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350 Years of Impressment of Sailors by the English                       Empire; Was it a form of Slavery?

11/30/2016

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The impressment squabbles between the British Military and the Colonists had roots in the 13th Century.  The act of “pressing” by the British Navy was common place. It was an instantaneous draft into naval service without any consideration for the pressed person or his family. In this article we wish to identify the overreaching practices that pitted Englishmen throughout the Empire against Parliament's laws.

First Queen Elizabeth I, in the 16th Century introduced a law called “An Act touching politick considerations for the maintenance of the Navy”. Parliament attempted to legitimize, define and clean up the concept with the Vagrancy Act of 1597.  It targeted British subjects that could not support themselves.  Unfortunately, the Vagrancy Act was practiced by Naval officers that knew only the needs of their “Man of War”. 

You are probably one step ahead of me.  The Vagrancy Act did not make impressment kinder.  While most impressments happened at sea there are classic examples of brute force on land.  Grooms at their weddings were impressed, drunks of all social classes, the first male born of a lower class family and Indentured boys were impressment targets. Civilians on commercial British ships returning to England were impressed. A foreign citizen that married a British woman could be impressed. Imagine the impact on a family awaiting the return of their husband or father to learn that he was now impressed in the British Navy for three full years.
 
A modification of the Vagrancy Act in 1703, called The Recruiting Act, permitted local authorities to send apprentice boys to the Navy and confirmed that rogues and vagabonds were subject to impressment.  The law was intentionally vague again to permit the Navy to judge for itself in time of war.
 
Oh, the pay was very good, but it was entrusted to the Admiralty for the full three years (to discourage desertion) and once tendered, six months pay was held to inspire re-enlistment.  Would you desert if you were in a foreign port without a penny?  How would your family support itself during your absence? Were you typically punished on-board to instill British discipline? What tasks were you given on-board if you had no nautical skills? Surely, there were no positive answers to the above questions. But they fed you well and ensured you had enough grog to keep you sedate.
 
The general population in England, Scotland, Ireland and Colonial America, were incensed with the practice.  In 1740 Parliament attempted to add benevolence by limiting the Act to men 18 to 45 years of age, and excluded foreigners.  No matter and perhaps expected by Parliament, the desperate British Navy continued to ignore the modifications.
 
In the Spring of 1757, the issue exploded in two English settlements, New York and Boston. “Three thousand British soldiers cordoned off New York City, and plucked clean the taverns and other sailors gathering places. "All kinds of tradesmen and Negroes" were hauled in, nearly eight hundred in all. Four hundred of these were "retained in the service."[i]  In Boston twenty-four were impressed leading to the closing of the harbor as the Colonists loaded their cannon at Castle William to prevent the British Navy from leaving town with pressed men.
 
The above numbers are modest. Let’s put it in context,  in 1805 Admiral Nelson defeated the French and Spanish Navies at Trafalgar. Total British Naval personnel was estimated at 120,000, among 425 ships and half of the personnel were impressed.[ii] 
 
By 1778 the Acts were further amended to permit the British Army to impress. Some exceptions were granted around harvest time. The Act was repealed in May of 1780. The British Army was now double in size at 45,000.
 
The war of 1812 resulted from The British Navy’s inconsideration of American citizenship.  As they exercised impressment, any American citizen born in England could be pressed.  
 
How deep was impressments impact?  In 1812, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, wrote a poem on the issue at the age of six.  On the Cruelty of Forcement to Man.”  She was speaking for the masses.
 
                Ah! The poor lad in yonder boat
                Forced from his Wife, his Friends, his home,
                Now gentle Maiden how can you
                Look at the misery of his doom?[iii]
 
Yes, she was six years old as she penned this poem.
 
In the deep recesses of Samuel Adams mind, he believed that impressment of Colonists was banned.  This appears to have been the case during the War of Succession of 1701-1714. Parliament exempted the Colonies from impressment. By the end of the war the British Navy began impressing again.  As the dispute arose Parliament interpreted the exemption to last only during the war.  Samuel Adams never let this issue rest and John Adams brought it to a head during the trial of four Irish seamen in Boston in the Spring of 1768.  Please see our blog for background information on the “The Rose and the Death of Lieutenant Panton.
Finally, impressment was repealed by Parliament in 1835, but the practice appeared to have ended with the defeat of Napoleon in 1815.

The Imperial English Empire continued for another one-hundred and thirty years, finally granting India their freedom in 1948.  Our independence so hard fought came one-hundred and seventy- two years earlier.  For that we can be very grateful.
 



  • [i] Nash, Gary, The Urban Crucible, The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution, 1986, ISBN 0-674-93058-4
 

[ii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impressment
 
 
                                                                   Bibliography
  • Nash, Gary, The Urban Crucible, The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution, 1986, ISBN 0-674-93058-4
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impressment
 
[iii] Elizabeth Barrett Browning Selected Poems, Edited by Marjorie Stone and Beverly Taylor broadview editions, New York, 1947.
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  • Freedom Trail Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Tour
    • Boston Civil War Tour
    • The Kennedy Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Lesson Plan
    • Paul Revere's Row to Charlestown 4/18/1775
    • Virtual Tour of the Massachusetts State House
    • The Boston Massacre per the Pennsylvania Gazette
    • Paul Revere Lesson Plan
  • Revere Bells Index
    • The Stickney Revere Bell Listings of 1976
    • Paul Revere Bell of Beverly
    • Revere Bells in Boston >
      • Paul Revere Bell Old South Meeting House
    • California's 2 Paul Revere Bells
    • Paul Revere & Son's Bell Westborough Massachusetts
    • Falmouth, Massachusetts
    • Revere Bell Fredericksburg VA
    • Revere Bell Hampton NH
    • First Parish Church of Kennebunk
    • Revere Bells in Maine
    • Revere Bell in Mansfield
    • Revere Bell of Michigan
    • Revere Salem Mass Bell
    • Roxbury First Unitariarn Universalist Church and their Revere Bell
    • Revere & Son Bell, Savannah Georgia
    • Singapore Revere Bell
    • Tuscaloosa Bell >
      • History of the St John and Leavens Patriarchs
      • Samuel St John Jr Estate Genealogy
      • Authenticating the Revere Tuscaloosa Bell
      • Joshua B Leavens Last Will and Testament
      • 20th Century Tuscaloosa bell
    • Revere Bells Lost in Time
    • Revere Bells Washington DC
    • Revere Bell in Wakefield, Mass
    • Revere Bells Woodstock VT
  • Bostonians
    • Edward F Alexander of The Harvard 20th Civil War Regiment
    • Polly Baker
    • John Wilkes Booth
    • The Mad Hatter, Thomas, Boston Corbett who Killed John Wilkes Booth
    • Richard-Henry-Dana-Jr
    • James Franklin
    • Benjamin Harris of Publick Occurrences
    • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
    • William Lloyd Garrison
    • USS Thomas Hudner DDG116
    • Edward Hutchinson Robbins Revere
    • Amos Lincoln
    • King Philip
    • Mayor's of Boston
    • Mum Bett & Theodore Sedgwick
    • James Otis
    • Paul Joseph Revere
    • John Rowe >
      • John Rowe's Diary Entries
      • John Rowe's Dinner Party
      • John Rowe and the Jail Fire
      • Hang John Rowe?????
      • John Rowe the Fisherman
      • Joh Rowe's Tea Ship
    • Be Proud to be Called a Lucy Stoner
    • Rachel Wall , Pirate
    • Paul Revere the Coroner of Boston
    • Deborah Sampson
    • Who was Mrs. Silence Dogood?
    • Dr. Joseph Warren's Dedication
  • History Blog
  • Lilja's of Natick
    • Lilja Brothers Military History
    • Lilja's Family Album
    • Memorials and Tributes to the Five Lilja Brothers
    • Lilja Family Tree
    • Lilja Historical Family Tree Documents
    • Lilja References
  • Collage of Boston
    • 4th of July Parade, Bristol RI
    • Boston Harbor
    • The Customs House
    • Forest Hills Cemetery
    • Georges Island
    • Nonviolent Monument to Peace - Sherborn
    • The Battle Road
    • Skate bike and scooter park
    • Cassin Young & USS Cassin Young
    • MIT
    • Historic Charles River
    • The Roxbury Standpipe on Fort Hill
    • John & Abigail Adams National Park