Tom Molineaux vs Tom Cribb, an 1811 engraving but it illustrates what boxing tournaments might have been like 20 years earlier
Moonstone Obsession addressed the issue of the slave trade including a monologue from the heroine’s brother that still moves me today.
In Moonstone Conspiracy, I still wanted to highlight that William Wilberforce’s campaign to end the slave trade was still some time away.
The ironic thing about late 18th century England is while Britain’s territories ran slaves, the motherland did not. Slavery in the United Kingdom itself was abolished in 1772 with a landmark case Known as either Lord Mansfield’s Rule or the Somersett Law.
…the Royal Courts of Justice, the Lord Chief Justice of England, Lord Mansfield, concluded his judgment on the case of a runaway black slave, James Somersett, who had been brought before him on a writ of habeas corpus. The writ had been obtained by Granville Sharp, a clerk in the Ordnance Office, who had engaged no less than five prominent barristers to plead. An equally strong team had appeared for the owner, Charles Steuart, Receiver-General of Customs in North America, a Virginian by birth.
It might be suggested that Lord Mansfield’s decision might have been swayed, in part by Dido Elizabeth Belle, the illegitimate daughter of his nephew John Lindsay – the story of Dido’s remarkable life was turned into a film a couple of years ago – but his judgement was unquestioningly the right one.
While other Africans were treated as indentured servants in England, others arrived to work and trade as freemen.
Yet not all the Black people who arrived in Britain during this period were enslaved. For example, Africans were recruited as sailors on the numerous slaving voyages of British traders, and it is likely that some of these sailors were free. Free Black people were also recruited into the Royal Navy. Some of these sailors will have settled and raised families in and around Britain’s ports.
Africans also visited Britain for other reasons. Some were merchants conducting business with British traders, and others were the children of wealthy African rulers or European planters who came to Europe to be educated. For example, Francis Williams, born in 1700, was a Jamaican of African descent who studied at Cambridge University. On his return to the West Indies, he ran a school in Spanish Town.
Many Africans embraced the Christian faith and their involvement in the churches no doubt provided the organisational framework for the abolition movement. Even today the biggest growth in Christian churches in the United Kingdom is among the African and Caribbean communities centred in London.
In 1765, the Gentleman’s Magazine reported on a Black man being ordained in Exeter, suggesting that some may have been preachers. In 1787, while collecting evidence in Manchester for the anti-slavery campaign, Thomas Clarkson was astonished to find a ‘great crowd of black people standing round the pulpit. There might be forty or fifty of them.’
As a result I wanted to explore some of the challenges, tensions and relationships of black people in England in the 18th century. But I didn’t want to create stereotypes – the maid, the butler, the buffoonish comedic foil so beloved by early 20th century Hollywood.
Around about the same time, I was writing Moonstone Conspiracy I came across a wonderful historical article about traveling boxing and wrestling troupes and then I knew I had my vehicle for George and Esther Clarke – husband and wife wrestling show impresarios. They are not victims of their time, place or circumstance, they are successful entrepreneurs who have a soft spot for waif and strays like Moonstone Conspiracy’s hero, the Honourable Daniel Ridgeway.
Their involvement is pivotal – not only in the developing love story between Daniel and Lady Abigail Houghall – but also in the overarching story centred on quelling England’s internal unrest following the French Revolution and the Radical plot to destablise government using terrorism tactics we’re familiar with today (and that will be another article for another time).
George and Bossy, (that’s Esther’s nickname by the way, for reasons that will become obvious through the story) are more than just Daniel’s employers, they’re even more than friends, they became his family during the lowest point in his life.
I hope you’ll fall in love with them too.
Excerpt
Daniel rapped the side of the caravan to announce his presence and it was Bossy who recognized him first.
“Oh my word, Dapper Dan, ah you!” And with surprising speed, the little middle-aged Jamaican woman rushed past her husband and threw her arms around him and squeezed asking, “Where did you come from?”
Bossy gripped his arms and held him back to take a good look. Daniel accepted her scrutiny with a familial affection.
“I’ve missed you too, Bossy,” he said, hugging the woman to his side with one arm while reaching forward with the other to shake the hand of Jamaica George, the boxing and wrestling impresario known the length and breadth of England.
Despite being in his mid-fifties, gray, and a little thicker in the middle than when Daniel last saw him, George nonetheless still looked strong and fit, though, as Daniel later learned from Bossy, he no longer boxed. These days, George performed only in the choreographed exhibition wrestling with other members of the troupe and not against those men who paid good money to try their luck and fists against the professionals.
“Well, it’s a fine day to see you again, boy,” said George, his Jamaican patois shifting to a soft clear English.
“You too, George.”
“Tell me,” Bossy asked. “what about that nice girl you was so keen on? You go make her your wife?”
“No, she found a better man,” he replied and felt his smile falter before he breathed life back into it by sheer force of will. “But I didn’t come here to talk about the past. I need your help.”
The big black man stood back and gave him a thorough appraisal. “Your clothes are very fine and if that’s your horse over there, so it is too. I guess you do not want your old job back.”
Daniel laughed. “Despite the worst expectations of my family, I’m doing all right for myself.” He plunged on, determined to change the subject.“I’m looking for a man—a man who doesn’t want to be found—and I need someone to be my eyes and ears.”
Bossy crossed her arms across her ample bosom.
“Daniel Fitzgerald Ridgeway, don’t be askin’ us to do somethin’ bring us to the attention of the law. We leave them alone and them leave us alone and that’s the way I like it. I don’t want to be in the hands of them deceivin’ slavers.”
George swiftly overruled his wife.
“Hush, Bossy, there be no risk of that. We’re baptized Christian and we’re lawful English. We make good money from people who want to see the colored folk while we look at the white folk for free. Daniel wouldn’t ask us to do something outside the law.”
The last statement was delivered with an edge, as if daring Daniel to contradict him.