Part 9
5102. How then is it possible to prevent the ships being applied to that purpose for which they are worth more than for any other?--Spanish ships are prevented from being used for the trade by being cut up when they are condemned.
5103. Mr. _Evans_.] But you have no power of doing so with the Portuguese ships?--No.
5104. Mr. _Aldam_.] Those vessels, from their small size, are not worth much for other trades?--There are some trades that they are adapted for, the fruit trade for instance, and they are employed in the smuggling of opium and such trades as those; they are not capable of carrying large burdens.
5105. In all cases it will answer the purpose of the merchant to give a larger price for those ships to be employed in the slave trade than for any other purpose?--Yes, probably.
5106. Viscount _Ebrington_.] Have you ever considered what the result would be of the British Government buying those ships in?--It would be impossible to buy them all in.
5107. All that are not liable to be broken up?--No. During last year, for instance, the number condemned was so large, that the Government, if they had bought them, could not have found a use for them.
5108. Mr. _Forster_.] Have you any doubt that those vessels have been sometimes knocked down by the auctioneer to agents of the slave traders on the coast?--It may have been so, and I have no doubt it has; I do not recollect a case at present, but I would have insisted upon it, as head of the court, that it should have been knocked down to any one who made the highest bid.
5109. It is your opinion also, that the prize goods have been frequently sold in the like manner?--Some portion of them, but certainly not the bulk of them.
5110. Was there any thing to prevent the whole of them being sold to the slave dealers, or the agent of the slave dealers?--Nothing whatever.
5111. Had you opportunities of observing, up to the time you left Sierra Leone, whether the agents of the slave dealers on the neighbouring coast frequently appeared in the market of Sierra Leone as purchasers of goods or vessels?--Not often; if the goods came into their hands it was through a third person generally. I have heard of Spaniards going down, and bidding for the vessels, but it was not an ordinary occurrence.
5112. Then you are of opinion that usually slave dealers at Gallinas did not visit Sierra Leone for the purpose of making purchases of goods or vessels?--Not in their own persons, they may have done it through a third party; but, perhaps, it would shorten the questions to state that the greater portion of the goods sold at the auctions captured from vessels in the slave trade were purchased by liberated Africans, by the hawkers there, and they made the best use of them. That a certain portion of the goods so purchased at auctions may get into the hands of slave dealers afterwards, is very possible; but I am convinced, from the description of goods which are sold, which may be used in lawful trade, and from the different appearance of the whole colony since goods were sold so extensively, that the greater portion of them are consumed in the colony, and are made use of in the lawful trade, by liberated Africans in the neighbourhood. I consider that the colony has been very much benefited indeed by those sales; that the condition of the liberated Africans has been very much improved by them, as has been very evident from the great wealth that has been stirring among them; and the liberated Africans have now not only completely bought out the Maroons and settlers, who were the original settlers of the place, but are gradually driving out the white merchants; and I think it a very great advantage, for they are able to live much more cheaply than the white men can do; they carry on their business at one hundredth part of the expense, and turn their money over very much more quickly.
5113. Are any precautions taken by the authorities at Sierra Leone to prevent slave dealers obtaining goods at Sierra Leone, either by public auction or in any other manner?--Certainly not.
5114. Mr. _W. Patten_.] You have stated that there was an illicit trade going on between Sierra Leone and Gallinas; are there any other circumstances than those you have mentioned, that you can adduce in proof of that?--None; in the trade that has been just referred to, of Spaniards and Portuguese at Gallinas sending up to purchase goods at auctions, they have done so, and they have been sent down to them through a third party, but it is seldom they appear themselves.
5115. You do not, of your own knowledge, know what is the connection between Mr. Kidd and any individuals at Gallinas?--No.
5116. Nor of any other merchant at Sierra Leone?--No.
5117. Do you believe that they act as commission merchants to purchase goods?--Yes; I suppose on commission.
5118. Is there any trade carried on by any merchant on his own account with the Gallinas?--I should think that very likely too; but it is impossible to know, for after vessels have gone outside the Cape they may carry their goods any where: you do not know what becomes of them.
5119. Mr. _Forster_.] Do you think it would be desirable to impose any restriction upon legitimate trade to Gallinas?--I think not; I think no restriction upon trade should be imposed, even on the intercourse between the two places.
5120. Mr. _W. Patten_.] How would you distinguish the legitimate from the illegitimate trade?--You cannot distinguish it; and there I think the danger lies of attempting to interfere with intercourse.
5121. Mr. _Forster_.] And therefore, in attempting to check or impede the one, you would do more harm than good in repressing and discouraging the other?--I think it very probable; I think it would be quite impossible to draw the line.
5122. But supposing it to be possible, do you think it would be, in fact, desirable to take any measures which would have the effect of checking the progress of legitimate trade?--Certainly not.
5123. Were there any Hamburgh vessels condemned at Sierra Leone?--Not in my time.
5124. Mr. _Hamilton_.] Do you think that the establishing such a blockade on the coast as you have alluded to just now, would have the effect of interfering with legitimate trade?--No, not such a blockade as I alluded to; I think the natives are well aware of the design for which the cruizers are on the coast, they would consider their presence rather as a protection, than otherwise, to the legitimate trade.
5125. Mr. _Forster_.] Were not large quantities of tobacco and rum sold at Sierra Leone from the prize vessels conveyed there leeward for sale to the Sierra Leone merchants?--Yes; I believe there were several cargoes of Brazilian tobacco and of spirits sent down the coast: I believe, principally to Badagry and that neighbourhood.
5126. That tobacco was, of course, especially imported on the coast for the purpose of the slave trade?--It was taken out of slave vessels; therefore, of course, it was.
5127. When it arrived at Badagry, it would consequently be very acceptable to slave dealers there?--Yes; but they had to pay for it.
5128. Mr. _W. Patten_.] Did you find when you were at Sierra Leone that the price paid for goods at auctions exceeded or was below the price of goods imported in other ways?--The necessary effect of such large quantities of goods being thrown on the market, and compelled to be sold at any rate to the highest bidder, was of course to lower the price; and I consider that the very cheap rate at which the liberated Africans were able to procure those goods, which, in former times, they could only obtain at a high price, was what formed the advantage which they derived from those sales.
5129. How do you account for it, that the merchants at Sierra Leone do not themselves purchase those goods?--They have not the money; in fact, they have no money at all. There are only one or two men that have any money in the place; they are almost all men who receive their goods from houses in England; they are generally very much in debt to the persons who send goods to them; and the only parties who have money in the colony, with the exception of two gentlemen, are liberated Africans, and many of the latter have very large sums.
5130. Mr. _Forster_.] Has the trade at Sierra Leone not, in your opinion, been a successful trade for some years?--It has been a successful trade for the liberated Africans.
5131. The question applied to British traders?--I cannot say; I have not been engaged in trade myself during that time; but I should think that the English traders must have suffered by the goods which were thrown on the market from slave vessels, whilst they had goods which were purchased at a much dearer rate to dispose of, and had not the money to purchase the low-priced goods there. But one case I can mention, where a white merchant at Sierra Leone had the funds to go into the market and compete with the liberated Africans; he has made a great deal of money by it, and the more in consequence of his means being so superior to those of the Africans; but that was because he had money: the losses of the others were because they had none.
5132. You have spoken of the advantages to the black population from the sale of those goods, which have led them to become hawkers and pedlars in the neighbouring country; it is the fact that the natives of Africa are very much disposed to that species of employment in preference to agricultural labour?--It certainly is so at Sierra Leone.
5133. Then the advantages derived from the encouragement thus given to them to embark in that species of employment in preference to the fixed pursuits of agriculture may be questionable on that ground?--I think not; I think if the liberated African can get money and can educate his family well, and procure all that he wants by trade, it is just as well as if he procured it by agriculture.
5134. Have you found them practically carrying on any regular system of agriculture voluntarily?--Not for export: there have been some articles cultivated, but to no very great extent: ginger, and pepper, and cassada, but cultivation has not been carried to any great extent for export at Sierra Leone.
5135. How do you account for cultivation and improvement having made so little progress in Sierra Leone after all the efforts of the party in this country, and all the money which has been expended upon it?--I doubt the proposition contained in the question; I think that they have made progress.
5136. Planting and cultivation is carried on there to a great extent?--No, it is not; but the people have other means of procuring what they require.
5137. Have any means been taken, or if taken, have they been successful, for promoting any regular system of agriculture or planting in the neighbourhood of Sierra Leone?--No, I think not, and I am very sorry for it; I think more might have been done in the way of premiums upon produce, and giving prizes for successful cultivation.
5138. In fact, has any thing been done in that way?--Nothing whatever, I believe, of late years. There was an agricultural society that existed many years before I went to the colony, which offered premiums, but the members of it died, and the scheme fell to the ground.
5139. The attempts of that society, in fact, were not successful?--No; it was before my time; I cannot speak positively to the efforts that were made; it is a great many years ago now.
5140. Can you distinguish the amount of captures to the south and north of the Line?--Yes; in 1838, 15 out of 30 vessels, either were captured, or took on board their slaves to the westward of Cape Palmas, or one-third of the vessels which were detained with full cargoes of slaves on board, or four out of seven, if we only look to the vessels detained in the West Indies. The whole, or very nearly, of the slave trade carried on in the north, or rather west of Cape Palmas, is for the supply of the island of Cuba, and generally on account of the Havannah merchants. In the following year, “of the 61 vessels which passed through the courts during the year 1839, three were captured in the West Indies, the remainder on this coast, eight to the southward of the Line, but none below the latitude of 4 deg. 58 min. south, and of 50 vessels captured north of the Line, 30 were met with to the eastward and 20 to the westward of Cape Palmas.”
5141. Mr. _W. Patten_.] Does not the return distinguish from what part of the coast those vessels came?--Yes; it goes into all the particulars of the places from which they came, and the places to which they went, and to which they took their cargoes; 18 of the whole number had slaves on board, 11 having shipped their slaves in parts to the eastward of Cape Palmas, and seven to the westward of the same point, and the river where they shipped them is mentioned.
5142. Mr. _Forster_.] Supposing that the time should arrive when the greatest number of prize vessels should be brought from the southward, would you in that case consider Sierra Leone to be the place best adapted for the mixed commission?--If that arose from the slave trade being permanently at an end in the north, I should say, that the commission should certainly follow the course of the slave trade.
5143. Mr. _W. Patten_.] From the position you held, had you any information, officially or otherwise, of knowing the state of the slave trade to the south of the Line?--No, except what I got from papers found on board detained vessels, and from conversation with naval officers.
5144. From information so obtained, were you led to believe that the slave trade on the coast of Africa, taking both the east and west coast, had increased or decreased during the period you were there?--It had decreased in the bights, so as to be almost entirely destroyed at one time.
5145. The question refers to the coast on the south of the Line?--When it was suppressed to a great extent in the bights, it was driven both north and south of the bights; the old slave trade rivers in the bights were the principal places frequented by slave vessels, but the whole efforts of the cruizers were directed to that point, and the trade was almost entirely suppressed in those rivers, the Bonny and many others.
5146. You had no information which could enable you to judge whether the slave trade on the whole had increased or decreased during your residence at Sierra Leone?--I should say, that it decreased during the last two years I was there, from the immense number of captures that were made.
5147. It has been stated by a witness on the Committee, Captain Bosanquet, that in his belief, the slave trade south of the line, has increased materially during the last 10 years?--I think Captain Bosanquet refers to the eastern coast.
5148. Captain Bosanquet stated that he was, at two periods, on the coast, and that at the last period he found the slave trade going on with much more violence than at the first?--The effect of the suppression of the slave trade in the bights was to drive the slave trade both north and south, and it increased in the north and south, but I should say that the whole extent of the slave trade had decidedly decreased during the last two years.
5149. Do you think that it is a very material decrease?--I do.
5150. Do you know any particular places on the coast to which slavers have resorted, more especially since it has been so much checked on the west coast north of the Line?--It increased to the south; there have been many more Brazilian captures made in the rivers immediately south of the Line, of late years, than there were before; but the great diminution in the bights has not been made up by the increased slave trade either north or south.
5151. Mr. _Stuart Wortley_.] Will you explain what period you refer to when you use the expression, “of late years”?--In the years 1835 and 1836, it began to diminish, and in 1837 there was hardly any slave trade at all in the bights.
5152. Then, I understand you to say that there has been an increase of captures south of the Line since the years 1835 and 1836?--Yes, there has been.
5153. Could the capture of vessels under Portuguese colours have taken place till 1836?--It could have taken place if the same rule had been applied then as was applied in 1838.
5154. But in fact were there any captures made?--No, the rule was not applied till 1838.
5155. Then when you speak of the increase of captures since 1835, you mean that the practice of making captures south of the Line has been introduced since that period?--Yes; and I would observe with respect to that, that the Act of Parliament for the suppression of the Portuguese slave trade really did very little good. I am alluding to the Act which was passed in order to catch vessels south of the Line, because we already dealt with them in the way I have mentioned, and the only trade the Act could possibly affect, was the trade carried on between the Portuguese islands off the coast and the main-land.
5156. Sir _T. D. Acland_.] Do you mean Prince’s Island?--Prince’s Island and St. Thomas.
5157. Mr. _W. Patten_.] Seeing that the sale of those goods at auctions conduces in some degree to the continuance of the slave trade on that coast, can you point out any other means by which those goods can be disposed of without contributing to the encouragement of that trade?--I do not see how it is possible to form regulations which shall follow the goods through all the hands into which they pass.
5158. Sir _T. D. Acland_.] Could they be sold elsewhere?--Yes, there is trade on the coast; but I think it would be very injurious to interfere with trade.
5159. Mr. _Patten_.] Do you think that if the captors of the slave vessel were allowed to take the vessels and cargoes, they having been condemned, and sell them in any other country, they might not make greater gains than they do by selling them on the spot?--It is possible that they might make greater gains, but it would be impossible for the court to allow goods that have been once submitted to their jurisdiction regularly to pass into other hands for disposal. When the goods are condemned, they are placed under the authority of the marshal, to be dealt with according to the decision of the court; it cannot allow that decree to be carried into effect by any other than its own officers.
5160. According to the present law, it cannot; but do not you think that arrangements might be made by which the parties making the capture might derive greater benefit from the capture, by being enabled after the condemnation to dispose of the goods in another country?--I think the captors would not benefit by such a regulation; it would take them away from their cruizing stations, where they have an opportunity of making other captures.
5161. Have you not heard complaints made by the captors of the very little benefit they obtain from it?--Yes; but I think without good grounds.
5162. Can you state what is the highest amount that you have heard of paid to a cruizer for the capture of a slaver?--I do not know any thing of the reward given in England; it does not come before us in any way whatever; that is an affair between the captor and the Government. But it is not the captor, strictly speaking, that is injured in this case; for the captor, as far as the court is concerned, has no interest whatever; the goods are not condemned as a prize to the captor, but as a prize to the British and foreign Governments, and the British Government may pay or withhold its moiety, if it pleases. It generally gives it to the captor, but it is in its power to pay any smaller sum. The captor has no claim, except upon the bounty of Government, with respect to the goods sold at auctions.
5163. But does it not come to this, that the remuneration paid to the captor depends upon the value of the cargo which he captures?--Where a captor has seized a cargo, it does; but cases vary very much; for instance, many vessels are seized quite empty, without any cargo; many vessels come over without any cargo, I should say the great proportion. Where a vessel is full of slaves, the interest of the captor is not affected, because the bulk of his remuneration depends upon the head-money he gets for the slaves.
5164. Can you account for this circumstance, that in a return made to Parliament, in the list of vessels that have been sold, it appears that the proceeds or effects of one vessel have amounted to 1,108_l._, and the charges on the sale have amounted to 585_l._ out of the 1,108_l._?--It seems very enormous, but I must know the circumstances of the case.
5165. This is the passage, “On the following cases of slave trade vessels sent in for adjudication to the commission courts of Sierra Leone by Captain Tucker of Her Majesty’s ship Wolverine, the charges here detailed were made: The San Antonia Victirioso, a Brazilian vessel, the proceeds and effects of that sale were 1,108_l._, and the charges on the sale were 585_l._”?--I cannot account for it; it did not happen in my time; I should know the name of the vessel if it had.
5166. _Chairman._] Can you, from your knowledge of the usual course of proceeding, explain the circumstances under which such a charge could have arisen?--No; I know what the expenses are likely to be, and I might account for a portion of it in that way.
5167. Mr. _W. Patten_.] Will you state the expenses in detail?--The expenses on Brazilian vessels were enormous, owing to the duty that was levied at Sierra Leone by the customs, on spirits and tobacco. The spirits and tobacco that are sent in Brazilian slave vessels are of a very inferior quality indeed, and the duty levied is very high; in many cases exceeding the value of the goods; so much so, that I took it upon myself a short time before I gave up my situation, to abandon the whole of several cargoes of spirits and tobacco to the custom-house, because the goods would not sell at the auction for the amount of the duty. I thought that the captors had great reason to complain; but subsequently to that, an Act was passed by the Governor in Council there, which was brought in by myself, to meet this exigency, and since that time I do not think that the captors have any reason to complain about the duty levied on those goods.
5168. _Chairman._] What was the nature of the Act you allude to?--It put on an _ad valorem_ duty instead of a fixed duty; the value of the articles alluded to was so small, that when you put a fixed duty upon them, a duty that was framed to meet tobacco and spirits from England, which were of a very different quality, they were hardly worth any thing beyond the duty; and I should suppose that was the principal cause of the heavy charges now referred to; but I know nothing of the case.
5169. Mr. _W. Patten_.] To take another case: the Palmira, a Spanish vessel was captured, the effects produced 1,824_l._, and 582_l._ were the charges?--That is not in my time.
5170. _Chairman._] Do you explain that by the same circumstance?--No; not knowing any thing of the circumstances of the case, I cannot explain it; the vessel may have been detained for several months at the desire of the captor; but I am quite sure that, with the exception of one or two items, and heavy items, of which the captors, I think, _had_ a right to complain, and over which the court had no control, the expenses were not unreasonably heavy.