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Zong massacre

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The Slave Ship, J. M. W. Turner's representation of the mass-murder of slaves, inspired by the Zong Massacre[1]

The Zong Massacre was the mass-killing of approximately 142 slaves by the crew of the Zong, a slave ship, carried out from 29 November to 1 December 1781.[2] The ship was owned by a slave-trading syndicate from Liverpool, England, who had taken out insurance on the lives of the slaves. When the ship ran low on water following navigational mistakes, the crew decided to murder some of the slaves, allegedly so that an insurance payment could be collected.

The owners of the Zong subsequently made a claim to their insurers for the loss of the slaves. When the insurers refused to pay, the resulting court cases held that in some circumstances the deliberate killing of slaves could be legal, and that insurers could be required to pay compensation for the slaves' deaths.

The hearings also brought the massacre to the attention of the anti-slavery campaigner Granville Sharp, who tried unsuccessfully to have the ship's crew prosecuted for murder. The Zong Massacre eventually galvanised the nascent abolitionist movement, and became a powerful symbol of the horrors of the Middle Passage. The massacre has also inspired several works of art and literature, and was commemorated in the bicentenary of Britain's abolition of the slave trade in 2007.

The Zong

The Zong had originally been named Zorgue (meaning "Care") by the Dutch, and operated as a slave ship based in Middelburg, owned by the Middelburgsche Commercie Compagnie. It had made a successful voyage to the coast of Surinam in 1777.[3] The Zong was later described as a "square stern ship", of 110 tons burden.[4] It was captured by a British 16-gun ship named Alert on 10 February 1781. By 26 February, the Alert and Zorgue had arrived at Cape Coast Castle, in modern-day Ghana.[5]

In early March 1781, the Zong was purchased by the master of the William, on behalf of a syndicate of Liverpool merchants.[6] The members of the syndicate were William, James and John Gregson, Edward Wilson, George Case and James Aspinall.[7] William Gregson had had an interest in 50 slaving voyages between 1747 and 1780, and had been mayor of the city in 1762.[8] By the end of his life, vessels in which he had a financial stake had taken 58,201 people from Africa.[9]

The Zong was paid for with bills of exchange, and came with a cargo of 244 slaves.[6] The ship was not insured until it had already embarked on its voyage.[10] The insurers, a syndicate from Liverpool, underwrote the ship and cargo for up to £8000, approximately half the potential market value. The remaining risk was borne by the Gregson family.[10][11]

Crew of the Zong

Mariners willing to risk disease and slave rebellions on slave ships were difficult enough to recruit within Britain;[12] they were harder to find for a vessel captured from the Dutch off the coast of Africa. The Zong was manned with remnants of the previous Dutch crew and the crew of the William, and with unemployed sailors from the settlements along the African coast.[13]

The Zong was the first command of Luke Collingwood, formerly the surgeon on the William.[8] While Collingwood lacked experience of navigation and command, it was ship's surgeons who were involved in selecting slaves for purchase in Africa, knowing that those they rejected were liable to be killed. Sometimes these killings happened in the presence of the surgeon. It is likely, therefore, that Collingwood had already witnessed the mass-murder of slaves, and this may have prepared him to participate in the massacre which occurred on the Zong.[14] The Zong's first mate was James Kelsall, who had also served on the William.[8] One passenger, Robert Stubbs, was the disgraced governor of Anomabu, a British fortification near Cape Coast Castle.[15][16]

Fatal voyage

Plan of the slave ship Brookes. The Brookes carried 609 slaves and was 267 tons burden, making 2.3 slaves per ton. The Zong carried 442 slaves and was 110 tons burden – 4.0 slaves per ton.[17]

The Zong had taken on more slaves than it could safely transport when it sailed from São Tomé on 6 September 1781, having left Accra with 442 slaves on 18 August.[10] In the 1780s, British-built ships typically carried 1.75 slaves per ton of the ship's capacity; on the Zong, the ratio was four per ton.[18] A British slave ship of the period would carry around 193 slaves, and it was extremely unusual for a ship of the Zong's relatively small size to carry so many.[17]

On 18 or 19 November 1781 the Zong neared Tobago, in the Caribbean, but failed to stop there. The crew cannot have known that the island was at that point in the possession of France.[19]

At this point it is unclear who, if anyone, was in charge of the ship.[20] The captain, Luke Collingwood, had been gravely ill for some time.[21] The man who would normally have replaced him, first mate James Kelsall, had been suspended from duty following an argument on 14 November.[21] Robert Stubbs had captained a slave ship several decades previously, and it appears that he was in overall command of the Zong, despite not being a member of the vessel's crew.[22] This breakdown of the command structure on the ship can explain why subsequent navigational errors were made, and why the lack of water on board was not noticed for so long.[23]

Massacre

Map of the Caribbean, showing Tobago, Hispaniola (red) and Jamaica (blue)

On 27 or 28 November, Jamaica was sighted but misidentified as Hispaniola, which was a possession of Britain's enemy Spain. This mistake was only recognised when the Zong was 300 miles leeward of the island.[19]

Overcrowding, malnutrition, accidents and disease had killed several mariners and approximately 62 enslaved Africans.[24] At this point, James Kelsall claimed that there was only four days' water remaining on the ship, with Jamaica still 10–13 days away.[25]

If the slaves died onshore, the Liverpool ship-owners would have no redress. Similarly, if the slaves died a "natural death" (as the contemporary term put it) at sea, then insurance could not be claimed. But if some slaves were jettisoned in order to save the rest of the "cargo" or the ship itself, then a claim could be made under the notion of "general average".[26] The ship's insurance covered the loss of slaves at £30 a head.[27]

On 29 November, the crew assembled to consider the proposal that some of the slaves should be thrown overboard.[28] James Kelsall later claimed that he had disagreed with the plan at first, but it was soon unanimously agreed.[27][28] On 29 November, 54 women and children were thrown through cabin windows into the sea.[29] On 1 December, 42 male slaves were thrown overboard; 36 slaves followed in the next few days.[29] Another ten, in a display of defiance at the inhumanity of the slavers, threw themselves overboard.[29] Having heard the shrieking of the victims as they were thrown into the water, one slave requested that the remaining Africans be denied all food and drink rather than be thrown into the sea. This request was ignored by the crew.[30] The account of the King's Bench trial reports that one slave managed to climb back onto the ship.[31]

It was subsequently claimed that the slaves had been jettisoned because the ship did not have enough water to keep all the slaves alive for the rest of the voyage. This claim was later disputed, as the ship had 420 imperial gallons (1,900 L) of water left when it arrived in Jamaica on 22 December.[27] In an affidavit made by Kelsall it was reported that on 1 December, when 42 slaves were killed, it rained heavily for more than a day, allowing six casks of water (sufficient for eleven days) to be collected.[27]

Subsequent history of the Zong

On 22 December 1781, the Zong arrived at Black River, Jamaica, with 208 slaves on board, which is less than half the number taken from Africa.[29] The slaves sold for an average price of £36 each.[4] The legality of the Zong′s capture from the Dutch was confirmed by the Jamaican Vice-Admiralty court, and the vessel was renamed Richard of Jamaica.

Luke Collingwood died three days after the Zong reached Jamaica, and thus was unable to testify at the 1783 court proceedings that provide the best record of the massacre.[32]

When the news of the Zong's voyage reached England, the Gregson syndicate tried to claim compensation from their insurers for the loss of the slaves. When the insurers refused to honour the claim, legal proceedings started. It is these proceedings which provide us with almost all the documentary evidence about the Zong Massacre, since the original logbook of the Zong does not survive (indeed, it had "gone missing" before the legal proceedings began).[33]

This is an important point, since it means that almost all the surviving source material has major issues with its reliability. Both John Stubbs and James Kelsall gave evidence in the legal proceedings: both were strongly motivated to exonerate themselves from blame.[34] It is possible that the figures concerning the number of slaves killed, the amount of water which remained on the ship, and the distance beyond Jamaica which the Zong had mistakenly sailed are all inaccurate.[35]

First trial

William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield in the robes of the Lord Chief Justice

Legal proceedings began when the insurers refused to compensate the owners of the Zong. The matter was initially tried at the Guildhall Sessions in London in March 1783.[27] In this first court case, the jury found for the owners of the Zong.[36]

On 19 March 1783, Olaudah Equiano, a famous freed slave, told anti-slave-trade activist Granville Sharp of the events aboard the Zong.[37] This prompted Sharp to become involved in the case.

King's Bench appeal

The insurers of the Zong applied to the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Mansfield, to have the previous verdict set aside, and for the case to be heard again.[4] A hearing was held at the Court of King's Bench in Westminster Hall on 21–22 May 1783, before Mansfield and two other justices.[38] The Solicitor General for England and Wales, John Lee, appeared on behalf of the Zong's owners (as he had previously done in the Guildhall trial).[39] Granville Sharp was also in attendance, as was the secretary he had employed to take a written record of the proceedings.[36]

Summing up the verdict reached in the first trial, Mansfield declared that the jury:

had no doubt (thought it shocks one very much) that the Case of Slaves was the same as if Horses had been thrown over board.... The Question was, whether there was not an Absolute Necessity for throwing them over board to save the rest, [and] the Jury were of opinion there was....[40][41]

At the hearing it was revealed that heavy rain had fallen on the ship during the series of killings. This led Mansfield to order another trial, because the rainfall meant that the killing of the slaves after the water shortage had been eased could not be justified in terms of the greater necessity of saving the ship and the rest of its human cargo.[42][43] One of the justices in attendance also stated that the evidence they had heard invalidated the findings of the jury in the first trial, which had been told that the water shortage resulted from the poor condition of the ship brought on by unforeseen maritime conditions, rather than from errors committed by its captain.[44] Mansfield concluded that the insurers were not liable for losses resulting from errors committed by the Zong's crew.[45]

There is no evidence that a further trial occurred.[46][47]

Despite Sharp's efforts, no officers or crew were charged or prosecuted for the murder of the slaves.[48]

Lord Mansfield's motivations

Mansfield wanted to ensure that commercial law remained as helpful to Britain's overseas trade as possible. Consequently, he was keen to uphold the principle of "general average", even in relation to the killing of humans. This principle holds that a captain who jettisons part of his cargo in order to save the rest can claim for the loss from his insurers. Finding in favour of the insurers would, therefore, have greatly undermined this idea.[49] The fact that it had rained heavily before the massacre had finished enabled Mansfield to order a retrial while leaving the notion of "general average" intact. He emphasised that the killings would have been legally justified and the owners' insurance claim would have been valid had the water shortage not arisen from mistakes made by the captain.[45]

In reaching these conclusions, Mansfield appears to have ignored the ruling of his predecessor, Matthew Hale, that the killing of innocents in the name of self-preservation was unlawful. This ruling was to prove important a century later in R v Dudley and Stephens, which also concerned the justifiability of acts of murder at sea.[50] Mansfield also ignored another important legal principle: that no insurance claim can be legal if it arose from an illegal act.[51]

Impact on the abolitionist movement

Depiction of the torture of a female slave by Captain John Kimber, produced in 1792. Unlike the crew of the Zong, Kimber was tried for the murder of two female slaves. The trial generated substantial news coverage in addition to printed images such as this – unlike the very limited reporting of the Zong Massacre a decade earlier.[52]

Granville Sharp campaigned actively to raise awareness of the massacre, writing letters to newspapers, the Lords Commissioners of Admiralty, and the Prime Minister, the Duke of Portland.[53][54] Neither Portland nor the Admiralty sent him a reply.[54] Indeed, the immediate impact of the Zong Massacre on public opinion was very limited, thereby demonstrating the challenge that the early abolitionists faced.[55] The first Zong court case in March 1783 was only reported by a single London newspaper, and very little about the massacre appeared in print before 1787.[52][55] Moreover, the newspaper article represented the first public report of the massacre, appearing almost 18 months after the event.[56]

Despite these setbacks, Sharp's efforts did have some success. In April 1783 he sent an account of the Zong Massacre to William Dillwyn, a Quaker, who had asked to see evidence which was critical of the slave trade. The London Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends decided shortly after to begin campaigning against slavery, and a petition signed by 273 Quakers was submitted to parliament in July 1783.[57] Sharp also sent letters to Anglican bishops and clergymen, and to those already sympathetic to the abolitionist cause.[58]

Thanks to Sharp's efforts, the Zong Massacre became an important topic in abolitionist literature, and the massacre was discussed by Thomas Clarkson, Ottobah Cugoano, James Ramsay and John Newton.[59][60] These accounts often omitted the names of the ship and its captain, thereby creating, in the words of Srividhya Swaminathan, "a portrait of abuse that could be mapped onto any ship in the Middle Passage".[56][61] The Zong Massacre offered a powerful example of the horrors of the slave trade that stimulated the development of the abolitionist movement in Britain, which dramatically expanded in size and influence in the late 1780s.[62][63][64]

The Zong Massacre in modern culture

Kaskelot, appearing as the Zong, at Tower Bridge during commemoration of the 200th anniversary of abolition in 2007.

The Zong Massacre has inspired several works of literature. Fred D'Aguiar's novel Feeding the Ghosts (1997) responds to the story of an enslaved African who survived being thrown overboard from the Zong. In the novel, the journal of the slave – Mintah – is lost, unlike that of Granville Sharp, signifying the silencing of African voices about the massacre.[31] M. NourbeSe Philip's 2008 poetry book, Zong!, is based on the events surrounding the massacre, and uses the account of the King's Bench hearing as its source.[31]

An episode of the television programme Garrow's Law is loosely based on the legal events arising from the Zong Massacre.[65] The historical William Garrow did not actually take part in the case, though he would certainly have been aware of it; Garrow was only called to the bar in 1783. Because the captain died shortly after the incident, his appearance in court for fraud is likewise fictional.[66]

2007 abolition commemorations

In 2007 a memorial stone was erected at Black River, Jamaica, near where the Zong would have landed.[67]

A replica of the Zong was sailed to Tower Bridge in London in March 2007 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, at a cost of £300,000. The replica housed a number of events about the Zong Massacre and the slave trade.[67] It was accompanied by HMS Northumberland, on board of which was an exhibition commemorating the Royal Navy's role in the suppression of the slave trade after 1807.[68]

Notes

  1. ^ Burroughs 2010, p. 106.
  2. ^ The exact number of deaths is unknown, but James Kelsall later said that "the outside number of drowned amounted to 142 in the whole" (quoted in Lewis 2007, p. 364).
  3. ^ Webster 2007, p. 287.
  4. ^ a b c Lewis 2007, p. 365.
  5. ^ Lewis 2007, p. 359.
  6. ^ a b Lewis 2007, p. 360.
  7. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 217.
  8. ^ a b c Lewis 2007, p. 358.
  9. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 57.
  10. ^ a b c Lewis 2007, p. 361.
  11. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 70.
  12. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 45–8.
  13. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 69.
  14. ^ Krikler 2007, p. 31.
  15. ^ Lewis 2007, p. 359–60.
  16. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 76–87.
  17. ^ a b Walvin 2011, p. 27.
  18. ^ Webster 2007, p. 289.
  19. ^ a b Lewis 2007, p. 363.
  20. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 90.
  21. ^ a b Walvin 2011, p. 87.
  22. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 77, 88.
  23. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 89.
  24. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 89, 97.
  25. ^ Oldham 2007, p. 299.
  26. ^ Webster 2007, p. 291.
  27. ^ a b c d e Weisbord 1969, p. 562.
  28. ^ a b Walvin 2011, p. 97.
  29. ^ a b c d Lewis 2007, p. 364.
  30. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 98, 157–8.
  31. ^ a b c Rupprecht 2008, p. 268.
  32. ^ Webster 2007, p. 288.
  33. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 85–7, 140–1.
  34. ^ Stubbs gave evidence in court; Kelsall produced a sworn affidavit in the Exchequer proceedings initiated by the insurers: Walvin 2011, pp. 85, 155.
  35. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 95.
  36. ^ a b Walvin 2011, p. 139.
  37. ^ Lovejoy 2006, pp. 337, 344.
  38. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 138.
  39. ^ Weisbord 1969, p. 563.
  40. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 153.
  41. ^ Krikler 2007, p. 36.
  42. ^ Krikler 2007, pp. 36–8.
  43. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 155.
  44. ^ Oldham 2007, pp. 313–4.
  45. ^ a b Krikler 2007, p. 38.
  46. ^ Krikler 2007, p. 37.
  47. ^ Weisbord 1969, p. 564.
  48. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 167.
  49. ^ Krikler 2007, pp. 32–3, 36–8, 42.
  50. ^ Krikler 2007, p. 39.
  51. ^ Krikler 2007, pp. 42–3.
  52. ^ a b Swaminathan 2010, p. 483.
  53. ^ Weisbord 1969, pp. 565–67.
  54. ^ a b Rupprecht, 'A Very Uncommon Case' (2007), p. 336.
  55. ^ a b Drescher 2012, pp. 575–6.
  56. ^ a b Swaminathan 2010, p. 484.
  57. ^ Rupprecht 'A Very Uncommon Case' (2007), pp. 336–7.
  58. ^ Walvin 2011, p. 170–1.
  59. ^ Swaminathan 2010, pp. 483–4.
  60. ^ Lovejoy 2006, pp. 337.
  61. ^ Rupprecht 'Excessive memories' (2007), p. 14.
  62. ^ Walvin 2011, pp. 176–9.
  63. ^ Swaminathan 2010, p. 485.
  64. ^ Rupprecht 'A Very Uncommon Case' (2007), pp. 330–1.
  65. ^ BBC "Garrow's Law". BBC. Retrieved 28 December 2012. {{cite web}}: Check |url= value (help)
  66. ^ Mark Pallis (12 November 2010). "Garrow's Law draws from real-life court dramas". TV & Radio Blog. The Guardian. Retrieved 19 November 2010.
  67. ^ a b Walvin 2011, p. 207.
  68. ^ Rupprecht 2008, p. 266.

References

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  • Krikler, Jeremy (2007). "The Zong and the Lord Chief Justice". History Workshop Journal. 64 (1): 29–47. doi:10.1093/hwj/dbm035. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  • Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1080/01440360701698551, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1080/01440360701698551 instead.
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  • Oldham, James (2007). "Insurance Litigation Involving the Zong and Other British Slave Ships, 1780–1807". Journal of Legal History. 28 (3): 299–318. doi:10.1080/01440360701698437. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  • Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1080/01440360701698494, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1080/01440360701698494 instead.
  • Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1093/hwj/dbm033, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1093/hwj/dbm033 instead.
  • Rupprecht, Anita (2008). "'A Limited Sort of Property': History, Memory and the Slave Ship Zong". Slavery & Abolition. 29 (2): 265–277. doi:10.1080/01440390802027913. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  • Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1080/0144039X.2010.521336, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1080/0144039X.2010.521336 instead.
  • Walvin, James (2011). The Zong: A Massacre, the Law and the End of Slavery. New Haven/London: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-12555-9.
  • Webster, Jane (2007). "The Zong in the Context of the Eighteenth-Century Slave Trade". Journal of Legal History. 28 (3): 285–298. doi:10.1080/01440360701698403. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help)
  • Weisbord, Robert (1969). "The case of the slave-ship Zong, 1783". History Today. 19 (8): 561–567. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

Further reading

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