THERE IS DEATH IN THE POT - The University of Texas at Arlington

Discarded Negroes in the Island of Antigua. 47 Prior to 1823, the relationship between the
anti-slavery movement and missionary societies was ambivalent as missionaries often
condoned rather than condemned slavery. 48 The link between anti-slavery and
missionary work was actually stronger in Sierra Leone than in the West Indies. In the
mid-1820s, British Quaker Hannah Kilham’s efforts in Sierra Leone, as well as the trial
of John Smith in Demerara, strengthened this connection. 49 The practice of including
“Relief of Negro Slaves” in the titles of women’s associations further reinforced the link
between anti-slavery and missionaries though these organizations, unlike Kilham,
focused their efforts in the West Indies rather than Africa, at least initially. 50
Women such as Lucy Townsend worried that missionary work and education
among the enslaved would distract women from their primary effort of the abolition of
47 First Report of the Female Society of Birmingham, 7. According to the Sheffield Anti-Slavery
Society, the Antigua association was organized in 1812, primarily by the Society of Friends in London, to
aid West Indian slaves. Friends were influenced by reports of the “shocking nature and number” of slaves
“who, from age, disease, or both, become incapable of earning their maintenance, are deserted by their
owners, and left either to provide for themselves, or to perish from want.” See Sheffield Anti-Slavery
Committee, “Preface,” in The Negro’s Friend, or the Sheffield Anti-Slavery Album (Sheffield: J. Blackwell,
1826), vii. James Cropper and his family were subscribers of the association. See Report of the
Association for the Relief of Some Cases of Great Distress in the Island of Antigua, among the Discarded
Negroes, &c. (London: n.p., 1823-1827). Interestingly, Elizabeth Heyrick was not a subscriber of the
Antigua group
48 Mary Turner, Slaves and Missionaries: The Disintegration of Jamaican Slave Society, 1787-
1834 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1982), ch. 1 and 3. This ambivalence is clear in the instructions
given to John Smith by the London Missionary Society. When Smith was dispatched to Demerara to
replace John Wray, he was cautioned to support the social status quo. Even though Smith was careful to
remain loyal to the LMS, his popularity with the slave population led to accusations that Smith provided
vital leadership during the slave rebellion of 1823. See Da Costa, Crowns of Glory, Tears of Blood, 252-
274; Davis, Inhuman Bondage, 215-218.
49
Midgley, Women against Slavery, 54-55. See also Mora Dickson, The Powerful Bond: Hannah
Kilham, 1774-1832 (London: Dobson, 1980).
50 Midgley, Women against Slavery, 55. Midgley points out that only one male association
included this phrase in their organization’s title.
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