Hottentot Venus

by Barbara Chase-Riboud

  —Is this the so-called Hottentot Venus?

  —Yes.

  —First of all, she can’t be a Hottentot. She would never have been allowed to leave the Cape Colony. My friend Lord Calledon, who is governor there, would never have knowingly allowed the expatriation of a Hottentot.

  —Well, if she isn’t a Hottentot, she’s certainly an African!

  —She could be an Englishwoman faking exotic origins. It’s been done before.

  —Well, the least we should do is check. It’s terrible. Her keeper is a Boer, a man named Hendrick Caesar. He’s written a letter to the Morning Chronicle defending his right to exploit his “servant,” but I’m sure she’s his slave. I’m sure of it! We must free her.

  Macauley looked up at me, leaning or rather pounding on his elaborate Georgian desk. I was making this one-ton block of English oak shake. Just like I had made conservative Britain shake, I thought.

  The Wedderburn name was one of my burdens. I was Robert Wedderburn, one of several illegitimate children fathered by James Wedderburn of Inveresk, a rich Jamaican plantation owner. I was the grandson of Sir John Wedderburn of Blackness, whose family had fled to the West Indies after the defeat at Culloden of the Scottish army of independence in 1746. My grandfather, Sir John, had been captured, tried for treason, then hung, drawn and quartered by the English. I always believed I had a lot of old Sir John’s blood flowing in my veins, because as his grandson, I had provoked and endured the repressive wrath of the British government ever since I had arrived in England. I was a licensed, self-taught Unitarian preacher who believed there should be an affinity between black West Indians and the British working class, between London’s artisan class and the ultraradical party. This, in turn, had spurred my crusade to rid Britain of chattel slavery and colonial slave trading. Together with the tacit help of the member of Parliament William Wilberforce, I had founded the African Association, which along with the Missionary Society and the African Institution had worked to bring about the abolition of slavery on English soil, which had occurred three years ago.

  —But isn’t it a circus? asked Macauley. Isn’t she part of some freak show?

  —Freak show? Because she’s an African? A freak?

  I could have snatched him from his comfortable seat and throttled him. But Zachary Macauley was simply stating a fact. He too had passed by number 225 and read the circus posters outside.

  —Peter and I will investigate the actual situation of the Hottentot Venus tomorrow, he said. On one condition, Robert, that you stay out of it. You have enough trouble with the law. You’re facing two trials, a libel suit and two contempt summonses. If you say one more word in public, they will surely put your hide in a penal colony and throw away the key!

  —I’ll keep quiet if you and Peter bring a suit against her keeper for kidnapping, contraband and unlawful duress.

  —Whoa, Robert. First, let’s get the facts in the case. We should take Thomas’s and Peter’s advice on this. After all, it will be up to them as civil barristers to put together a suit.

  Like me, Zachary Macauley had been at the forefront of the battle that had abolished the slave trade in England in 1807. He had been a co-founder of the African Association and the Missionary Society. He had served as governor in Sierra Leone, where he had helped establish a colony for liberated slaves taken at sea by the Royal Navy slave patrol. He had even made the infamous Middle Passage voyage on a slave ship bound for the West Indies so that the slave experience would not just be an intellectual exercise for him. Macauley was also the editor of the ChristianObserver, whose offices were nearby. He had seen the advertisements and wondered how or why his friend Lord Calledon, the governor of the Cape Colony, would have allowed the expatriation of a Hottentot even if she were a Venus.

  As we walked arm in arm into the library of the African Institution, I stopped, as I always did, to admire the handsome room which was built like an oval amphitheater. The floors were covered with Persian carpets, the law and history books bound in fine leather. Maps of the world and globes were scattered amongst the long tables and armchairs. Light poured through large arched windows framed in blue silk draperies. The luxurious decoration of the African Association reflected its aristocratic origins. The town house that housed it was situated on Regent’s Crescent, one of the most fashionable addresses in London, for the landlord was none other than the Duke of Westminster. There were three or four visitors in the library, and at the end of the room sat the barrister Peter Van Wageninge, secretary of the association.

  Peter Van Wageninge was a Dutchman of means who was a passionate abolitionist. Tall, slim and soft-spoken with short wavy blond hair and cornflower-blue eyes, he was also considered one of the most eligible bachelors in London. Somewhat of a dandy, he was famous for his all-black frock coats, narrow trousers and snowy white linen that he sent back to Amsterdam to be washed and ironed. He claimed that he hadn’t found an English laundress worthy of the name. Unlike Macauley, he had never been to Africa. He had never even been at sea except for the Channel. His travels in Europe had all been overland. There were rumors that he had caught the eye of one of the Grenville girls and moved in the highest political and social circles. He was popular and charming and had put his fortune, as the London Times had put it, where his mouth was.

  Van Wageninge looked up, unsurprised, as we approached him.

  —Peter, Robert here has something important to dis . . .

  —The Hottentot Venus, said Van Wageninge dryly.

  —How d’you know?

  —I’ve been assembling a file on her. Why? Because I knew Robert was going to come to her rescue . . . Look at this pile of newspaper clippings, advertisements, posters. Letters have also been coming into the association about her . . .

  He pushed a large folder towards us.

  —The first editorial letter arrived at the Morning Chronicle on October twelfth—that’s on the top with the keeper’s reply. His name is Hendrick Caesar and he’s a South African Boer. The other man involved is a certain physician, named Alexander William Dunlop, a Scot. The Venus has been making headlines for weeks and provoking an avalanche of letters to the editor. The first protest came in a letter from John Kemble, the actor . . . He was alarmed that she might die during the winter from cold and illness and fall into the hands of the anatomists, knowing, as he said, the adventurous hardihood of science. Zachary and I sat down to read the file in the overstuffed armchairs next to Van Wageninge’s desk.

  A PROTEST

  Morning Chronicle,

  FRIDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1810

  Sir, you will perhaps anticipate the cause I am now pleading, and to which I wish to call public attention. I allude to that wretched object advertisedand publicly shewn for money—the “Hottentot Venus.” This, Sir, is a wretched creature—an inhabitant of the interior of Africa, who has been brought here as a subject for the curiosity of this country, for 2s. a head. This poor female is made to walk, to dance, to shew herself, not for her own advantage, but for the profit of her master, who, when she appearedtired, held up a stick to her, like the wild beast keepers, to intimidateher into obedience. I am sure you will easily discriminate between those beings who are sufficiently degraded to shew themselves for their own immediate profit, and where they act from their own free will: and this poor slave, who is obliged to shew herself, to dance, to be the object of the lowest ribaldry, by which her keeper is the only gainer. I am no advocateof these sights; on the contrary, I think it base in the extreme, that any human beings should be thus exposed. It is contrary to every principle of morality and good order, but this exhibition connects the same offence to public decency, with that most horrid of all situations, Slavery.

  Your obedient servant,

  AN ENGLISHMAN

  A REPLY

  Morning Chronicle,

  MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1810

  Sir, having observed in your paper of this day, a letter signed “An Englishman,” containing a malicious attack on my conduct in exh
ibiting a Hottentot woman, accusing me of cruelty and ill treatment exercised towardsher, I feel myself compelled, as a stranger, to refute this aspersion, for the vindication of my own character, and the satisfaction of the public. In the first place, he betrays the greatest ignorance in regard to the Hottentot, who is as free as the English. This woman was my servant at the Cape, and not my slave, much less can she be so in England, where all breathe the air of freedom; she is brought here with her own free will and consent, to be exhibited for the joint benefit of both our families. That there may be no misapprehension on the part of the public, any person who can make himself understood to her is at perfect liberty to examine her, and know from herself whether she has not been always treated, not only with humanity, but the greatest kindness and tenderness.

  . . . Since the English last took possession of the colony, I have been constantly solicited to bring her to this country, as a subject well worth the attention of the Virtuoso, and the curious in general. This has been fully proved by the approbation of some of the first Rank and chief Literati in the kingdom, who saw her previous to her being publicly exhibited. And pray, Mr. Editor, has she not as good a right to exhibit herself as an Irish Giant or a Dwarf etc. etc. However, as my mode of proceeding at the place of public exhibition seems to have given offence to the public, I have given the sole direction of it to an Englishman, who now attends.

  Hendrick Caesar

  A LETTER TO THE EDITOR

  Morning Chronicle,

  TUESDAY, OCTOBER 30, 1810

  Yes, she has a right to exhibit herself, but there is no right in her being exhibited. The Irish Giant, Mr. Lambert, and the Polish Dwarf, were all masters and directors of their own movements; and they, moreover, enjoyed the profits of their own exhibition: the first two were men of sound understanding, and were able to tell when they were plundered and defrauded of those profits, and to insist on the appropriation of exhibitionprofits to themselves: the money derived from personal misfortunewas their own: it comforted them in the active moments of their existence, or supplied them with enjoyment when laid aside. Do the publicbelieve that one shilling, nay a single farthing, of the profits arising from her exhibition will ever go into the hands of the Female Hottentot, or of her relatives or friends? Who audits the accounts? Who looks after the balance between expense and income? The avaricious speculator, or the unfeeling gaoler who have brought her here, who receive the money, and—who will keep it. No; after having run the gauntlet through the three capitals of England, Scotland and Ireland, and traversed their provincial towns, dragged through them with greater barbarity than Achilles dragged the body of Hector at the foot of his chariot round Troy’s walls, this miserable female will be taken back to the Cape; not enriched by European curiosity, but rendered poorer if possible than when she left her native soil.

  Humanitas

  I slammed the file shut without reading any further.

  —Damn Boer scoundrel.

  —I think these letters are going to incense a mob of abolitionists to take things into their own hands . . . We’d better get over there, said Van Wageninge.

  —Oh, the public loves it, cheap thrills, pornography . . . it beats a two-headed gorilla or an albino rhinoceros any day! This kind of exploitation has a sleazy life of its own, borne upwards by the ignorance and intolerance of the English. It will be an uphill fight to wrest her from her keepers, who are making a fortune off her, I replied.

  —We must help her, said Macauley.

  —Well, the first thing to deal with is the conscience of Dunlop and Caesar, if they possess such an appendage . . .

  The next day, Macauley, Van Wageninge and I paid our two shillings and walked into the marketplace of freaks that was at number 225 Piccadilly. It was a Thursday and the stalls and walkways were calm. Thus, we managed to get very close to the stage. We waited for a break and then approached the barker Hendrick Caesar. He acted as if he expected us. We introduced ourselves.

  —We’re from the African Association.

  —Yes, I know of you, said Caesar.

  —This is Mr. Zachary Macauley and Mr. Peter Van Wageninge, I am the Reverend Robert Wedderburn. We would like to ask you how you came to manage the person of . . . Saartjie Baartman.

  Caesar eyed me with contempt. It was clear he wasn’t going to answer to any black man no matter how elegant. He turned away from me to the white men.

  —She’s my servant.

  —Servant or slave, sir?

  —I said servant.

  —In South Africa?

  —Well, she’s here now, isn’t she?

  —That’s just the point. Our association is a benevolent organization to protect, educate and civilize Africans.

  —Well, the Venus is under my protection and she’s pretty civilized.

  —May I ask how you got her out of South Africa? Travel by Cape Hottentots is prohibited. Did she procure a passport?

  —She has a passport issued by the governor of the colony, Lord Calledon, if it’s any of your damned business . . . interjected the second man, Alexander Dunlop.

  —May I see his signature? He is well known to me.

  —By God! No, you can’t, said Dunlop. Mind your own business. No reason why I should carry it around with me and no reason why I should show it to you . . .

  —I imagine she speaks Dutch.

  —Yes.

  —Well, this gentleman speaks Dutch, may he speak with her?

  —She doesn’t fraternize with male members of the audience . . . police ordinance, you know . . .

  I eyed the man who had interjected himself into the argument. He was a fine figure of a man, tall and athletic, who could be thirty as easily as he could be forty or twenty. His eyebrows and his thick wavy hair were jet black. His complexion was pale under the artificial brown of seafaring and his eyes were sea green. His features were classical and most agreeable, straight aquiline nose, fleshy lips, angular chin with a deep cleft, small well-shaped ears and a largish skull sitting on a thick column of neck and shoulders. When he smiled, his eyes crinkled up and he displayed a mouth full of large, even white teeth with upper canines that extended lower than the rest but were square rather than pointed. He could surely swim, I thought, certainly sword-fight and shoot, probably ride excellently, and he was definitely not interested in boys like so many English adventurers. He had Scottish blood, like me, but no accent. He was obviously well educated, but perhaps not a gentleman. He was expensively dressed in crimson and blue, but I wagered he was penniless. There was a sort of man who couldn’t hold on to money, even if his life depended upon it, even if he came into a fortune. And he was of that race. It was obvious it was simply in his nature; a fatal flaw of character or upbringing or simply fate. He would always be relieved of it in some bizarre manner: war, theft, gambling, women, but he would go on, making even more and losing it, because people could not resist him. That’s it, I thought. This man was irresistible. It was more than charm, it was a kind of fatality, a magnetic attraction for both men and women—which was perfectly immoral, and impossible for ordinary people with ordinary brains not to succumb to.

  —Miss Baartman, said Van Wageninge in Dutch, are you here under your own free will?

  The Venus nodded but said nothing.

  —Do you have any family at the Cape?

  Silence. Dunlop glared. Of the two men, I thought, Dunlop was the most dangerous. Could I take him? I could feel my Scot’s blood rising along with his. Our respective Scot’s blood rising with our respective Scot’s brogue.

  —Brothers, sisters, parents?

  —All dead, she said in English.

  Dunlop whispered something in her ear. But she waved him away.

  —Are you happy here?

  We continued on for another ten minutes asking question after question. Finally, in frustration, I asked the Venus directly:

  —Would you like to go home? Would you like us to send you home? To pay for your passage? But the Venus remained mute.

 
; The request was repeated in Dutch by Van Wageninge.

  —We have organized a defense committee on your behalf and you will be able to explain to a civil court whether you feel you would be better off relieved of the presence of Mr. Dunlop and Mr. Caesar and put under the protection of the African Association, I said.

  —Thank you, the Venus suddenly said softly, shaking her head as she contemplated the miracle of a black man denouncing a white one.

  We bowed, turned on our heels and left, with the Venus staring helplessly after us. Our three top hats bobbed and weaved in and out of the crowd. I could feel the Venus’s eyes upon us even at a great distance. It was only later that we discovered that Dunlop had been absent for several months and had reappeared only several days ago, walking in the door, out of nowhere. News of the controversy around his exhibition of the Venus had reached him and he had returned to London to defend himself.

  When we got outside, I turned to Macauley.

  —Lord Ellenborough will never take her from the custody of Caesar and Dunlop without proof that this exhibition is against her will. And we cannot free her only to send her back into the world without a home to go to. We must argue that if she is taken from her impresarios, we will assume her safety under our own protection. She will not find herself without friends.

  In the weeks that followed our visit, the Venus made headlines in the yellow tabloids and the penny press . . .

  —The journalistic world is most enamored of Miss Baartman, commented Peter Van Wageninge. Look at this. It’s called “Prospects of Prosperity, or Good Bottoms Going into Business” and it has just been published by Walter & Company of Cornhill. It shows Lord Grenville and the Hottentot Venus advancing towards each other with outstretched arms. Behind Venus is a well-dressed man, the showman Alexander Dunlop himself. In Grenville’s pocket is a list of the new administration. Behind him are the current ministers looking on unhappily. Grenville is saying, My dear Saartjie, I come to congratulate you. You are trading in on your own bottom, I see. I expect soon to be in the same situation myself. She answers: Me only got half my bottom belong to me. No do much good wid dat.