1815: Napoleon's Abolition of the Slave Trade

Pro-Napoleon propaganda produced by William Hone in 1815

William Hone(1780-1842) was a satirist, a writer and a bookseller whom the authorities tried to silence in the years after Waterloo. His acquittal in three trials in 1817 proved highly popular, and a public collection was made on his behalf. Among those publicly contributing were the Duke of Bedford and his son the Marquis of Tavistock. Like many reformers and Foxite Whigs, Hone was highly sympathetic to Napoleon.

This piece, in the British Museum Collection was dedicated to Sir William Wilberforce, and to the memory of Charles James Fox, "who abolished the slave trade in England". It reminded readers that Napoleon, "by a stroke of his pen," had abolished the slave trade in France.

In the same year Hone wrote Buonapartephobia, a satirical piece attacking the editor of the Times, Sir John Stoddart, "Dr Slop", a staunch Tory, for his vitriolic articles about Napoleon.