The Hack family of Chichester and the anti-slavery movement
From the 1820s there was a growing movement to abolish slavery in British colonies and the Quakers (Society of Friends) played a key role in this, as they had in the campaign for the abolition of the slave trade in 1807. They were active on a local level as well as a national one.
The Hacks were a prosperous Chichester Quaker family working as bankers and merchants. James Hack (with Charles Dendy) founded the Chichester Bank in 1809 whilst his brother, Stephen, ran a successful curriers business. They and their families were part of a well-established community of Friends in Chichester; the first Quaker meeting in the city was held by one of the founders of the Society of Friends, George Fox, in 1655.
James Hack and his wife Hannah (nee Jeffreys) had several children, including James and Priscilla Hack. Priscilla married the Quaker tea merchant, Samuel Tuke, and moved with him to York whilst James married Rhoda Gravely of Storrington and remained in Chichester. Following Priscilla’s move to York her family kept up a steady stream of correspondence with her, much of which survives at WSRO.
Whilst a great deal of this correspondence deals with day-to-day family life, the letters also offer an insight into the progress of the Chichester campaign for the abolition of slavery. This is particularly the case in the letters from Rhoda Hack to Priscilla Tuke.
There are 41 letters between the two women, spanning a period of around 18 years, in which they converse freely about both family matters and the news and issues of the day. Amongst the subjects under discussion was the abolition of slavery; James Hack (Priscilla’s father and Rhoda’s father-in-law) regularly hosted meetings of the Chichester anti-slavery movement at his house. In a letter dated 4th February 1824 Rhoda writes ‘Father came, in a great bustle for some slavery papers which he has to distribute’ and goes on to talk about plans in Chichester for a petition to be submitted to the Council Chamber where it could be signed by residents. She also describes a public meeting in Southampton at which pro-slavery crowds voted down a proposal to send a petition to Parliament.
Rhoda’s next letter, dated 29th March 1824, refers to the successful signing of the petition and the efforts of another local Quaker, John Barton, in relation to this. However, Rhoda is not optimistic about its impact, referring to the ‘extreme caution and slowness’ of the government in taking action on slavery and her concern that this delay will lead enslaved people to ‘take the justice which is thus inhumanely withheld’. She also expresses her doubts that plantation owners will ever act voluntarily to end slavery.
Rhoda and Priscilla were clearly active readers of anti-slavery literature and shared thoughts about this in their letters. Writing in November 1824, Rhoda shares her views on Elizabeth Heyrick’s pamphlet ‘Immediate, not Gradual Abolition’. Whilst she feels it is ‘too fierce’ it has prompted Rhoda to boycott sugar from the West Indies (‘we have been stirred up to use none but East India sugar’) to exert pressure on the plantation owners in the Caribbean and asks if Priscilla will be doing the same.
Over a year later, on 23rd January 1826, Rhoda writes that the anti-slavery Friends in Chichester have been given leave to hold a public meeting in the Assembly Rooms. This was the culmination of the anti-slavery campaign in Chichester with the Duke of Richmond in the chair and both Chichester MPs attending. The meeting saw the petition signed by many of the most important and influential people in the city and was presented to the House of Lords by the Duke of Richmond and to the House of Commons by the two Chichester MPs.
It would take another seven years for the Slavery Abolition Act to pass in 1833 but its eventual success was in no small part thanks to grassroots movements such as the one in Chichester that the Hacks were involved in.
Key documents:
Letter from Rhoda Hack to Priscilla Tuke, 4 February 1824 (Add Mss 49716/32)
Letter from Rhoda Hack to Priscilla Tuke, 29 March 1824 (Add Mss 49716/33)
Letter from Rhoda Hack to Priscilla Tuke, 12 November 1824 (Add Mss 49716/36)
Letter from Rhoda Hack to Priscilla Tuke, 23 January 1826 (Add Mss 49716/40)
