Description

The African Institution was a prominent British Abolitionist society founded in 1807, after Britain announced that it would seek to ban the global slave trade.  Its mission was, in addition to lobbying to make the ban of the trade effective and to end slavery altogether, was to sponsor the colony of Sierra Leone such that it would become an economically productive home for former slaves.  Their reasoning was that only when the liberated slaves could stand on their own feet would they be truly free.  The Institution took over the mandate of the defunct Sierra Leone Company, which while founding said colony in 1786, failed to make it viable.  While the previous efforts in Sierra Leone focused on converting the freed slaves to Christianity, the African Institution concentrated more on practical, or bread and butter, issues.

The African Institution, which held its inaugural meeting on April 14, 1807, was led by the esteemed attorney James Stephen (1758 – 1832) and William Wilberforce (1759 – 1833), the MP who would gain fame for securing the ablation of slavery in the British Empire only days before his death.  The President of the Institution was the Duke of Gloucester, the nephew of King George III, and the society was supported by a ‘Who’s Who’ of Britain’s Liberal elite, including many noblemen, tycoons and clergyman, with especially strong representation from the Quaker and Unitarian communities.  The venture was well financed and packed a quite a political punch, although it had powerful enemies in the West India lobby and those who ran certain large trading enterprises in Africa.

On the ground in Sierra Leone, the Institution worked closely with enterprising black businessmen such as Paul Cuffe and John Kizell, and the mutual-assistance organization for black entrepreneurs that they founded, the Friendly Society of Sierra Leone.  The Institution lobbied the crown to make land grants to various business ventures, and funded agricultural, whaling and mercantile enterprises.  However, the Institution and its allies ran into strong headwinds from Macaulay & Babbington, the private company which held a near monopoly on trade in Sierra Leone.

Further afield, in 1820, the African Institution negotiated with Said bin Sultan, the Sultan of Muscat and Oman, to wind down his massive slavery operations in the Indian Ocean.  In this regard, it worked closely with the Governor of Bombay, Sir Evan Nepean, and Ralph Darling, the Governor of Mauritius, who sought to enforce the agreement.

While the the African Institution was only partially successful in its immediate objectives (Sierra Leone remained a problematic place), it played a key role in pressing the British government to choke off the slave trade, by signing treaties with foreign powers and employing the Royal Navy for enforcement: indeed, the ignoble trade’s days were numbered.  It also did much to set the British Empire on a course towards abolishing the slavery throughout its lands, which was declared in 1833.

The African Institution operated until 1827/8, although from 1823 its activities were increasingly taken over by the Society for the Mitigation and Gradual Abolition of Slavery Throughout the British Dominions, popularly known as the ‘Anti-Slavery Society’, with which it shared many key backers.  The Society was ironically led by Thomas Babington Macaulay (whose father Zachary Macaulay, the co-founder of Macaulay & Babbington, the firm that was the scourge of the African Institution in Sierra Leone) and was known for its more open and less elitist style.

The Present Annual Reports of the Committee of the African Institution

Every year, the ‘Committee’ (Board of Directors) published an annual report, called the Reports of the Committee of the African Institution.  In total, 21 reports were issued from 1807 to 1827.  The Reports are not only definitive sources on the Africa Institution’s activities, priorities and intelligence gathering, but they also provided invaluable insights into the nature of the abolitionist movement during the critical period between Britain’s 1807 ban on the international slave trade and its decision to abolish slavery throughout its empire in 1833.

Notably, the first five reports (for the years 1807 to 1811) were issued in several editions; we gather that the examples present here of the first editions.

Far for being dry technical documents, the reports are loaded with fascinating stories and vignettes of diverse information, backed up with statistics and eyewitness observations from the field.  In addition to discussing the Africa Institution’s policies and finances, the reports cover subjects such as the activities of Black entrepreneurs in West Africa; stories and testimonials, of specific named people who were liberated from slavery, and who moved to Sierra Leone; accounts of economic development schemes and social services programs (ex. schools) sponsored by the Institution in Sierra Leone; extracts form the journals of travelers to Africa; texts from treaties, legislation, court cases and petitions against slavery and the slave trade; reports from the field on the activities of slave traders and the efforts stop them; as well as lists of the Institution’s directors and subscribers (the Who’s Who of liberal Britain).

Present here is an uninterrupted run of the first 13 reports (for the years 1807 to 1819 inclusive), bound in 3 volumes of very fine half-calf gilt period bindings.  All issues of the annual Reports of the Committee of the African Institution are today very rare, and a collection of an uninterrupted run of so many reports, as here, is extremely uncommon, providing a view of the arch of the history of abolitionism over a period of twelve critical years.  Of the present reports, the first issue (for 1807) was printed by William Phillips, while all the subsequent issues (1808 to 1819) were published by Ellerton & Henderson.

The present reports are summarized as follows:

[VOLUME I:]

First Report (1807): This inaugural report, presented July 15, 1807, features the well-meaning, but somewhat patronizing mission statement of the African Institution: “The committee expressed its view that the people of Africa were sunk in ignorance and barbarism and took for itself the task of introducing the blessings of civilisation to what they viewed as constituting a quarter of the habitable globe”.

Second Report (1808): This report discusses a series of prizes of 50 Guineas each, to be awarded by the Institution to the first person to import from West Africa to Britain: 1 ton of marketable cotton; 100 weight of indigo; and 10 tons of white rice.  The prizes were to encourage black entrepreneurs and farmers to learn to become self-sufficient, successful planters of cash crops.

Third Report (1808): This issue, presented on March 25, 1809, contains a discussion of an additional 50 Guinea prize that the Institution agreed to award to the person who brought the most land in West Africa under coffee cultivation.  It also features a relation about three African youths, who under the Duke of Gloucester’s patronage, had been trained at the Duke of York’s Royal Military School from techniques developed in India.  After graduation, they went to Sierra Leone, where they served as as teachers employed by the War Ministry.  It was also hoped that they would help to introduce cotton cultivation to the country.

Fourth Report (1810): In this report, presented on March 28, 1810, the Institution’s directors regret that British stave traders were finding ways to ply their craft by adopting
Spanish and Swedish flags of convenience.  There is also a review of British anti-slave trade legislation; ‘Directions for the Cultivation of the Silk Worm’ for introducing the industry to West Africa; and a traveler’s account of his trip to the Gold Coast.

Fifth Report (1811): In this report, presented on March 27, 1811, the Institution’s directors lament the ongoing participation of British and American ships in the slave trade, employing Portuguese and Spanish flags of convenience.  British capital was still a major driver of the slave trade, and they discussed how Henry Brougham, MP had introduced bill to Parliament to prosecute, at the Vice-Admiralty courts of Sierra Leone, those using flags of convenience to illegally transport slaves.  There is also coverage of a court case against a Nevis planter for cruelty to his slaves in; the testimonial of John Wise, a free black map from St. Vincent; slavery legislation in the Spanish Empire; and a list of the plants sent to Sierra Leone by Dr. Roxburgh, the Director of the Calcutta Botanical Gardens, for assisting agrarian development in that country.

[VOLUME II:]

Sixth Report (1812): This issue, presented at the Freemasons’ Tavern, London, on March 25, 1812, notes with alacrity that the Transatlantic slave trade had grown to include 70-80,000 enslaved Africans in the year 1810, with the Portuguese colony of Bissau (Guiné / Guinea-Bissau) playing a major role.  There are also reports on 6 named captured slave ships; the case of Catherine Richardson, a free black woman; ‘Reports of the Committee of African Inquiry’ on the slave trade, Sierra Leone, and indigo cultivation, etc.; as well as an account of the ‘Kroomen’ (Kru) people of Liberia.

Seventh Report (1813): This issue, presented at the Freemasons’ Tavern, London, on March March 14, 1813, has the directors rejoice in the news that the previous year has seen a decline in the slave trade, in part due to the efforts of the Royal Navy officers Commodore Frederick Paul Irby and Captain Edward Scobell, to whom the Institution expresses their gratitude.  There are also sections on the illegal slave trade in the Cape of Good Hope and Mauritius; the slave registry in Trinidad; as well as on anti-slave trade measures concerning Sweden and Denmark.

Eighth Report (1814): In this report, tabled on March 23, 1814, the directors discuss the ongoing legal cases regarding the seizure of Portuguese slaving ships.  They commend the effort of the Royal Navy’s West Africa Squadron to suppress the slave trade, highlighting their attacks against a slave factory at Cape Mesurado.  There is also coverage of the Institution’s lobbying efforts to get more of the “great Powers of Europe” to agree to anti-slave trade treaties; a report of all ships in the British Empire that have been condemned for slave trading; Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh’s instructions to the Admiralty for dealing with Portuguese slave traders; and the various anti-slave trade measures being undertaken in South America and the Netherlands.

Ninth Report (1815): This issue was presented on April 12, 1815, and here the directors express their continued horror at the “the desolation of Africa, the degradation of Europe and the afflicting scourge of humanity”.  They are disappointed that the Treaty of Paris (1814) did not include provisions for ending the slave trade, although subsequent accords at the Vienna Conference have brought hope, notably in the form of the Anglo-Portuguese anti-slave trade treaties of January 21-22, 1815.  There are also accounts of slave trading in Mauritius and Réunion; slavery legislation in Jamaica; the story of the Falcon, a captured slave ship; a report on the health of freed slaves in Sierra Leone; as well as a discussion of cloth-dying and commerce in West Africa.

[VOLUME III:]

Tenth Report (1816): This report features letters to the Committee from French subjects on the slave trade.  Of great interest, there is also the relation of Charles Hamilton, a free black man from Jamaica, who was illegally captured and made a slave, before regaining his freedom.  There is also intelligence from Sierra Leone.

Eleventh Report (1817): This issue discusses the efforts to suppress the slave trade in the Indian Ocean; a list of the slave trading vessels captured by the HMS Tyne; a discussion of the progress towards abolition made in Java and Ceylon; efforts to make a census of the slave population of Barbados; and notes on the state of missionary activities in West Africa and schools in Freetown.

Twelfth Report (1818): In this report, tabled on April 9, 1818, the directors expressed their anxiety that the end of the Napoleonic Wars would lead to the diminishment of the West Africa Squadron, so allowing the Transatlantic slave trade to be revived.  Moreover, slave traders, even when they were caught red-handed, were finding ways to evade condemnation in the Vice-Admiralty courts, due to legal technicalities, as was recently the case with the French slaver Le Lois.

 

Thirteenth Report (1819): This report features Answers to Queries on the slave trade posed by the Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh; the Additional Abolition Act of the United States (1819); and documents regarding the French involvement in the slave trade.

 

Provenance

 

Inside the front cover of the first volume (containing the report for 1807-11) there features the manuscript annotation: “Hommage offert à la Société de la Morale chrétienne, Comité pour l’abolition de la Traite par M. de Staël”.  This refers to Germaine de Staël (1766 – 1817), the legendary French woman of letters and political philosopher, and a prominent abolitionist, while the ‘Société de la Morale chrétienne, Comité pour l’abolition de la Traite’ was a religious society formed in 1821 that was dedicated to abolishing the slave trade.  This inscription is somewhat puzzling, as the present set of reports includes issues dated to 1819, two years after de Staël’s death, while the Société de la Morale chrétienne was founded four years after her passing.  Our best guess is that perhaps the books were acquired for the Société de la Morale chrétienne by a fund set up by Madame de de Staël’s (financially significant) estate.

 

Also, the title of the 11^th Report (1817) featurs the faded manuscript owner’s signature of “Revd. Dr. Grindlay”.  This almost certainly refers to Reverend Dr. John Grindlay (1756–1818), a prominent cleric and abolitionist.  He was the father of Captain Robert Melville Grindlay (1786 –1877), the famous banker and artist of views in India.

 

It seems that the volumes were gathered and bound, likely sometime shortly after 1819, for the Société de la Morale chrétienne.

 

A Note on Rarity

All issues of the Report of the Committee of the African Institution are extremely rare on the market.  The only sales record we can trace for any of the issues is for an example of the 1^st Report of 1807, which appeared in a British bookdealer’s catalogue in 2010.  As such, the present collection of the first 13 issues is quite extraordinary.

Institutionally, all issues of the Report of the Committee of the African Institution are rare, with sets of several issues, located almost entirely in Britain, being very rare.  We can trace only two complete sets of 21 issues (1807-27), held by the Bodleian Library, Oxford University and the Yale University Library; while assemblies of several volumes are held by the King’s College Library; Cadbury Research Library, University of Birmingham; University of Leeds Library; Canterbury Cathedral Library; and the National Library of Scotland.  Beyond that, some other libraries hold one or two isolated issues.

References: Bodleian Library – Oxford University (complete set of 21 issues): (RHO) 600.121 r. 25; Yale University Library (complete set): Ntf10 Af83; King’s College Library (nos. 1-20): Foyle Special Collections: [FCDO Historical Collection 2]; Cadbury Research Library, University of Birmingham (nos. 1-11 and 16): DT1.A4I6; University of Leeds Library (nos. 1-4 and 7-21): Birkbeck Library 1098-1101; National Library of Scotland: 3.2800(4); National Library of Scotland: 3.2800(4)OCLC: 1180825636.  Cf. Kenneth Wayne ACKERSON, The African Institution (1807–1827) and the Antislavery Movement in Great Britain (Lewiston, NY: E. Mellen Press, 2005).