3. Development of the Slave-Trade

Portugal and Spain having demonstrated that the slave-trade was profitable, England also determined to engage in the traffic; and as early as 1530 William Hawkins, a merchant of Plymouth, visited the Guinea Coast and took away a few slaves.  England really entered the field, however, with the voyage in 1562 of Captain John Hawkins, son of William, who in October of this year also went to the coast of Guinea.  He had a fleet of three ships and one hundred men, and partly by the sword and partly by other means he took three hundred or more Negroes, whom he took to Santo Domingo and sold profitably.[1] He was richly laden going homeward and some of his stores were seized by Spanish vessels.  Hawkins made two other voyages, one in 1564, and another, with Drake, in 1567.  On his second voyage he had four armed ships, the largest being the Jesus, a vessel of seven hundred tons, and a force of one hundred and seventy men.  December and January (1564-5) he spent in picking up freight, and by sickness and fights with the Negroes he lost many of his men.  Then at the end of January he set out for the West Indies.  He was becalmed for twenty-one days, but he arrived at the Island of Dominica March 9.  He traded along the Spanish coasts and on his return to England he touched at various points in the West Indies and sailed along the coast of Florida.  On his third voyage he had five ships.  He himself was again in command of the Jesus, while Drake was in charge of the Judith, a little vessel of fifty tons.  He got together between four and five hundred Negroes and again went to Dominica.  He had various adventures and at last was thrown by a storm on the coast of Mexico.  Here after three days he was attacked by a Spanish fleet of twelve vessels, and all of his ships were destroyed except the Judith and another small vessel, the Minion, which was so crowded that one hundred men risked the dangers on land rather than go to sea with her.  On this last voyage Hawkins and Drake had among their companions the Earls of Pembroke and Leicester, who were then, like other young Elizabethans, seeking fame and fortune.  It is noteworthy that in all that he did Hawkins seems to have had no sense of cruelty or wrong.  He held religious services morning and evening, and in the spirit of the later Cromwell he enjoined upon his men to “serve God daily, love one another, preserve their victuals, beware of fire, and keep good company.”  Queen Elizabeth evidently regarded the opening of the slave-trade as a worthy achievement, for after his second voyage she made Hawkins a knight, giving him for a crest the device of a Negro’s head and bust with the arms securely bound.

[Footnote 1:  Edward E. Hale in Justin Winsor’s Narrative and Critical History of America, III, 60.]