Off the Coast of Benin, West Africa
November 12th 1792
My Dearest Sophie
At last we are anchored off land in a calm sea. The heat is intolerable during the day, but at night as darkness falls I am able to write by candle-light.
A Chance meeting with a sea-captain from Conway allows me to send you this hastily-scribbled message. I have never been so uncomfortable in my life – below deck all is stiflingly, intolerably hot, and the crew are working feverishly in the extreme heat to do work on the ship ‘putting in the racking for the cargo’ as they describe it.
I have only been allowed to go on shore once, and then only to an offshore fort manned by some of our own Soldiers. Their commanding officer was most civil, but seemed very surprised to see me. He asked what I was doing off the African coast, and warned me that the ne4xt stage of my voyage was likely to prove very shocking to ‘a young man of limited experience.’
He told me that he himself was hoping to be posted elsewhere very soon ‘anywhere would be preferable to this hell-hole, and this filthy trade’.
I had a most strange Conversation with Captain Wainwright this afternoon – he has asked me to ‘keep to my cabin on the Middle Passage, even if the weather is stiflingly hot’. He has also rebuked me, most unfairly, I thought, for talking to one of the younger seamen, one Idris Peters, who, I discover, comes from Mostyn, near our dear home.
Young Idris tells me that he hates this work: and he asked me if I had ever seen cattle being taken to a slaughterhouse. When I asked him why, he replied “I want to know how strong your stomach is – you will know why soon enough’. It is all most mysterious.
And now I must give my letter to my esteemed friend from Conwy, for he sails in a quarter of an hour. My next letter to you will, God willing, be from the West Indian Isles – and our mystery may by then be uncovered.
With all my Love, and my Love and Duty to our parents,
William
My Dearest Sophie
Off the Coast of Benin, West Africa
September 12th
At last we are anchored off land in a calm sea. The heat is intolerable during the day, but at night as darkness falls I am able to write by candle-light.
A Chance meeting with a sea-captain from Conway allows me to send you this hastily-scribbled message. I have never been so uncomfortable in my life – below deck all is stiflingly, intolerably hot, and the crew are working feverishly in the extreme heat to do work on the ship ‘putting in the racking for the cargo’ as they describe it.
I have only been allowed to go on shore once, and then only to an offshore fort manned by some of our own Soldiers. Their commanding officer was most civil, but seemed very surprised to see me. He asked what I was doing off the African coast, and warned me that the next stage of my voyage was likely to prove very shocking to ‘a young man of limited experience.’
He told me that he himself was hoping to be posted elsewhere very soon ‘anywhere would be preferable to this hell-hole, and this filthy trade’.
I had a most strange Conversation with Captain Wainwright this afternoon – he has asked me to ‘keep to my cabin on the Middle Passage, even if the weather is stiflingly hot’. He has also rebuked me, most unfairly, I thought, for talking to one of the younger seamen, one Idris Peters, who, I discover, comes from Mostyn, near our dear home.
Young Idris tells me that he hates this work: and he asked me if I had ever seen cattle being taken to a slaughterhouse. When I asked him why, he replied “I want to know how strong your stomach is – you will know why soon enough’. It is all most mysterious.
And now I must give my letter to my esteemed friend from Conwy, for he sails in a quarter of an hour. My next letter to you will, God willing, be from the West Indian Isles – and our mystery may by then be uncovered.
With all my Love, and my Love and Duty to our parents,
William