settlers at the Madeira islands; and that all the jealousies and animosities between the Whites and Blacks had subsided, and that they had been very orderly ever since Mr. Vasa and two or three other discontented persons had been left on shore at Plymouth. Schools are established on board each ship, as I had proposed; and they have daily prayers. The account is from the chaplain, Mr. Fraser *." "31st October, 1787. "I have had but melancholy accounts of my poor little ill-thriven swarthy daughter, the unfortunate colony of Sierra Leone. They have, however, purchased twenty miles square of the finest and most beautiful country (they all allow) that was ever seen! The hills are not steeper than Shooter's Hill; and fine streams of fresh water run down the hill on each side of the new township; and in the front is a noble bay, where the river is about three leagues wide: the woods and groves are beautiful beyond description, and the soil very fine. So that a little good management may, with God's blessing, still produce a thriving settlement." "Madam, G. S. to Mrs., New York.-[EXTRACT.] "January 12, 1788. "I have long delayed acknowledging your letter, in the daily expectation of hearing from some of the adventurers who sailed last spring to form a new settlement at Sierra Leone, on the coast of Africa; but I had no tidings of them till the middle of October last, and those but discouraging: so that I had no inducement to communicate them. Although the ships were ready to sail by Christmas 1786, they did not get away till April last, which fatally postponed their arrival on the coast till the rainy season commenced; whereby dreadful fevers and a great mortality ensued, the people not having had time to prepare sufficient shelter and accommodation for themselves at their landing. But the greatest blame of all is to be charged on the intemperance of the people themselves; for the most of them (both Whites and Blacks) became so besotted during the voyage, that they were totally unfit for business when they landed, and could hardly be prevailed on to assist in erecting their own huts. Besides, the distempers occasioned by their The Rev. Mr. Fraser, originally a member of the Scottish Church, was, at his own request, and in compliance with the wishes of the settlers, allowed to attend the expedition.-See Letter from G. S. to the Archbishop of Canterbury, August 1786, page 264. intemperance carried off a large proportion of them before they reached the coast; so that the climate of Africa is by no means chargeable with the mortality, though our public prints have asserted the contrary, and have asserted also that the purposed settlement had entirely failed *. But I am not without hopes that it may still succeed and thrive. The code of Regulations which I drew up for the settlement, not being objected to by Government, was adopted by the settlers before they sailed and if they would be careful to maintain it, they would become the freest and the happiest people on earth; because the poor are effectually provided for, and their rights secured, the meanest cottager being allowed a due share of the land, besides a property and interest in the settlement. There are about two hundred settlers still remaining in the township that was formed on their first landing; and they are still in peaceable possession of the free land which they obtained by voluntary agreement with the Natives. Any kind of cultivation may be carried on there. Cotton, in particular, it is supposed, may be raised of the most valuable texture, such as would always succeed at the London market; and rice, gum, dying wood, and other valuable articles innumerable, may also be raised, with very little labour. "I remain, dear madam," &c. &c. "P. S. There are several people here, both Blacks and Whites, who are very desirous to join the settlers, but have no means of obtaining a passage. If I could afford to fit out a proper ship at my own expense, I would certainly do it. I have several times offered to give 100l. towards the expenses; but it has not been deemed sufficient encouragement to undertake the business." The nature of the reports here alluded to, may be gathered from the following paragraph, which appeared in The Times. “ Sir J-——— H———y stated, that in the spring of the year 1788 he had been at Sierra Leone, where he had touched in an East-India ship, and found the insalubrity of the climate such, that, of one thousand seven hundred persons who had been there in the preceding year, only one remained; all the rest having died there, with the exception of about twelve, who took refuge in an island in the river. One fourth of the crew of a vessel perished there during a stay of two months." It is mortifying to observe in what degree the channels even of respectable papers were opened to the most erroneous statements respecting this colony. The above paragraph was written after the publication of the complete Reports of the Sierra Leone Company.-It has already been shown, that, instead of seventeen hundred settlers, about four hundred only went out at first from England; the mortality amounted to less than one half; and it will presently appear, that Captain Thompson remained at Sierra Leone during the whole rainy season with his Majesty's sloop Nautilus, and lost one man only by sickness! (and even his death' was not attributed to the climate, but to a fever caught by being wet through, while out a-shooting). "Dear Sir, G. S. to Dr. Lettsom, M. D. "Wicken Park, near Stony Stratford, Bucks, October 13, 1788. "Your kind communication of a sensible letter from Dr. Thornton at Philadelphia, has devolved on me an indispensable duty to give you the fullest information in my power respecting the new settlement of Sierra Leone, because your friend seems to be heartily desirous to promote it. "The opinion, which he has adopted of my late worthy friend Dr. Fothergill, that the establishment of a free settlement on the coast of Africa for honourable trade would be the most effectual means of destroying the Slave Trade, has so far been always my own opinion, that it induced me to advance much more money than a private person in my situation ought to have done, among the first settlers, to encourage their embarkation last year*. Several circumstances concurred to injure this first attempt, though the expense of transports and subsistence, as also of tools, arms, &c. was defrayed by Government. Many of the Black poor were embarked in the river Thames before Christmas 1786; but others delayed going on board till January and February 1787, being deterred by a jealousy which prevailed among them that Government intended to send them to Botany Bay, as the transports for that expedition were then waiting at Portsmouth, where the ships for Sierra Leone were ordered also. On the 20th February 1787, instead of 700 Black poor who had offered themselves to • The following minute stands in an "Account-Book of Expenses of Settlers on the Coast of Africa." M.-Given to the settlement £111 14 8 68 1 0 45 3 8 17 15 118 10 6 361 5 2 14 14 9 Lent to individuals, to enable them to redeem their pledged goods, 122 10 8 Other charges making the total............ 567 0 4 498 10 7 N. B. This account is exclusive of my expenses in 1788, when I sent out the Myro brig to assist the settlement, which amounted, with subsistence of poor Blacks since, to Add expenses above ......1168 18 4 ...... 567 0 4 1735 18 8' : go to the proposed settlement, there were only 439 or 441 (for the accounts differ) that embarked on board the three transports appointed for them—-viz. the Belisarius, Atlantic, and Vernon-which by that time were all arrived at Portsmouth. On the 22d February 1787, they sailed, under the command of Captain Thompson, of his Majesty's sloop the Nautilus; but, meeting with stormy weather, they were separated, and it was the 19th March before they were all collected in Plymouth Sound. Thus the best part of the season was lost, and many of the people had been on board above three months, and were become very sickly. Unhappily, the allowance of rum, granted to them by the Government with the most benevolent intention, really proved their greatest bane many of them drank their whole day's allowance at once, and got drunk with it and this irregularity, together with a diet of salt provisions, and being rather too much crowded between decks, increased the sickness, and occasioned the loss of more than fifty lives, it is said, even before they reached Plymouth. Other bad consequences of the rum were disagreements and mutinous behaviour, for which twenty-four were discharged, and twenty-three ran away. Nevertheless, by an account before me, 411 settlers sailed from Plymouth on the 8th April 1787; so that they must have had some recruits, though they are not mentioned in the list. Of these 411 persons who sailed from Plymouth, thirty-four died in April and May, before they had made any settlement on the coast, and fifteen were discharged, or ran away; and on the 16th September, when his Majesty's sloop Nautilus left the settlement, there remained in all 276 persons: so that ninety-six must have died at Sierra Leone in June, July, August, and September, 1787. But this mortality on the coast is not to be attributed to the climate, for most of the people still continued intemperate, and they had not yet any fresh provisions; so that many of the sick did not recover of the distempers they carried with them; and the rainy season set in before they could finish their huts, which were therefore neither wind nor water tight, and this bad accommodation certainly increased the mortality *. "I am obliged to be very prolix in my account, lest the misfortune should be attributed to the climate and country, instead of the true causes. "22d March, 1788. * "Lieutenant Morton has procured for me an extract from the journal of the Nautilus, which is very agreeable to me. I find the mortality at Sierra Leone has not been so great as former accounts set forth; and that the Nautilus, out of near one hundred men, lost only one man during her long stay of four calender months and one week, in the most dangerous season, during the rains. So that there is ample reason to believe, that the loss of the settlers was occasioned by their intemperance on ship-board, and the want of sufficient shelter from the rains when in a distempered state."-Letter of G. S. to Dr. J. Sharp. "However, a fine tract of mountainous country, covered with beautiful trees of all kinds, was purchased at a trifling expense of a Negro Chief, called King Tom, extending from the watering-place in Frenchman's Bay (since called St. George's Bay) up to Gambia Island, which is above fifteen miles. I have since been informed, that the extent on the river is above twenty miles of the southern bank of Sierra Leone river, and twenty miles back all the way, which reaches almost across the promontory to the Sherbro river. "This situation between two great rivers renders the air particularly temperate for that climate, and the advantages for trade will certainly be very great. Captain Thompson fixed upon a beautiful eminence, rising from the side of a higher mountain, for the site of the new township, having a fine brook of fresh water on three sides of it. Above 360 town lots, of one acre each, were marked out in streets; and the lots were drawn and appropriated on the 12th June 1787 but the death of Mr. Irwin, the agent conductor, as also of Mr. Gesau, the town-major (who was a good engineer, and had particular instructions and drawings for temporary works of defence and accommodations), and of Mr. Riccards, the gardener (on whose skill for the cultivation of vines and other useful produce I had built great expectations of public profit), and the desertion of many others, who had previously sold their muskets and other arms for strong liquors, occasioned great discouragement to those that remained. The sickness also of the Rev. Mr. Fraser, the chaplain, was another great misfortune to the settlement. His weak state of health obliged him to go to Bance Island, about thirty miles distant, as he was afraid of the want of accommodation in the new settlement. His disorder increased so much, that he came home in March last, seemingly in a deep consumption; which, however, cannot be attributed to the climate of the settlement, as he did not reside in it; and it is remarkable, that when he called there, just before his return to England, he found that he himself was the only unhealthy person in the settlement. The number of settlers was then, as he told me, only 130 persons in all which great reduction he did not attribute to sickness, but merely to emigration; for they were too poor, it seems, to purchase live stock of the Natives, without which even the best land becomes almost useless, and affords but a scanty subsistence. "On receiving this account, I was apprehensive that a total desertion was probable, and that all the public and private expenses that had been bestowed on this undertaking were in danger of being lost, together with that beautiful tract of land, and the opportunity of forming in it a free settlement (as an asylum for the poor) on the most eligible spot in all Africa. |