religious
principles the movement had also emerged
in an era when colonial institutions
were already beginning to be questioned
by those in Britain after the American
Revolution many began to debate the
identity of the British Empire and what
role it should undertake on the global
stage
abolitionists had clearly expressed
through their attack on the slave trade
their visions for Empire one which
abided by and promoted new enlightened
forms of Christianity and became a
bastion of reformed and positive change
the conflict of the trade with
Christianity was best expressed in the
widely read and influential essays
written by two abolitionists
retrospectively the Scottish Anglican
curate James Ramsay and a devout
evangelical Christian Thomas Clarkson
James Ramsay had worked as a naval
surgeon in the West Indies and had lived
on the island of st. Kitts from 1762 to
1777
the curate commented on the inhumane
treatment he had personally witnessed
Schloss living in the Caribbean in his
essay on the treatment and conversion of
African slaves published in 1784 Ramsey
suggested that those involved in the
brutal trade who would be willing to
sacrifice their profits in order to
ameliorate the conditions of slaves
would be rewarded by God endless are the
methods by which in an unprecedented the
common accidents of life to reward men
who preferred duty to present advantage
who cooperate with his benevolence in
promoting the happiness of their fellow
creatures the pains that we use to
improve the minds of our fellow
creatures or a tun with advantage into
our bosoms God's grace will be stirred
up within us and our own disposition and
behavior will be corrected and amended
Ramzi also commented on the benefits of
ending the trade in terms of its
promotion of Christianity among slaves
many of whom I convert to the faith and
hence Christianity would receive new
strength Liberty new subjects the
Anglican campaigner and founding member
of the abolition society Thomas Clarkson
in his award-winning thesis published in
1786 entitled an essay on the slavery
and commerce of the human species echoed
the words of his influencer Ramsey in a
more direct attack on the slave trade
itself and those slave owners involved
Clarkson claimed how Christianity
suffers by the conduct of you receivers
for by prosecuting this impious Commerce
you keep the Africans in a state of
perpetual ferocity and barbarism and by
prosecuting it in such a manner as must
represent your religion as a system of
robbery and oppression you not only
opposed propagation of the gospel as far
as you are able yourselves but throw
impediments in the way of other who
might attempt the glorious task it's a
really important thing to remember that
as important as sugar was and as
lucrative as sugar was there were always
people who had their doubts about how it
was being produced so anti-slavery
questioning slavery is something that we
see from the 17th century through to the
18th century in some form or another and
very often those qualms that people have
about the institution of slavery are
moral and religious is it right to
exploit other human beings in these ways
simply so that we can have a commodity
that we enjoy eating
looking back today it would seem
appropriate to view these men as the
evangelical heroes after all they were
doing the right and honorable thing by
attacking such a brutal and degrading
commerce it's at the time these men was
seen as little more than mad eccentrics
and at the very best romantic idealists
and that's because they're attacking an
institution that had to find British
wealth and power for generations and an
institution that was growing every year
and so this begs the question how was
the abolition society going to gather
the support of the increasingly literate
but still predominantly illiterate
population in Britain and more
importantly how were they going to get
government to listen
the abolition committee set about this
task by mobilizing a campaign that would
gather the support of millions across
Britain morality humanitarianism and
Christianity was central to this
campaign and abolitionists would use
innovative strategies and propaganda
still seen in effective pressure group
politics to this day clever and perhaps
at the time unconventional campaigning
tools were used by the committee to
mobilize the public to play upon the
moral conscience of the population
pamphlets were published and brandished
with images that elicited sympathy from
even those who were illiterate Brooks's
slaveship was a prime example of an
image used to rile the public an
illustration of the inhumane and cramped
conditions endured by Africans aboard a
slave vessel that had sailed from
Liverpool to Jamaica in the late 18th
century the use of branding also enabled
the public to express their disapproval
of the traffic and feel as though they
were engaging in the debate the
campaign's emblem designed by Josiah
Wedgwood in 1787 that depicted a knelt
and shackled slave begging and uttering
the words am I not a man and a brother
was worn on bracelets or medallions
stamped into pottery and kitchenware and
even used on tobacco pipes
to many it became a symbol of an
enlightened view of the world really
quite suddenly a group of abolitionists
motivated for a variety of reasons but
mainly through an interest in religion
and a moral outrage at slavery managed
to galvanize popular opinion so that by
the end of the 1780s with the formation
of a abolition society looking to end
the slave trade in 1787 millions of
people had started to sign petitions
calling for the abolition of the slave
trade by engaging with the wider public
the campaign was able to gather huge
momentum dozens of sugar boycotts were
organized and petitions received
millions of signatures despite there
already being an appetite for debate in
Parliament the campaign was now
bolstered by the support of the masses
and the fundamental question of
abolition
it can be ignored by government no
longer
it was also not only white abolitionists
in Britain who opposed slavery for
generations and slaved Africans in the
Caribbean had been finding ways to
resist and rebel against the system this
would continue and take on new forms
during the time of the abolition debates
and in Britain the black community many
of whom were escaped or former slaves
also found ways to raise their voices
against slavery one such man was Paula
alder heck we are no one of the most
influential abolitionists of his
generation a former slave who had
purchased his freedom and travelled to
Britain published his autobiography in
1789 which documented his kidnap from
Africa his voyage across the Atlantic
and the brutality he witnessed during
his life in slavery it was very common
for slaves to be branded with the
initial letters of their masters name
and a load of heavy iron hooks from
around their neck
indeed on the most trifling occasions
they were loaded with chains and often
instruments of torture were added the
iron muzzle pump screws and such are so
well known assume not need a description
and was sometimes applied for the
slightest fault I have seen an equal be
into his bones were broken for only
letting a boil over by 1792 at qui a
nose book became a best-seller evidence
such as this not only gained public
attention but became extremely useful
when it came to lobbying for abolition
and government the man to spearhead the
campaign in Parliament was William
Wilberforce the MP for Yorkshire perhaps
best known for a speech he delivered to
the House of Commons on the 12th of May
1789 was convinced that the trade should
be stopped not only in principle but
also due to the inhumane conditions
endured by slaves across the Atlantic
and throughout the infamous Middle
Passage using facts and figures
accumulated by Clarkson Wilberforce
reason that the trade was morally
reprehensible and an issue of natural
justice exposing in detail the appalling
conditions in which slaves traveled from
Africa during the Middle Passage and
arguing that abolition would also bring
an improvement to the conditions of
existing slaves in the West Indies never
had the issue been so explicitly
described in the Commons chamber
Wilberforce's 12 resolutions signaled
the beginning of a long battle to
abolish the traffic in Parliament and
his arguments were echoed by MPs
throughout the 20-year debate that would
follow the early campaign however for
all its noise and all its support saw
very little legislative success
Wilberforce's first proposed bill
introduced in April 1791 was defeated
convincingly and eight years later
Britain's slave trade witnessed its
biggest year with nearly 50,000 children
women and men forced onto British
merchant ships to labor on sugar
plantations in the tropical colonies as
the 19th century dawned Wilberforce and
the other abolitionists clearly still
had a mountain to climb
one major obstacle that they had to
overcome was the overwhelming influence
and vested interest of both the colonial
planters so the abolitionists are trying
to abolish something that is really
really quite important and entrenched it
was the slave trade slavery and the
production of sugar had been central to
the British Empire for a while by the
time that they begin their campaign so
it's not a surprise that they come up
against opposition and principal
opponents for them perhaps
unsurprisingly are those people who own
large numbers of slaves and those people
involved in the slave trade sugar
planters with big properties in the West
Indies are a really vocal group that
seek to oppose the abolitionists and
argue against their case for ending the
slave trade but also the traders of
slaves Liverpool merchants and Bristol
merchants traders operating ships out of
those two really big British ports that
are central to the the slave trade on
the West African coast those slave
trading merchants are also really
important voices in opposition to the
Appalachia
I see that the miscreant Wilberforce has
begun upon the slave business again if
they mean nothing why do they play us
but they are so ignorant and obstinate
that they do not nor will not hear truth
or reason reason tells everyone to be
humane to everything under him but they
will not allow us to have common sense
reason tells them not to grate and
harass the minds of people that give
them a revenue of a million and a half
yearly and feed six hundred thousand of
her inhabitants but then who says no I
will annihilate you and I will suck the
blood from your vital
the initial momentum of the abolitionist
movement was in the early 1790s stopped
in its tracks but this was not a result
of any mismanagement or miscalculation
by the movement it was external factors
that came into play events occurring
across the channel and in the Caribbean
in part two of this documentary we will
focus on these external events namely
the revolution in France and
consequently the slave uprising in the
former French colony of Santa mang what
effect did these events have on the
abolition campaign and how abolitionists
able to utilize the domestic political
environment in their bid to see the
trade abolished forever
[Music]
you
you
Click on any text or timestamp to jump to that moment in the video
Share:
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
One-Click Copy125+ LanguagesSearch ContentJump to Timestamps
Paste YouTube URL
Enter any YouTube video link to get the full transcript
Transcript Extraction Form
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
Get Our Chrome Extension
Get transcripts instantly without leaving YouTube. Install our Chrome extension for one-click access to any video's transcript directly on the watch page.
Works with YouTube, Coursera, Udemy and more educational platforms
Get Instant Transcripts: Just Edit the Domain in Your Address Bar!
YouTube
←
→
↻
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc
YoutubeToText
←
→
↻
https://youtubetotext.net/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc