The Great Stain

by Noel Rae

  Next morning he invited the commanders of the eight other slave ships then lying at Annamaboe to join him on board the Henry, “and I having acquainted them with the whole matter, and they also having heard the Negro’s confession, ‘That he had killed the white man,’ they unanimously advised me to put him to death, arguing, ‘That blood required blood by all laws both divine and human; especially as there was in this case the clearest proof, namely, the murderer’s confession. Moreover this would in all probability prevent future mischiefs, for by publicly executing this person at the ship’s fore-yardarm, the Negroes on board their ships would see it, and as they were very much disposed to mutiny, it might prevent them from attempting it.’ These reasons, with my being in the same circumstances, made me comply.

  “Accordingly we acquainted the negro that he was to die in an hour’s time for murdering the white man. He answered, ‘He must confess it was a rash action in him to kill him; but he desired me to consider that if I put him to death, I should lose all the money I had paid for him.’ To this I bid the interpreter reply, ‘That though I knew it was customary in his country to commute for murder by a sum of money, yet it was not so with us; and he should find that I had no regard for my profit in this respect; for as soon as an hour-glass, just then turned, was run out, he should be put to death.’ At which I observed he showed no concern.

  “Hereupon the other commanders went on board their respective ships in order to have all their Negroes upon deck at the time of the execution, and to inform them of the occasion of it. The hourglass being run out, the murderer was carried on the ship’s forecastle, where he had a rope fastened under his arms in order to be hoisted up to the fore-yardarm, to be shot to death. This some of his countrymen observing, they told him (as the linguist informed me afterwards), ‘That they would not have him be frightened, for it was plain I did not design to put him to death, otherwise the rope would have been put about his neck, to hang him.’ For it seems they had no thought of his being shot, judging he was only to be hoisted up to the yardarm, in order to scare him. But they immediately saw the contrary, for as soon as he was hoisted up, ten white men who were placed behind the barricado on the quarter-deck fired their muskets, and instantly killed him. This struck a sudden damp on our negro-men, who thought that on account of my profit I would not have executed him.

  “The body being cut down upon the deck, the head was cut off and thrown overboard. This last part was done to let our Negroes see that all who offended thus should be served in the same manner. For many of the blacks believe that if they are put to death and not dismembered they shall return again to their own country, after they are thrown overboard.

  “When the execution was over I ordered the linguist to acquaint the men-Negroes, ‘That now they might judge, no one that killed a white man should be spared.’ And I thought proper now to acquaint them once for all, ‘That if they attempted to mutiny again, I should be obliged to punish the ringleaders with death, in order to prevent further mischief.’ Upon this they all promised to be obedient, and I assured them they should be kindly used if they kept their promise; which they faithfully did. For we sailed two days after from Annamaboe for Jamaica; and though they were on board near four months, from our going off the coast till they were sold at that island, they never gave us the least reasons to be jealous of them; which doubtless was owing to the execution of the white man’s murderer.”

  Captain Snelgrave also told the story of Captain Messervy, of the Ferres Galley, of London, “who, by his overcare, and too great kindness to the Negroes on board his ship, was destroyed by them.” Snelgrave had “met this gentleman at Annamaboe on the coast of Guinea in January, 1722. At his coming on board my ship he informed me of his good fortune, in that he had purchased near three hundred Negroes in a few days at a place called Cetre-Crue on the windward part of the coast of Guinea.”

  The captain’s nightmare—an uprising on board ship. These were expected, and most ships were provided with a stout wooden barrier, called a barricado (visible just to the right of the rigging on the rear mast), which kept the insurgents at bay while the crew fired on them.

  Messervy’s good fortune was due to his having arrived at Cetre-Crue just as a war between the people of the coast and the people inland came to an end with the triumph of the coasters, and he thus “had the opportunity of purchasing a great many of the captives at an easy rate.” For their part, the conquerors were glad to sell as otherwise “they would have been obliged to have killed most of the men-captives for their own security.” Since this was Messervy’s first voyage to Guinea, Snelgrave “took the liberty to observe to him, ‘That as he had on board so many Negroes of one town and language, it required the utmost care and management to keep them from mutinying.’” Messervy thanked him for this advice, and invited Snelgrave to visit his ship the next day.

  “I went accordingly aboard his ship about three o’clock in the afternoon. About four o’clock the Negroes went to supper, and Captain Messervy desired me to excuse him for a quarter of an hour whilst he went forward to see the men-Negroes served with victuals. I observed from the quarter-deck that he himself put pepper and palm oil amongst the rice they were going to eat. When he came back to me I could not forbear observing to him, ‘How imprudent it was in him to do so; for though it was proper for a commander sometimes to go forward and observe how things were managed, yet he ought to take a proper time, and have a good many of his white people in arms when he went; or else their having him so much in their power might encourage the slaves to mutiny. For he might depend upon it, they always aim at the chief person in the ship, whom they soon distinguish by the respect shown him by the rest of the people.

  “He thanked me for this advice but did not seem to relish it, saying, ‘He thought the old proverb good, that The master’s eye makes the horse fat.’ We then fell into other discourse, and among other things he told me, ‘He designed to go away in a few days.’ Accordingly he sailed three days after for Jamaica. Some months after I went for that place where, at my arrival, I found his ship, and had the following melancholy account of his death, which happened about ten days after he left the coast of Guinea, in this manner: Being on the forecastle of the ship, amongst the men-Negroes when they were eating their victuals, they laid hold on him and beat out his brains with the little tubs out of which they eat their boiled rice. This mutiny having been plotted amongst all the grown Negroes on board, they ran to the forepart of the ship in a body and endeavoured to force the barricado on the quarter-deck, not regarding the muskets or half-pikes that were presented to their breasts by the white men through the loopholes. So that at last the chief mate was obliged to order one of the quarter-deck guns laden with partridge shot [small bullets] to be fired amongst them; which occasioned a terrible destruction, for there were near eighty Negroes killed and drowned, many jumping overboard when the gun was fired.

  “This indeed put an end to the mutiny, but most of the slaves that remained alive grew so sullen that several of them were starved to death, obstinately refusing to take any sustenance. And after the ship was arrived at Jamaica they attempted twice to mutiny before the sale of them began. This, with their former misbehaviour, coming to be publicly known, none of the planters cared to buy them, though offered at a low price. So that this proved a very unsuccessful voyage, for the ship was detained many months at Jamaica on that account, and at last was lost there in a hurricane.”

  By no means all insurrections ended in failure. The Gentleman’s Magazine of February, 1753, had this story:

  “By Captain Wright of the Endeavour, from the coast of Guinea, we had the following account of the loss of the Marlborough, Captain Codd, of Bristol, by an insurrection of the Negroes the beginning of October last. Capt. Codd, having indulged 28 Gold Coast Negroes with their liberty on deck to assist in navigating the ship, they behaved for some time in a very tractable, civil manner. But on the third day after he sailed from the bar of Bonny, while most of the crew were below clea
ning the rooms, and none but the captain and two white men, armed with cutlasses, left above to take care of the ship, all of a sudden the Negroes on deck snatched the arms from them, wounded the captain, and forced him up the fore-shrouds, where they shot him dead. The rest of the Negroes securing the quarter deck and small arms, became soon masters of the ship, and spent the rest of the day in most cruelly butchering the crew (who were in number 35), except the boatswain and the cabin-boy, whom they saved to conduct the ship back again; which they did after 8 days, and came to an anchor within the bar of Bonny. About the same time, the Hawk, Captain Jones, of Bristol, arrived at that place, and hearing of the affair, bore down on her with an intent to re-take her; but the Negroes were so expert at the great guns and small-arms that they soon repelled him. After putting the Bight Negroes ashore that chose it, in number 270, the remainder, consisting of 150, weighed anchor, set their sails and stood out to sea with intent, as it is supposed, to go to their own country, tho’ the undertaking was extremely hazardous, as they had no one to navigate the ship, the boatswain having jumped overboard the night before they sailed, and got to the Hawk.”

  No doubt the story of this escape lived on for many years in the memories of the people of Guinea—and was forgotten as soon as possible by the white traders. And there were plenty of other stories for them to forget, such as these that appeared in a Charleston newspaper in July, 1759: “The ship Polly, Capt. Hamilton, and the ship Mercury, Capt. Ingledieu, both of Bristol, were lately lost on the coast of Africa. Capt. Hamilton was destined for this port with a cargo of slaves. A sloop commanded by a brother of the above Capt. Ingledieu, slaving up the River Gambia, was attacked by a number of the natives about the 27th of February last, and made a good defense; but the captain, finding himself desperately wounded, rather than fall into the hands of such merciless wretches, when about 80 Negroes had boarded his vessel, discharged his pistol into his magazine and blew her up; himself and every soul on board perished.” And in the same issue: “The snow [a two-masted ship] Perfect, Capt. William Potter, of Liverpool, bound for this port, is also cut off by the Negroes in the River Gambia and every man on board murdered, and the vessel lost.”

  The Rhode Island News Letter carried this story, written by George Scott, master of the sloop Little George, which left the coast of Guinea on June 1, 1730, “having on board ninety-six slaves, thirty-five of which were men. On the 6th of said month, at half an hour past four of the clock in the morning, being about 100 leagues from land, the men slaves got off their irons, and making their way thro’ the bulkhead of the deck, killed the watch, consisting of John Harris, doctor, Jonathan Ebens, cooper, and Thomas Ham, sailor; who were, ‘tis thought, all asleep. I being then in my cabin and hearing a noise upon deck (they throwing the watch overboard) took my pistol directly and fired up the scuttle which was abaft, which made all the slaves that were loose run forwards, except one or two men, who seemed to laugh at the cowardice of the rest, and defiance of us, being but four men and a boy.”

  The mutineers then closed the cover of the scuttle, or hatch, confining Scott and his companions below, where they had little food but plenty of weapons and gunpowder. After “consulting together” they “filled two round bottles with powder, putting fuses to them, in order to send them among the slaves, with a design at the same time to issue out upon them, and either suppress them or lose our lives.” But before they could do that, one of the bottles accidentally exploded, igniting a keg of gunpowder and causing a second explosion which “rais’d up the deck, blew open the cabin doors and windows, discharged all our fire arms but one, destroyed our clothes and burnt the man that had the bottle in his hand in a most miserable manner, and myself with the rest very much hurt thereby.”

  Their next move was to send up the cabin-boy “in order (if possible) to bring them to terms, but they slighted our message.” The mutineers then got hold of a swivel gun, but couldn’t get it to fire down the scuttle because of the wet weather, while the crew kept them at bay by firing up at them with muskets. Next the mutineers “took pieces of boards and laid them over the scuttle,” then “laid the tarpawlin with a great weight upon them to prevent our coming up.” This stand-off went on for nine days while the ship drifted back toward the coast, “in which time the boy, being forced by hunger, run up among the slaves, who immediately put him in irons.

  “Finding ourselves grow very weak thro’ these hardships and for want of sustenance, we thought it proper before our strength was quite spent to take some desperate course.” This was to “bore some holes thro’ the vessel’s bottom, which being approved of, was directly done, and let in about three feet of water. I then called the slaves and told them I would drown them all, which frightened them exceedingly. They then sent the boy to the cabin door to tell us that they had but just made the land, and that when they got a little nearer the shore they would take the boat and leave with the young slaves. I told them if they would do that I would not sink her. They stood in for the land about twelve a clock at night, struck upon the bar of the Sierra Leone River, and were in great danger of being lost. The vessel being strong beat over the bar, and they run ashore about three leagues up the river, on the north side, being then high water.”

  As the Little George came to rest, well-armed locals waded out from the shore and would “have fain tried to overcome us, but were persuaded from it by the slaves on board, who told them we would shoot them if they appeared in our sight. They persuaded the grown slaves to go ashore, and drove the young ones overboard and then followed them, making the vessel shake at their departure. Our boy assuring us the slaves had all left the vessel, we immediately went up with our arms and saw the slaves just ashore. As we hoisted out our boat the natives mustered very thick on the shore and fired at us divers times. We made what haste we could to the other side of the river, where we rowed down about two leagues, and found a sloop riding in Frenchman’s Bay belonging to Monserrat, James Collingwood commander, where we refreshed ourselves, being all of us in a weak and miserable condition, having had nothing to subsist upon during the nine days we were under this affliction but raw rice.”

  Then there is this story told by Captain Hugh Crow, an Englishman, which took place at Bonny, on the African coast:

  “Among twelve or fourteen sail of vessels that lay in the river was the ship Bolton of Liverpool. She had on board about a hundred and twenty negroes, and these men not being properly guarded contrived to free themselves in the night from their irons and, rising upon the officers and crew, they took possession of the ship. Unfortunately, the trade powder, [i.e. gunpowder] in quantity about two hundred barrels, was stowed in the fore peak, and to this the insurgents, in their rage for mischief, soon found access. At daylight, by which time the circumstance became known, the several masters of the vessels in the river held a meeting to determine how the ship and cargo might be redeemed. The result was that I and some others were appointed to go on board the Bolton, and endeavour, if possible, to save the blacks from that destruction to which, in their ignorance, they were so fearfully exposed.

  “They consisted chiefly of Quaws, a most desperate race of men. Before we got on board they had brought up many barrels of the gunpowder, which they had started and spread all loose between decks. It would have been madness for any of us to go below amongst them, for a single spark thrown by one of them amongst the powder would have involved us in instant destruction. We prevailed upon a few Eboes to leave the vessel, and these, with all the women, were taken aboard some of the other ships. The Quaws were deaf to all our entreaties and warnings—until evening, when a number of them also gave themselves up. The ringleaders, however, to the number of about a dozen, obstinately remained among the loose powder.

  “In this situation they remained until the afternoon of the next day, when we observed the ship to be on fire, and as she was the headmost vessel in the river we manned all our boats in order, if possible, to tow her off, lest she might fall amongst us. We had been but a few minutes in t
he boats when, with all the unfortunate creatures on board of her, she blew up with a tremendous explosion. I was in our boat with eight or nine of my best men—and only about a hundred yards from her when the catastrophe occurred; and such was the violence of the shock that the poor fellows fell down in the bottom of the boat. The smoke, the pieces of the wreck, the clothes and other articles of trade that flew about in every direction presented a truly awful scene. Several of the latter fell into our boat, and many articles were afterwards found blown as far as Bonny.

  “After this misfortune it became necessary to be more watchful of the blacks, and particularly of the Quaws”—who were probably the same people as the viper-eating Ghanaian Ququs, described earlier by Al-Gharnati as having “short necks, flattened noses, and red eyes. Their hair is like peppercorns and their smell is abominable, like that of burnt horn.”

  In spite of all these hazards and disasters, the trade flourished and soon had well-established procedures for every phase, including the sale of their cargoes. Alexander Falconbridge describes how this was carried out in the West Indies:

  “Sometimes the mode of disposal is that of selling them by what is termed a scramble; and a day is soon fixed for that purpose. But previous thereto the sick, or refuse, slaves, of which there are frequently many, are usually conveyed on shore and sold at a tavern by vendue, or public auction. These, in general, are purchased by the Jews and surgeons, but chiefly the former, upon speculation, at so low a price as five or six dollars a head. I was informed by a mulatto woman that she purchased a sick slave at Grenada upon speculation for the small sum of one dollar, as the poor wretch was apparently dying of the flux. It seldom happens that any who are carried ashore in the emaciated state to which they are generally reduced by that disorder long survive the landing. I once saw sixteen conveyed on shore and sold in the foregoing manner, the whole of whom died before I left the island, which was within a short time after. Sometimes the captains march their slaves through the town at which they intend to dispose of them, and then place them in rows where they are examined and purchased.”