Victoria’s Scottish Lion

by Greenwood, Adrian; Haythornthwaite, Philip;

  The most compelling evidence showed Smith as accessory before the fact. Prior to the revolt Smith had received a note written by Jack Gladstone to another slave, which read, ‘The rest of the brothers are ready, and put their trust in you, and we hope that you will be ready also. I hope there will be no disappointment, either one way or the other. We shall begin tomorrow night at the Thomas [estate] about seven o’clock.’41 Though the note was vague, Smith was well aware of the whiff of insurrection in the air. ‘I learnt yesterday that some scheme was in agitation; without asking questions on the subject, I begged them to be quiet’, he had written the next day. Guyana historian James Rodway argued that after reading Jack’s note it was Smith’s ‘bounded [sic] duty to make inquiries, and every honest man must consider him culpable or weak in not having done so … his behaviour was certainly not that of a loyal citizen’.42

  Rev. John Smith, from David Chamberlin’s Smith of Demerara.

  Smith mounted his own spirited defence. He had strong evidence in his favour, not least that in the early stages of the revolt he had tried to dissuade the slaves surrounding the plantation house at Le Resouvenir. He called several planters, missionaries, slaves and, somewhat surprisingly, Lieutenant-Colonel Leahy, in his defence. The slaves repeated Smith’s contention that he had always impressed upon them the importance of obedience. It was a noble effort but Smith’s fate was sealed. According to his wife, at least two unnamed officers ‘could not refrain from shewing their ill will towards him on the trial … Here, at present, almost all are prejudiced against Mr Smith, from the highest to the lowest.’43 Many colonists simply could not believe that their slaves were capable of organising a revolt, and therefore Smith’s leadership was the only credible explanation. He was found guilty of three of the four charges and sentenced to death, though with a recommendation of mercy. Given the seriousness of hanging a clergyman as compared to hanging a slave, sentence was delayed until it had been confirmed by London. This meant a stay of execution of at least a couple of months, possibly more, depending on the weather.

  There is no record as to whether Campbell supported the verdict or whether it was even unanimous. A guilty verdict only needed a simple majority. Throughout the trial Campbell kept as quiet as possible. The only record of him intervening was after Smith recounted the governor’s warning that if he taught slaves to read he would be exiled. Campbell objected that it was not Murray who was on trial and asked for the phrase to be stricken from the record. The court withdrew to consider and, upon returning, supported Campbell.* Having loyally defended his boss, he did not speak again. Then again, members of a court martial, like a jury, are generally quiet in court, so it would be easy to read too much into his near silence.

  The London Missionary Society pressed the British government to commute Smith’s sentence, arguing that he should be repatriated given his poor health. The government was merciful and reduced his sentence to perpetual exile from the king’s Caribbean territories and a £2,000 fine. Bathurst’s letter, instructing Murray to send Smith home, arrived in Georgetown on 9 February. In the same despatches Bathurst informed the governor that he was to be relieved of his duties.

  Smith had died only three days before. Since 1821 he had suffered from what appeared to be tuberculosis and his long stay in a damp cell brought it to a head. For some his passing was a blessing. ‘I am not sorry to hear of Smith’s death,’ wrote Sir John Gladstone, ‘as his release would have been followed by much cavil and discussion here.’44 But for John Morley (William Gladstone’s biographer), ‘The death of the Demerara missionary … was an event as fatal to slavery in the West Indies as the execution of John Brown was its deathblow in the United States.’

  Initially British newspapers had been positively bloodthirsty in their praise of Smith’s sentence, well pleased that the threat to the empire from a treacherous cleric had been squashed. However, in the hands of William Wilberforce, Smith became a martyr to the abolitionist cause. In what was to be his last speech to the House, Wilberforce accused the planters of trying to ‘deter other missionaries from attempting the conversion of the slaves and, by the terrors of his example, to frighten away those whose Christian zeal might otherwise prompt them to devote themselves to the service of this long injured body of their fellow creatures’.45’ From the beginning of these proceedings to their fatal termination there has been committed more of illegality, more of violation of justice than, in the whole history of modern times I venture to assert, was ever witnessed in any inquiry that could be called a judicial proceeding’,46 complained Henry Brougham MP. Fifteen years after the abolition of the slave trade, slavery once again dominated debate at Westminster. In 1823–24 alone over 750 petitions against slavery were presented to parliament.47 That same year the Anti-Slavery Society was founded. Within a year it had 220 branches. The newspapers abruptly changed tack. Having faced the bloodlust of Demerara’s colonists, Campbell now confronted the outrage of a British press desperate to shame those responsible. ‘It is a sacred duty, on the part of the conductors of the public press, to take care that the members of this court shall have all the notoriety they merit’, insisted the Bury and Norwich Post, before revealing the names of those sitting on the court martial.48 Not surprisingly, the local papers were most critical where Methodism was strongest.

  There were limits to how much damage they could inflict on Campbell. Wellington had always been suspicious of non-conformists in general and Methodists in particular,* and his predilections set the tone in the army. Radicals and abolitionists had never enjoyed influence of any consequence in his domain. Given the preponderance of senior officers who had served as governors in the West Indies and the paucity of evangelicals at Horse Guards, Campbell’s role in the slave revolt was unlikely to do him any lasting damage, indeed it might actually enhance his reputation.

  Campbell never publicly condemned the way the uprising was suppressed, nor any of the actors in it. Neither did he object during the revolt – at least not on record. Of course, it was a brave man who questioned the morality of the planters’ cause. John Cheveley was victimised as a rebel sympathiser simply because, when ordered to fire on a fleeing slave, he missed. The Reverend Wiltshire Stanton Austin, who helped defend Smith, was hounded out of the colony. Had Campbell stood up to the mob, it would certainly have been the end of his career and perhaps, in that febrile atmosphere, the end of his life.

  As far as Campbell was concerned, it was a serious blot on his escutcheon. His appearance on the court martial had been compulsory and on the public record but he did his best to cover his tracks; in his service record of 1829 the insurrection went unrecorded, and in the ‘memorials’ he wrote later when lobbying for promotion, Demerara was never mentioned. Campbell’s name, while not insuring anonymity, at least insured confusion. There were enough Colin Campbells in the army to throw the casual enquirer off the scent.

  When, after his death, Campbell’s involvement resurfaced in obituaries, all except one glossed over the event, and that one rejected any moral failing on his part. ‘We may very readily acquit the departed soldier of any other part in this scandalous business than that of obeying his military superiors’, claimed the Boys’ Miscellany. None mentioned his role in the court martial, and seventeen years after Campbell’s death, his biographer Shadwell evidently felt enough time had passed that he could overlook the revolt altogether.** Yet for a soldier who spent much of his career facing down insurgents, the slave revolt was a key formative experience. Had Campbell not been at the centre of so vicious a backlash, how might his reaction have differed thirty-four years later during the bitterest war against colonial insurgents in the history of the empire: the Indian Mutiny?

  Sir Benjamin D’Urban, from G. Cory’s The Rise of South Africa..

  The appointment of Major-General Sir Benjamin D’Urban*** as Murray’s replacement was announced in the London Gazette on 6 January 1824. D’Urban was a cut above the usual washed-up, half-pay soldier governors. As a young officer he had b
een posted to San Domingo and Jamaica before taking the bold step of going on half-pay to study at the Royal Military College. During the Peninsular War he served with the Portuguese and reached the rank of major-general while still only a colonel in the British army. He had been Governor of Antigua since 1820. Balding, with drooping eyelids and a somewhat fleshy nose, he had a distinctly Churchillian aspect.

  Campbell stayed on in Demerara to act as ADC to the new incumbent while Leahy’s Fusiliers left for St Vincent.* The Court of Policy granted them the enormous sum of 500 guineas to spend on silver for the mess, 200 guineas to the West India regiment for the same purpose, 200 guineas for a prize sword for Colonel Leahy and 50 guineas to Lieutenant Brady for the same. Brady received a further 1,000 guineas from the people of Demerara. Campbell’s name did not appear in any of the official thanks from Murray, nor did he receive any silver.

  D’Urban reached Georgetown on 24 April 1824. He and his ADC hit it off immediately. Campbell later described D’Urban as one of the two best general officers in the British army.49 With Murray gone, proceedings against fifty slaves imprisoned and awaiting trial were halted. D’Urban appointed a Protector of Slaves (to whom slaves with grievances could appeal), introduced a prohibition on slaves working between sunrise on Saturday and dawn on Monday, on whips being used in the fields and on the flogging of women, and restricted the flogging of men to twenty-five lashes (considerably lower than the maximum sentence in the army). Slaves were also granted the right to marry, hold property and purchase their freedom. Even these mild improvements were forced through in the teeth of local opposition, with his loyal amanuensis in the wings doing the paperwork.

  Though affable and gentlemanly, D’Urban never enjoyed the popularity of his predecessor, but that could be said to be a badge of honour. His time in office was a civilising one for all, with the creation of a book club and a philosophical society, new public buildings, the start of a steam riverboat service and the introduction of British coin as legal tender.50 In 1831, his governorship culminated in the union of Demerara, Berbice and Essequebo as the new colony of British Guyana. With the exception of Sir Charles Napier, D’Urban was the soldier Campbell respected most of all, which, given that he only saw D’Urban in administrative mode, says much about Campbell’s concept of the talents required of the peacetime officer. In a little less than twenty years, Campbell would have his own island to run.

  It would be easy uncritically to impute D’Urban’s liberalism to Campbell by association. There are no letters extant from this period of Campbell’s career that settle the matter one way or the other. His respect for D’Urban may imply more partiality to his agenda than Murray’s, but it might indicate nothing more than a personal warmth between the two men, professional respect rather than political concord. We simply don’t know whether Campbell’s loyalties lay with the colonists or whether, under Murray, he was a sceptical officer reluctantly obeying orders who subsequently found a like-minded reformer in D’Urban. All one can say with certainty, whether or not he arrived in the West Indies a ruthless imperialist of the Murray/Leahy stamp, he certainly left it with a sympathy for the people over whom he held sway.

  By 1825 Campbell had been a captain for twelve years. His dazzling wartime rise had ground to a snail’s pace in peace. Promotion in the 1820s was a lost cause for those without the means to buy it. Penniless officers could remain at the same rank for decades. Then, in November 1825, Major Henry Thomas of the 21st Fusiliers bought an unattached lieutenant-colonelcy, giving Campbell the chance to take his place. By now the number of captains in the regiment had fallen to just eight, leaving Campbell the second most senior. Unfortunately, Thomas’s majority was available for purchase only, at £1,400 (more than four years’ pay for a major). It was the most expensive step for an infantry officer – the next jump, to lieutenant-colonel, cost only £1,300.51

  Campbell tried every entreaty to scrape together the cash.* He borrowed £600 from a friend in Demerara and persuaded the regimental agents to advance him £200. Somehow, he raised the funds. It was the first time he had needed to purchase a commission, but the twelve-year wait for promotion from captain to major had been the longest of his career. He showed no scruples about leapfrogging the senior captain, Roche Meade. ‘He was a friend of mine. I am sure he did not feel at all annoyed’, Campbell claimed.52

  That year Lord Palmerston, Secretary of State at War, reorganised the army. Now each battalion of ten companies, if posted overseas, would keep four companies in Britain. Immediately this gave enhanced scope for officers to serve at home, and in early 1826 Major Campbell headed back to command the depot companies in Britain. As it happened, the 21st were recalled from the West Indies to Windsor within a year anyway. Campbell returned, praised to the echo. In an effusive letter to Sir Herbert Taylor (military secretary to the commander-in-chief), D’Urban extolled his talents.53 On his third stint as aide-de-camp Campbell had shone.

  The Britain to which he returned was convulsed by change, but its government preserved in aspic. Lord Liverpool, prime minister since 1812, was still in office pursuing a minimalist form of government. Balancing the books and maintaining public order remained the priorities, though that philosophy was increasingly threatened by the new spirit of liberal Toryism. The basic tenet of classical economics, that the pursuit of self-interest led inevitably to improvements for all (as long as government stayed well clear), was under attack and the state was being challenged to take responsibility for wider social ills. Radicalism had been waiting in the wings since the 1700s. The Napoleonic Wars had merely silenced it temporarily. Almost as soon as peace was announced, pent-up frustrations erupted. In 1816 there were riots in several manufacturing towns. They were soon quashed. Without a police force, the government used the army to impose order, often in a brutal fashion. When cavalry charged a crowd of demonstrators at St Peter’s Field, Manchester on 16 August 1819, killing fifteen people (soon dubbed the Peterloo Massacre), public disquiet reached a new peak.

  The army was as oblivious to change as the government. The commander-in-chief, the Duke of York, quite the reformer before the Peninsular War, now seemed indifferent. The Duke of Wellington’s power and influence gave him the capacity to push forward reform, but his natural bias was to discourage it, especially in the army that had trounced the French. After all, if you started tinkering with the military, you might break it. Consequently, the army of 1826 was virtually identical to the one Campbell had joined in 1808. Flogging was still widespread. The pay was stuck at 1s a day, though prices had, if anything, fallen since Waterloo. Life in barracks for Campbell’s men was spartan: 300cu.ft per man was deemed sufficient living space. At night, wooden tubs were provided as urinals, then emptied each morning and filled with water for the men to wash in. In these same barrack rooms lived wives and children, with sheets hung up as divisions in an attempt to create some privacy. The diet was unchanged: two meals a day of beef and bread. The men had no libraries or books available to them, but then two-thirds of them were illiterate. It is true that army conditions equated to the lot of many Britons, but mortality rates for troops were consistently higher than those in comparable sections of the civil population.54

  The one component which had changed was ornament. Wellington had always allowed his troops latitude with regard to dress, so much so that during the occupation of France the British were roundly mocked by their allied colleagues for their variegated appearance.55 In reaction, the Prince Regent, a man who believed elegance always trumped practicality, had created an army of dandies. Plumes and braid grew thicker, helmets taller, and everywhere brass and gold shone. As one regiment donned a more exuberant and expensive shako, so their rivals had to go one better. For some colonels the appearance of their soldiers became more significant than their abilities. That an officer was the right height or had the right colour hair became the priority.56 This trend continued until, at a military review in 1829, the wind caught the Duke of Wellington’s enormous busby and he was blown
clean off his horse.57

  Leahy lacked the funds to embellish his regiment, so he concentrated on precision instead. The Fusiliers ‘reached, for those days, the nearest possible approach to perfection in military organisation’, reported one sergeant. ‘Perfectly drilled in the rigid manoeuvres of the period, and so steady, that such a thing as a wink of the eyelid, or a sneeze, while in the ranks, would be ruinous to the offender’. This was not mere boasting on the part of a loyal veteran either. When the Duke of Clarence (later William IV) inspected the regiment he was so impressed that he worried they might show up the Foot Guards.58

  When not perfecting the Fusiliers’ drill, Campbell was strengthening his contacts within the establishment. He struck up a friendship with Dr John Keate, headmaster of Eton. For a soldier used to the slave colonies of the West Indies, a public school in the 1820s was eerily familiar. Eton boys lived ‘a life in which licensed barbarism was mingled with the daily and hourly study of the niceties of Ovidian verse’, as Strachey put it, intermittently ‘overawed by the furious incursions of an irascible little old man carrying a bundle of birch-twigs’59 – the infamous Dr Keate, a man ‘little more, if more at all, than five feet in height, and … not very great in girth’, according to pupil Alexander Kinglake, but within whom ‘was concentrated the pluck of ten battalions’.60 Twenty-seven years later Kinglake, as a journalist, would report Campbell’s battles in the Crimea. Another of Keate’s victims was Charles Canning, youngest son of Prime Minister George Canning. Thirty years later, it would be Canning as governor-general of India who with Campbell would stem the tide of revolt. Also at Eton was the young William Gladstone and his brothers. And so, on the other side of the Atlantic, Sir John Gladstone’s slaves were flogged to better cultivate the sugar to provide the profits to allow Sir John, back in Britain, to send his sons to Eton to be flogged by Dr Keate.**