WHY WAS SLAVERY ABOLISHED?
In 1807 the slave trade was abolished in the British Empire. This meant that no ship from Britain w as allowed to carry slaves from Africa to America. This wasn’t the end of slavery though. The abolitionists like William Wilberforce, Olavdah Equiano and Thomas Clarkson were still fighting for abolition of slavery and carried on campaigning. They argued in parliament on moral, economic, religious legal and revolutionary grounds.
The moral case was important. It was about the way slaves were treated etc. The English navy was stopping other boats from using the slave trade which other countries saw as unfair. They didn’t see why the English could have slaves and they could not. The slave trade was cruel to the slaves. They were treated like animals and were kept very poorly on the voyage to America. When they were bought, women and children usually got split up. Thomas Phillips, an abolitionist, said “I can’t think there is any basic value in one colour more than another”. They had no say in what they did. They were whipped and women were often be raped. They had to work up to 16 hours in a day in summer when it was very hot. Most of them never bought their freedom and worked for all their lives. The abolitionists put forward these points and others showing how cruel slavery was.
