The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839)Clarkson, Thomas
History
The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839)
Clarkson, Thomas
Slave trade -- Africa
In the middle watch, or between one and two next morning, George Ormond
looked out of one of the port-holes, and called to Green, but received
no answer. Between two and three, Paul Berry, a seaman, was sent down
into the boat, and found him dead. He made his report to one of the
officers of the ship. About five in the morning the body was brought up,
and laid on the waist near the half-deck door. The captain on seeing the
body when he rose, expressed no concern, but ordered it to be knocked
out of irons, and to be buried at the usual place of interment for
seamen, or Bonny Point. I may now observe, that the deceased was in good
health before the punishment took place, and in high spirits; for he
played upon the flute only a short time before Rodney asked him for the
keys, while those seamen, who were in health, danced.
On hearing this cruel relation from George Ormond, who was throughout a
material witness to the scene, I had no doubt in my own mind of the
truth of it; but I thought it right to tell him at once that I had seen
a person, about four weeks ago, who had been the same voyage with him
and Peter Green, but yet who had no recollection of these circumstances.
Upon this he looked quite astonished, and began to grow angry; he
maintained he had seen the whole; he had also held the candle himself
during the whole punishment. He asserted that one candle and half of
another were burnt out while it lasted. He said also that, while the
body lay in the waist, he had handled the abused parts, and had put
three of his fingers into a hole, made by the double walled knot, in the
head, from whence a quantity of blood and, he believed, brains issued.
He then challenged me to bring the man, before him; I desired him upon
this to be cool, and to come to me the next day, and I would then talk
with him again upon the subject.
In the interim I consulted the muster-roll of the vessel again; I found
the name of George Ormond; he had sailed in her out of Liverpool, and
had been discharged at the latter end of January in the West Indies, as
he had told me. I found also the names of Michael Cunningham and of Paul
Berry, whom he had mentioned. It was obvious also that Ormond's account
of the captain of the Alfred being on board at the time of the
punishment tallied with that given me at Bristol by an officer of that
vessel, and that his account of letting down Peter Green into the boat
tallied with that which Mr. Falconbridge, as I mentioned before, had
heard from the king and the black traders in Bonny river.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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