Address on the State of Slavery in the West India Islands (1824)

An Address on the State of Slavery in the West India Islands (1824) was composed by Robert Hall  during his ministry at the Baptist chapel in Harvey Lane, Leicester. Hall was asked by Thomas Babington, President of the Leicester Auxiliary Anti-Slavery Society, to compose a pamphlet against slavery, which was published anonymously by the Society in 1824, entitled An Address on the State of Slavery in the West India Islands.  Hall, a member of the Executive Committee, delivered a stinging critique of the practice as it continued among the British Colonies.  Apparently some members of the Society may have felt that Hall went too far in his statements, for in a letter to Thomas Babington of 16 February 1824, Hall apologizes for any of his statements which might “suggest matters of cavil,” and regrets that his address “was not more nicely sanctioned by the Committee” (Babington MSS, Trinity College, Cambridge).  This may also explain why his name never appeared on the pamphlet, along with his continued reluctance to enter the political arena he so relished in the early 1790s.  As a result, copies of the pamphlet held at the British Library and the Bodleian, for example, are not catalogued under the name of Robert Hall.