Extract from "The History Of The Rise, Progress, And Accomplishment Of The Abolition Of The African Slave Trade By The British Parliament", 1808
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The Abolitionists were anxious to end the torture of the slaves but their purposes went further. Their intention was to alter the exploitative relationship which they saw as the root cause and motive for the oppression of the plantations. Their success in ending the African trade was a first step towards the abolition of slavery in the Caribbean, but the measures which allowed the slave owners to retain their property for a period merely intensified some of the cruellest practices. Thomas Clarkson and his colleagues denounced Emancipation as a sham, guessing, correctly, that the combination of government and planters had no intention of making fundamental changes to the role played by the Caribbean region in the British economy.
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