CHAPTER III

ILLEGAL TRAFFIC IN SLAVES

Legislation against habits which by an evolution of sentiment have become moral issues is always followed by flagrant violations, for men are usually loth to acquiesce in things which they consider a curtailment of their livelihood. For a century and a half, the slave traffic had been an immense source of revenue for a large class of citizens. Despite the constitutional prohibition, the imposition of heavy fines and the offer of large rewards, the traffic in negroes continued to flourish--nor was it carried on with any great degree of surreptitiousness. Vessels intended for this purpose were built with a reference to speed and were probably the fleetest craft afloat.

In the early years of the Union the revenue and naval forces were necessarily small and the coast a vast and sparsely inhabited one. Algerian pirates called for a part of their strength, and their energies were again directed against the British in 1812; pirates harassed commerce off the South Atlantic States and in the Gulf of Mexico--Lafitte establishing a kingdom at Barataria, an island in the lower Mississippi, from which sailed many piratical expeditions, and where a brisk trade in slaves was carried on. Though our naval force seemed inadequate it had been singularly successful against these outside adversaries. These preoccupations seem scarcely sufficient excuse for the flourishing condition of the illegal traffic in slaves. Money, politics, and indifference appear to have been a trinity that glossed over rottenness then as now. Obscure harbors and lonely shores were not always the destination of these hell-craft, but they sailed to and from the principal seaport towns. With scarcely an exception they were fitted up by New Englanders and New Yorkers and manned by down-east seamen; Rhode Island led with Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York as close seconds. The West Indies and Brazil offered a market, and some found their way into Southern ports, where, through the co-operation of an equally criminal class of Southerners, the unfortunate, contraband humans were sold.

While the middle passage before 1808 was a veritable inferno, it was afterwards characterized by a barbarity which should have sickened the soul of all humanity, yet the voice and sentiment of humane, law-abiding Americans were not strong enough to make this traffic impossible. Cyrus King in a speech on the Missouri Question, in 1819, described the shameless situation: “It well might be supposed that the slave trade would in practice be extinguished; that virtuous men would by their abhorrence stay its polluted march and the wicked would be overawed by its potent punishment, but unfortunately the case is far otherwise. We have but melancholy proofs from unquestionable sources that it is still carried on with all the implacable ferocity--and insatiable rapacity--of former times. Avarice has grown more subtile in its evasions; and watches and seizes its prey with an appetite quickened rather than suppressed by its guilty vigils. American citizens are steeped up to their very mouths (I scarcely use too bold a figure) in this stream of iniquity? They throng the coasts of Africa under the stained flags of Spain and Portugal, sometimes selling abroad their ‘cargoes of despair,’ and sometimes bringing them into some of our Southern ports, and there, under the forms of law, defeating the purpose of the law itself, and legalizing their inhuman but profitable adventures.”

Those so unfortunate as to have been brought into any of the Southern States were by the Constitution “subject to any regulations, not contravening the provisions of the act, which the legislatures of the several states or territories at any time hereafter may make, for disposing of any such negro, mulatto, or person of color.” As some extenuation for those Southern States, let it be asked, What was to be done with these unfortunate Africans? Barbarians all--often of the lowest type--and sometimes cannibals--could they be given freedom? The attention of thinking men was early directed to the status of the free black; how to place him to his own best advantage that his position as a citizen would not be equivocal; and to avoid arousing by his idle example or designing machinations, discord, dissatisfaction, and even mutiny among the slaves. In 1803, a colonization plan was discussed in the Virginia Assembly; this led to a correspondence on the subject between Madison, who was then Governor, and President Jefferson. Out of this was born in 1816, what soon became a very active organization, the American Colonization Society. After negotiations, lands were secured on the west coast of Africa at Cape Mesurada. There the society established a colony to which such free blacks as desired might be conveyed, and which was also to receive the Africans taken from slavers, or those found to have been smuggled into the country by traders. During all the years of the society’s activities the unfortunates reached by their clemency were small in proportion to those surreptitiously sold into bondage; this was due to the powerful abettors--often legalized ones--of the traffic. A lack of intelligent forethought was responsible for disheartening results in their early efforts at colonization. But the society’s efforts at home were more successful by fostering a spirit against the trade, and it was instrumental in regulating the laws in some of the Southern States which were so ambiguous as to aid rather than crush the trade.[15] In 1819, Congress stipulated that contraband Africans were to be taken from State jurisdiction to become wards of the Government, and the President was authorized to make “such regulations and arrangements as he may deem expedient for the safe-keeping, support, and removal beyond the limits of the United States, of all such negroes, mulattoes, or persons of color, as may be so delivered and brought within their jurisdiction. And to appoint a proper person or persons, residing upon the coast of Africa, as agent or agents for receiving negroes, etc., delivered from on board vessels, seized in the prosecution of trade by commanders of the United States armed vessels.” In 1819, Congress acting upon a memorial presented by the Colonization Society, declared the slave traffic to be piracy punishable with death. In this same year the statute of 1809 was enlarged and made more stringent and the President was empowered to send armed vessels along the African coast. One hundred thousand dollars was appropriated for this purpose.

Rigid legislation only multiplied the horrors, without curtailing the evil. With death as the penalty, when there was danger of apprehension, it was not uncommon for the whole cargo to be thrown into the sea. This, compared with the tortures of frequent passages, was almost humane. To escape the terrors, numbers would embrace death if given the opportunity. Yet the trade was highly profitable even if three out of four cargoes were lost.

By the Treaty of Ghent (1815), the United States and Great Britain agreed separately and individually to use their influence to suppress the trade. Yet later the United States threw sheltering arms around those of her citizens whom Britain had reason to suspect--maritime rights, the statement that Southern slave owners might make voyages accompanied by their slaves, or the plea of slave hands on merchant ships--often protected malefactors. After Parliament abolished slavery from the British colonies, the American brig _Comet_ was stranded off the Bahamas (1830), as was the _Encomium_ in 1834 and the _Enterprise_ in 1835; slaves were found aboard in each case and liberated by the English. Americans raised a loud cry. After a correspondence covering nearly ten years Great Britain agreed to pay for the Africans, and admonished her colonies on the southern borders of the United States to “maintain good neighborhood.” As the years went by and all so-called efforts proved ineffectual, England, with a sincere desire to end the traffic, developed an assumption that it was her especial privilege, and inaugurated a right of search, or visit, against the very nature of which it was imperative that the United States should protest. In many cases this necessity became unavoidably another protection for malefactors. As the flags of various countries were constantly used to cover the traffic, England in 1803 united with Russia, France, Austria, and Prussia for the suppression, and acquired supervision along the African coast, maintaining a right of search. America was not approached on this subject, though Lord Palmerston boldly declared to the world England’s right to “visit” American merchantmen (Aug. 13, 1841). This was later sustained by Lord Aberdeen (Oct. 13, 1841). America’s attitude toward the situation was awaited with great interest by European Powers. Such an assumption could not be tolerated--America had already suffered too much from British assumption--and President Tyler in his message to Congress protested that “however desirous the United States may be for the suppression of the slave trade, they cannot consent to any interpolations of the maritime code at the mere will and pleasure of other governments. We deny the right of any such interpolation to any one, or all the nations of earth without our consent.... American citizens prosecuting a lawful commerce on the African seas, under the flag of their country, are not responsible for the abuse or unlawful use of that flag by others; nor can they rightfully, on account of any such alleged abuses, be interrupted, molested, or detained while in the ocean; and if thus molested and detained while pursuing honest voyages in the usual way and violating no laws themselves, they are unquestionably entitled to indemnity.”[16]

Lord Aberdeen in his correspondence with Mr. Stephenson (Oct. 13, 1841) had admitted that it would be an infringement of public law, to visit and search American vessels during times of peace, if that right were not granted by treaty. “But no such right is asserted. We sincerely desire to respect the vessels of the United States, but we may reasonably expect to know what it is we respect. Doubtless the flag is prima facie evidence of nationality of the vessel; and, if this evidence were in its nature conclusive and irrefragible, it ought to preclude all further inquiry. But it is sufficiently notorious that the flags of all nations are liable to be assumed by those who have no right or title to bear them. Mr. Stephenson himself fully admits the extent to which the American flag has been employed for the purpose of covering this infamous traffic. The undersigned joins with Mr. Stephenson in deeply lamenting the evil; and he agrees with him in thinking the United States ought not to be considered responsible for the abuse of their flag. But if all inquiry be resisted, even when carried no further than to ascertain the nationality of the vessel, and impunity be claimed for the most lawless and desperate of mankind, in the commission of the fraud the undersigned greatly fears that it may be regarded as something like an assumption of that responsibility which has been deprecated by Mr. Stephenson....

“The undersigned, although with pain, must add, that if such visit lead to the proof of the American origin of the vessel, and that she was avowedly engaged in the trade, exhibiting manacles, fetters, and other usual implements of torture, or had even a number of those unfortunates on board, no British officer could interfere further. He might give information to the cruisers of the United States, but it could not be in his power to arrest or impede the prosecution of the voyage and the success of the undertaking.”

The question called for a diplomatic correspondence. In 1842, Lord Ashburton was sent as special minister to the United States, empowered to settle the Northwest Boundary, and other questions of controversy. The result of his conference with Daniel Webster, Secretary of State, was a treaty between Great Britain and the United States known as the Ashburton Treaty and as the Treaty of Washington. By the eighth article each stipulated to “maintain on the African coast an adequate squadron, to carry in all not less than eighty guns, to enforce separately and respectively the laws, rights, and obligations of the two countries for the suppression of the slave trade.”

There was also the realization that as long as certain countries offered open markets for slaves, the temptation to malefactors would be so great that their efforts would be more or less ineffectual; by the ninth article both countries agreed to “unite in all becoming representations and remonstrances with any and all powers within whose dominions such markets are allowed to exist,” and that “they will urge upon all such powers the propriety and duty of closing such markets effectually, at once and forever.”

Americans, among others, continued to brazenly carry on the trade; as the gap between the North and the South widened, it was carried on with renewed vigor. The Abolitionists’ thoughts were focused on conditions in the South, and failed to note the flourishing trade carried on under their very eyes from the ports of New England and New York. Inhabitants of these places were constantly being found implicated, but by lack of proof, or through some technicality, they were seldom convicted. Officials, who were either conniving or indifferent, aided them in their lucrative trade. As late as 1858, a brisk trade was carried on; statistics show that in that year eighty-five slavers were fitted out and sailed from New York alone, and these successfully captured and sold into slavery fifteen thousand Africans. Sometimes they were sent into the South. The schooner _Wanderer_ in the fall of 1858 surreptitiously landed three hundred at Brunswick, Georgia; they were taken up the Savannah River and sold. In October, of the same year, an alleged slave bark, _Isle de Cuba_, was taken in custody at Boston, and her crew held as witnesses under a thousand-dollar bond; later they and Captain Dobson were discharged. In November, the schooner _Madison_ was taken by the United States marshal at New York. She was intended for the slave trade, was sold at auction, and bought in for Eddy & Gardener of Salem, Mass., for sixteen hundred dollars. Evidence pointed that she was bound for Salem to be fitted out as a slaver when captured. In September the _Echo_ was captured by a revenue cutter and taken to Charleston as the nearest port; Charleston was very active in her efforts to restrain the trade. The _Echo_ was commanded by Captain Townsend of Rhode Island--the queen of the slave-trading States. The Africans were cared for at Charleston until the Colonization Society could take charge of them. They were the wildest barbarians--men and women were alike nude, though this was no evidence that they had been accustomed to going so in their native land, as their clothes were usually taken from them by their captors. Some of the charitable ladies provided clothing for them. Among all these unfortunates there was but one article of clothing--a glove--and this was worn with great pride and distinction by a tall, handsome negress. Hoop-skirts were then in vogue, and this woman was dressed by the ladies in full regalia. Entranced, she danced and shrieked with delight, pushing the hoop-skirt on one side to see it stick out on the other.

Many violations might be cited. Sometimes ships reported deserted vessels on the high seas--vessels whose manacles and wooden spoons told a gruesome tragedy. An article in the New York _World_, in 1859, described some of the methods by which the slavers escaped punishment: “The slave trader takes care to cross the ocean without a national flag or purpose of any kind. The reason for this is that if captured, no court can condemn them for piracy. The vessels may be condemned and the negroes liberated by the captor, but the crew can be punished only by the nation under whose flag the offense was committed. No flag, the crew escapes.” Slavers no longer left America with manacles, gewgaws, and fire-water, but carried money. Once on the African coast they could buy from English or other vessels the articles needed for trade. The bargain struck, the crew that made the outward voyage was usually discharged, and a new one of adventurous spirit procured on the African coast.

Thirteen years after the ratification of the Ashburton Treaty, when England made reclamations on the Brazilian Government for innumerable violations of her treaties, the reply of the Emperor was “if Great Britain would find the real culprits, she must go to the ports of Boston and New York to find them.”[17]