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I am happy to add , on the same authority , ( p . 383 , ) that this Member of Parliament " declared in a future stage of the debate , that he wished to
see a prudent termination , both of the Slave Trade and of Slavery ; and that , though he was the eldest son of his father , he never would , on any consideration , become the owner of a Slave . " Were " the Honourable
Member for Bristol" once to contemplate this subject as a man , and especially as a Christian , rather than as a retained advocate of ** West-India interests / 5 I should not despair of his listening to the whisper from his internal monitor , abi et fac similiter . J . T . RUTT .
May 14 . P . S . When I wrote the above , I had not met with the pamphlet entitled " Negro-Slavery , " on reading which , the conduct of * ' the Honourable
Member for Bristol" appears still more unaccountable , if we admit the undisputed principles of equity , which are acknowledged to direct the intercourse between man and man . It had been
inexcusable in an advocate of West-India interests , " not to have read this pamphlet with the most diligent attention . Reading it , indeed , with any degree of attention , he must have discovered not only the dispassionate terms in which Mr . Cooper expresses himself , but the facts to which he
appeals as an eye-witness , and especially the powerful corroboration of his testimony , which immediately follows in the " Evidence of John Williamson , M . D . ( p . 71 , ) certainly no willing evidence against the system of Negro-Slavery , for the continuance of which lie is unequivocally an advocate .
lhis physician resided in Jamaica from 1798 to 1812 . In 1817 he published " Medical and Miscellaneous Observations relative to the West India Islands , " dedicated « ' to the Earl of Harewood , on whose estate , in the Vale , Jamaica , he hud lived for about four years in a professional capacity . "
Dr . Williamson sufficiently , though incidentally , proves all which the justification of Mr . Cooper ' s testimony can possibly require . He discovers to us our brethren and sisters , the Negroes and Negresses of Jamaica brutalized under the driver ' s whip , and reduced to , at least , a community
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of suffering with those proverbiall y unfortunate quadrupeds , by whose aid " the Honourable Member for Bristol" may , perhaps , be now posting to Parliament , there to expose the enthusiastic humanity of fanatics , and to vindicate the endangered reputation of the West-India Slavery ,
Dr . Williamson , no fanatical preacher of human equality , shall describe this Slavery . He witnessed , as evidently no rare occurrences , " lacerations which tear up the skin" repeated
till " the parts become insensible , " when ' * new sources of torture must be found out by which the commission of crime may be checked . I blush , " lie adds , " to reflect that white men should be the directors of such
disgraceful deeds . " He shews his readers " a large heavy whip" in " the driver ' s hands , " and describes " the frightful sound" heard ** every minute in passing through estates . " This is " the
crack of the lash , " which " when a Negro seems to be tardy at his work , " perhaps " incapable of the usual labour of the healthy—the driver sounds near him , or lets him feel it as he
thinks proper ; " nor is the Negress exempted from this discipline of the whip , while " the impression made upon the passenger , who is probably a
stranger , is horrible indeed . If , " says he , in a warm day , we pass by a gang" ( their backs being then uncovered ) , " it is a reproach to every white man to observe in them the
recently lacerated sores , or the deep furrows which , though healed up , leave the marks of cruel punishments . " These he justly reprobates as " unperishing testimonials of uncalled-for cruelty . " I know not whether " the
Honourable Member for Bristol" will allow himself to join Dr . W . with Mr . Cooper in a common charge of " gross exaggerations , " or how he will receive my animadversions , not unjust , I believe , however unceremonious , on the language which he is reported to have uttered in that privileged place , where ,
alone , libels are legalized . Should he be convinced that he has ill-treated Mr . Cooper , it may be fairly expected , from a regard to his own reputation , ( for Mr . Cooper ' s can receive little injury from the ipse din it even of ^ Member of Parliament , ) that he will hasten to make his amende honora ble .
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284 Mr . Rutt on Negro-Slavery .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1823, page 284, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1784/page/28/
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