[A]: Astley's collection, vol. 1. page 139.
[B]: Collection vol. 1. p. 148.
[C]: Ibid. 257.
This bad example of the Portuguese was soon followed by some evil disposed Englishmen; for the same captain Towerson relates,[A] "That in the course of his voyage, he perceived the natives, near D'Elmina, unwilling to come to him, and that he was at last attacked by them; which he understood was done in revenge for the wrong done them the year before, by one captain Gainsh, who had taken away the Negro captain's son, and three others, with their gold, &c. This caused them to join the Portuguese, notwithstanding their hatred of them, against the English." The next year captain Towerson brought these men back again; whereupon the Negroes shewed him much kindness.[B] Quickly after this, another instance of the same kind occurred, in the case of captain George Fenner, who being on the coast, with three vessels, was also attacked by the Negroes, who wounded several of his people, and violently carried three of his men to their town. The captain sent a messenger, offering any thing they desired for the ransom of his men: but they refused to deliver them, letting him know, "That three weeks before, an English ship, which came in the road, had carried off three of their people; and that till they were brought again, they would not restore his men, even tho' they should give their three ships to release them." It was probably the evil conduct of these, and some other Englishmen, which was the occasion of what is mentioned in Hill's naval history, viz. "That when captain Hawkins returned from his first voyage to Africa, Queen Elizabeth sent for him, when she expressed her concern, lest any of the African Negroes should be carried off without their free consent; which she declared would be detestable, and would call down the vengeance of heaven upon the undertakers." Hawkins made great promises, which nevertheless he did not perform; for his next voyage to the coast appears to have been principally calculated to procure Negro slaves, in order to sell them to the Spaniards in the West Indies; which occasioned the same author to use these remarkable words: "Here began the horrid practice of forcing the Africans into slavery: an injustice and barbarity, which, so sure as there is vengeance in heaven for the worst of crimes, will some time be the destruction of all who act or who encourage it." This captain Hawkins, afterwards sir John Hawkins, seems to have been the first Englishman who gave public countenance to this wicked traffic: For Anderson, before mentioned, at page 401, says, "That in the year 1562, captain Hawkins, assisted by subscription of sundry gentlemen, now fitted out three ships; and having learnt that Negroes were a very good commodity in Hispaniola, he sailed to the coast of Guinea, took in Negroes, and sailed with them for Hispaniola, where he sold them, and his English commodities, and loaded his three vessels with hides, sugar and ginger, &c. with which he returned home anno 1563, making a prosperous voyage." As it proved a lucrative business, the trade was continued both by Hawkins and others, as appears from the naval chronicle, page 55, where it is said, "That on the 18th of October, 1564, captain John Hawkins, with two ships of 700 and 140 tuns, sailed for Africa; that on the 8th of December they anchored to the South of Cape Verd, where the captain manned the boat, and sent eighty men in armour into the country, to see if they could take some Negroes; but the natives flying from them, they returned to their ships, and proceeded farther down the coast. Here they staid certain days, sending their men ashore, in order (as the author says) to burn and spoil their towns and take the inhabitants. The land they observed to be well cultivated, there being plenty of grain, and fruit of several sorts, and the towns prettily laid out. On the 25th, being informed by the Portugueze of a town of Negroes called Bymba, where there was not only a quantity of gold, but an hundred and forty inhabitants, they resolved to attack it, having the Portugueze for their guide; but by mismanagement they took but ten Negroes, having seven of their own men killed, and twenty-seven wounded. They then went farther down the coast; when, having procured a number of Negroes, they proceeded to the West Indies, where they sold them to the Spaniards." And in the same naval chronicle, at page 76, it is said, "That in the year 1567, Francis Drake, before performing his voyage round the world, went with Sir John Hawkins in his expedition to the coast of Guinea, where taking in a cargo of slaves, they determined to steer for the Caribbee islands." How Queen Elizabeth suffered so grievous an infringement of the rights of mankind to be perpetrated by her subjects, and how she was persuaded, about the 30th year of her reign, to grant patents for carrying on a trade from the North part of the river Senegal, to an hundred leagues beyond Sierra Leona, which gave rise to the present African company, is hard to account for, any otherwise than that it arose from the misrepresentation made to her of the situation of the Negroes, and of the advantages it was pretended they would reap from being made acquainted with the christian religion. This was the case of Lewis the XIIIth, King of France, who, Labat, in his account of the isles of America, tells us, "Was extremely uneasy at a law by which the Negroes of his colonies were to be made slaves; but it being strongly urged to him as the readiest means for their conversion to christianity, he acquiesced therewith." Nevertheless, some of the christian powers did not so easily give way in this matter; for we find,[C] "That cardinal Cibo, one of the Pope's principal ministers of state, wrote a letter on behalf of the college of cardinals, or great council at Rome, to the missionaries in Congo, complaining that the pernicious and abominable abuse of selling slaves was yet continued, requiring them to remedy the same, if possible; but this the missionaries saw little hopes of accomplishing, by reason that the trade of the country lay wholly in slaves and ivory."
[A]: Collection, vol. 1. p. 148.
[B]: Ibid. 157.
[C]: Collection, vol. 3, page 164.