Report from the Select Committee on Slave Trade (East Coast of Africa); together with the proceedings of the Committee, minutes of evidence, appendix and index

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 832922498

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-79587

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Report from the Select Committee on Slave Trade (East Coast of Africa); together with the proceedings of the Committee, minutes of evidence, appendix and index

Place of publication:: [London]

Publisher:: [The House of Commons]

Year of publication:: 1871

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (XXIV, 242 S.)

Collection:: Economics Books

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122 APPENDIX TO REPORT FROM SELECT COMMITTEE r i: i’l Í Í I Appendix, No. 7. The returns of the Zanzibar custom house show the import of slaves during the year 1859 to have amounted to 19,000. The duty levied is now two dollars per head ; so that the loss the abolition of the traffic would cause to the revenue of (he Sultan would amount to about 38,000 crowns, or 8,5007. sterling per annum. (signed') British Consulate, Zanzibar, 5 October 1860. C. P. Rigfjy, Lieut. Colonel, Her Majesty’s Consul, Zanzibar. Resolution by the Honourable Board, dated the 28th March 1861. Resolved, Brigadier Coghlan sent a copy of this interesting report to Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for India before he sent the original to tliis Government. The subjects to which Brigadier Coghlan has drawn attention involve questions which are for the decision of Her Majesty’s Government, and the Honourable the Governor in Council feels confident that the complete and lucid statement submitted by that officer will obtain an earnest con sideration. It is merely as a matt-r of form that this Government records any observations on this report. 2. The Honourable the Governor in Council is certain that the details furnished by Brigadier Coghlan, as to the extent to which the slave trade is carried on, on the east coast of Africa, will convince the British Government, which has ever been the chief instrument by which Providence has curbed this inhuman traffic, that its work is net yet completed, and that a great evil has still to be encountered and subdued. 3. Brigadier Coghlan places one fact prominently before the British Government, that however much the ruler of Zanzibar may be disposed to fall in with the views of modern civilization on the subject of the slave trade, lie is almost entirely unable to resist the influences around him. It is too much to expect a chief with a disputed title, who must therefore endeavour to conciliate his subjects, sternly to oppose a system from wliich he derives a considerable portion of bis revenue, when every man around him is a slave crimp or a slave broker. Advice and remonstrance are excellent instruments for good, in proper times and places, but they are of singular feebleness, when addressed to one in the helpless position of the Sultan of Zanzibar. Ihe British Government must be prepared to support the Sultan by its ships and by iis money, the strengthening of the Cape fleet, and the frequent extension of its surveillance to Zanzibar and the adjacent African coast, the stationing of gun-bcats at Zanzibar, and the grant of com; ensation to the Sultan for the revenue he will sacrifice, are measures which ¡t would be presumptuous in this Government to advocate. The Honour able the Governor in Council, cannot for a moment doubt that if the horrors described by an officer so cautious as Brigaoier Couhlan, were made known to the British nation, not a voice w ould be raised against so >mall an acknowledgment to Zanzibar as 8,5001, per annum, for the attainment of so noble an object as the extinction of the East African slave trade. 5. The Honourable the Governor in Council, fully concurs with Brigadier Ccghlan as to the propriety of obtaining a revision of the treaty, by which all export and import of slaves within the Zanzibar dominions should be prohibited. The permission vvhicli now exists for the transport of slaves from one portion of Her Majesty’s territories to another, in a great measure deprives the restrictions on the trade of all their value. 6. TV itil respect fo the Pe rsian Gulf, the Honourable the Governor in Council believes that the defect in the action of the squadron for the suppression of the slave trade, has been that operations have been carrieci on loo much within the Gulf, instead of at the month, and that the proper lime for operations has not been chosen with sufficient care. The squadron is small, and many duties are imposed on it, and the Honourable the Governor in Council tears that the Resident detaches vessels fium it on political raii-sions, at the time when every vessel that can be spared should be on the h ok out for slavers returning from A (rica at the mouth of the Gulf. The Honourab e the Governor in Council will not, however, at present i-sue orders on this subject, as from a r ceni teleeram, it would appear that Her Majesty’s Goveinment has determ ned to relieve the Inaian navy from the duty of suppressing the slave trade. His Excellency in Council has no doubt that the evil, though now ii appears so formidable, would in a very few years succumb to the vigorous exertions of an oigauisation directed expressly against it, under the guidance of a carefully selected officer. 7. The Honourable the Governor in Council concurs with Brigadier Coghlan m consider ing (hat if the prohiintion of transport of slaves from one ponionef the Zanzibar dominions to another is insisted on, three years’ warning should be given before the prohibition is enforced. 28 March 1861. (signed) G. Clerk. H. W. Reeves. W. P. Frere.

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