On the 5th of July 1821, Perry was doubly happy, in his first sole command of a man-of-war, and in her being bound upon a worthy mission. The Shark was to convey Dr. Eli Ayres to Africa as agent of the United States in Liberia. He was especially glad that he could now enforce his ideas of ship hygiene. His ambition was to make the cruise without one case of fever or scurvy.
The Shark sped directly through the Canaries. Here, the human falcons resorted before swooping on their human prey. At Cape de Verde, he found the villianous slave-trade carried on under the mask of religion. Thousands of negroes decoyed or kidnapped from Africa, were lodged at the trading station for one year, and then baptized by the wholesale in the established Roman faith. They were then shipped to Brazil as Portuguese “subjects.” It was first aspersion, and then dispersion.
At Sierra Leone, Dr. Ayers was landed. Three out of every four whites in the colony died with promptness and regularity. The British cruisers suffered frightfully in the loss of officers, and the Thistle, spoken October 21st, had only the commander and surgeon left of her staff.
Perry performed one act during this cruise which powerfully effected for good the future of the American negro in Africa, and the destiny of the future republic of Liberia. The first site chosen for the settlement of the blacks sent out by the American Colonization Society was Sherbro Island situated in the wide estuary of the Sherbro river which now divides Sierra Leone from Liberia. In this low lying malarious district, white men were sure to die speedily, and the blacks must go through the fever in order to live. On Perry’s arrival, he found that the missionary teachers, Mr. and Mrs. Winn, and the Reverend Mr. Andrews were already in the cemetery from fever. Some of the new colonists were sick and six of them had died.
Perry saw at once that the foundations of the settlement must be made on higher ground. He selected, therefore, the promontory of Mont Serrado, called Cape Mesurado. This place, easily accessible, had no superior on the coast. It lay at the mouth of the Mesurado river which flowed from a source three hundred miles in the interior.[[4]]
Having no authority to make any changes, the matter rested until December 12, 1832 when Captain Stockton, Doctor Ayres, and seven immigrants visited the location chosen by Matthew Perry. “That is the spot that we ought to have,” said Captain Stockton, “that should be the site of our colony. No finer spot on the coast.” Three days later a contract to cede the desired land to the United States was signed by six native “Kings.” Seventeen of the dusky sovereigns and thirty-four dignitaries enjoying semi-royal honors, had assented, and on the twenty-fifth of April 1832 the American flag was hoisted over Cape Mesurado. Shortly afterwards, Monrovia, the future capital, named after President Monroe, began its existence. To this form of the Monroe doctrine, European nations have fully acceded. Liberia is the only colony founded by the United States.
The Shark ran, like a ferret in rat-holes, into all the rivers, nooks and harbors, but though French, Dutch and Spanish vessels were chased and overhauled, no American ships were caught. Perry wrote “The severe laws of Congress had the desired effect of preventing American citizens from employing their time and capital in this iniquitous traffic.” Yet this species of commerce was very actively pursued by vessels wearing the French, Portuguese, Spanish and Dutch flags. The French and Portuguese were the most persistent man-stealers. So great was the demand for slaves, that villages only a few miles apart were in constant war so as to get prisoners to be disposed of to the captains of slave-vessels. Perry wrote:
“In this predatory warfare the most flagitious acts of cruelty are committed. The ties of nature are entirely cut asunder for it is not infrequent that parents dispose of their own children.”
The cargoes which the slavers carried to use in barter for human flesh consisted of New England rum, Virginia tobacco, with European gunpowder, paint, muskets, caps, hats, umbrellas and hardware. Most of the wearing apparel was the unsalable or damaged stock of European shops. The Guinea coast was the Elysium of old clothes men and makers of slop work. Long out of fashion at home, these garments sufficed to deck gorgeously the naked body of a black slave-peddler, while the rum corroded his interior organs. The Caroline, a French ship overhauled by Perry, had made ten voyages to Africa. The vessel, cargo and outfit cost $8,000, the value of the cargo of one hundred and fifty-three slaves at $250 each, was $38,250, a profit of nearly $30,000 for a single voyage. The sixty men, ten women, and sixty-three children stowed in the hold were each fed daily with one bottle of water and one pound of rice. The ships found off Old Calabar and Cape Mount—now seats of active Christian and civilizing labors—having no one on board who could speak English, were completely fitted for carrying slaves. Those sailing below the equator, and under their national flags, could not be molested. No Congress of nations had yet outlawed slave-trading on all the seas as piracy. The commander of the British squadron reported: “No Americans are engaged in the [slave] trade. They would have no inducement to conceal their real character from the officers of a British cruiser, for these have no authority to molest them. All slaves are now under foreign flags.”
In this villainous work, the Portuguese from first to last have held undisputed pre-eminence. Perry, after his three African cruises, was confirmed in his opinion formed at first, and which all students of Africa so unanimously hold. Mr. Robert Grant Watson, who has minutely studied the national disgrace in many parts of the world thus formulates this judgment.