AFRICAN COMPANIES, EARLY. The circumstances of trade with Africa, or rather with Africa excluding the Mediterranean coast, were of such a nature as to favour particularly the formation and maintenance of privileged trading companies. The trade was sufficiently dangerous to suggest the need of special privileges, and not sufficiently profitable to permit of being carried on without them. England, however, was not the first country to enter into trading relations with the west coast of Africa. Portugal held that position, and practically enjoyed a monopoly till 1536. In that year we hear of English adventurers and of their success. Benin on the Guinea coast was the attraction of the traders. The venture was probably repeated more than once ; without leading immediately to the formation of a company. That result, however, soon ensued, and the first charter was granted, the precursor of many others.
(1) 1588 ; Elizabeth granted to certain merchants of Devonshire, Exeter, and London a charter giving exclusive trading privileges for ten years to the rivers of Senegal, Gambia, and the neighbouring district. This company, called The Guinea Company, was in reality the forerunner of the African companies, among which it may itself be numbered. They were all companies formed to trade with the west coast. Under the auspices of this company several voyages were made, the chief goods brought back being pepper, ivory, palm oil, cotton cloth. It seems to have been very unsuccessful, owing in part to the action of " interlopers " or independent traders.
(2) 1618 ; a new exclusive charter to Sir Robert Rich and other Londoners. It too was unsuccessful, first through the action of private traders and secondly owing to the very small profit gained by those engaged in this trade before the development of the slave trade between the west coast and the English plantations in America.
(3) 1631 ; a new company was formed, the charter granted to Sir Richard Young, Sir Kenelm Digby, and others for thirty-one years, the limits assigned extending from Cape Blanco to the Cape of Good Hope. Similar causes to those before enumerated appear to have led to its dissolution.
(4) 1662 ; a fourth company formed this time with the definite object of conveying 3000 slaves a year to the American settlements. Its development was interfered with by wars with the Dutch, and it gave way to— (6) 1672 ; the Royal African Company, which really bought out the rights of the proprietors of the foregoing. These, like other trading companies of the time, were based on grants of exclusive privileges to certain persons made by royal charter. As such they were doomed by
the act passed after the Revolution of 1688, whereby all exclusive privileges except those authorised or granted by parliament were withdrawn. The African trade was thus thrown open though it must be remembered that the company was not destroyed. Its exclusive rights were taken away ; but (1698) some part of these rights were restored by statute (9 & 10 Will. III.) in regard of the settlements and forts which had to be supported. Traders other than those belonging to the company were burdened with differential duties. From this time onwards disputes continually arose as to the expediency of restriction. But despite the attention devoted to the bade, it continued to be most unprofitable. At one time its stock dropped to 4-1/2 and though it rose above this low figure it seems never to have approached par except at the time of the South SEA BUBBLE. In consequence of the low credit it stood in, and of the increased liabilities incurred by the company, it was resolved to transfer its property to a new company composed of the proprietors of the old company and its creditors, and— (6) 1750; a new African company was established. It was of course without exclusive rights. In 1752 the property of the former company was finally transferred to its hands.
(7) 1791 ; the Sierra Leone Company may be classed with the early African companies in the sense that the acts of parliament establishing and determining it both precede the act determining the old African companies.
The Sierra Leone Company originated in the philanthropic schemes of certain gentlemen who (1787) formed themselves into a committee and raised a fund for assisting destitute blacks, most of whom had been the victims of the slave trade, to settle in Sierra Leone. The project very quickly took the form of a regular company, and in 1791 an act was passed incorporating the Sierra Leone Company. In 1800 letters patent were issued definitely granting the peninsula of Sierra Leone, so far as was in the power of the crown, to the company. But the French war very adversely affected the fortunes of the company, and heavy subsidies were granted from imperial funds to sustain it, so that in 1807 an act was passed providing for the extinction in seven years' time of the Sierra Leone Company and its rights over the colony. In 1809 a charter was granted to the company providing for the " Colony of Sierra Leone," and after the powers given to the company had expired, this charter was (in 1821) regranted direct to the colonists, who were then placed directly under the crown of Great Britain. C. A. H.